
Twitter is not censoring flotilla. - spif
http://search.twitter.com/search?q=flotilla
======
mseebach
I am disgusted by the "twitterati" in this case. What happened off the coast
of Gaza is likely to very significant, and "we" get all puffed up yelling
bloody censorship over what is very likely to be a technical fluke.

The story is highly publicized in mainstream media. It's wide open. Whoever
allegedly decided that censoring a topic from trending on Twitter would matter
even the slightest is too stupid to have a job at Twitter with access to do
that.

~~~
lhorie
What confounds me is that we have people saying they'd rather not see
discussions on this event on HN due to its political nature, and yet the
Everybody Draw Muhammed Day post two weeks ago was quite lively.

I mean, geez, people _died_ on that boat and commenters are more interested in
some sidebar widget in Twitter?

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cmelbye
Okay, so that particular word is not in the trending topics. News flash:
"Justin Bieber" isn't either, and I'll bet my life that his fans are still
tweeting about him. Twitter just released a new trending topic algorithm, and
they specifically said that it wouldn't catch _every_ trend.

~~~
tamersalama
This particular topic was at around 0.85% of all tweets yesterday. What type
of algorithm would ignore this traffic, in favor of say around 0.05% (for
first topic).

This has some human fingerprints.

Today - some related topics are making it to the trends.

~~~
po
> What type of algorithm would ignore this traffic

Here's are some algorithms that would cause behavior different than what you
would expect:

* Take rate of tweets into account

* Take the geography of tweeters into account

* Only allow a topic to trend if it has an odd number of letters

Obviously the real algorithm probably doesn't count the letters in the topic
but it could be if it was a bug. It appears your mental model for how
something gets into trending topics is:

* Take the topics that have the highest total tweets per day.

That is almost certainly not correct.

> This has some human fingerprints.

You absolutely don't know that. It's pure speculation.

------
ciupicri
Seems to be working for me. Here are some tweets:

> jonathanfryer: If Iran not Israel had carried out an attack on aid flotilla,
> we'd now be at war. Western double standards make me sick.

> Sarabughazal: "your blood reached the shores of Gaza before your aid"
> #flotilla #freedomflotilla

> aslanmedia: Shocking footage from Al-Jazeera before communication to ships
> was cut off. <http://bit.ly/cZyYYw> (expand) #israel #flotilla #gaza

~~~
hboon
It's different from trending. Someone was suggesting that the word isn't
trending.

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adimit
Erhm. Am I not getting something?

It _IS_ in the trending topics: <http://imgur.com/QxuqV>

Is the story here that they are censoring something or that they are _not_?
Because if it were the latter, I'd be sad. Do we assume that for social
networks to censor communications on recent politically grave events is the
default now?

~~~
ahoyhere
The story is:

* nothing was censored

* it just wasn't showing as a trending topic

* Twitter is probably just having stupidity in their system (as usual)

* somebody wanted to get lots of clicks

* somebody wrote an inflammatory blog post

* HN upvoters fell for it

------
sukuriant
Forgive me, but ... what's the relevance of that word? Isn't a flotilla just a
bunch of ships? Why would Twitter censor it?

~~~
malloreon
Israeli IDF shot at and attacked a flotilla of ships carrying humanitarian aid
to the Gaza strip a few hours ago through international waters.

EDIT: Differing reports as to casualties: ranging from 0 to 30 dead.

~~~
sorbus
So why would Twitter censor the word?

~~~
david927
Because this is a very, very, very big deal. Let me be clear: It's a big
fucking deal. It's huge.

It was attacked in international waters. On board were a Nobel Peace Prize
Laurette, a Swedish MP and three German MPs (members of parliament/congress).
No one yet knows the fallout of this, but here in Europe, no one can talk
about anything else.

~~~
nir
Is there a precedent of Twitter censoring "Big Deal" words before? IIRC @ev
actually recommended Al Jazeera's Gaza Twitter feed during last year's
escalation there.

If anything, it's a case study in how conspiracy theories grow: Every Twitter
user is familiar with these type of issues. However in this case Israel is
involved, which gave rise to various suspicions of "censorship". When some
people then reported the search working fine for them, the theory grew a
"location-dependent" subtheory, and users were "reporting" blocked/unblocked
per their location. No doubt, a month from now significant parts of the
Internet will be referring to the "flotilla censorship" as a known fact.

------
seabee
I thought the point isn't that twitter is censoring tweets with the word
'flotilla', but that it's not appearing as a trending topic.

However, both #freedomflotilla and 'Gaza flotilla' are trending right now.

------
tamersalama
It's not censoring #flotilla search - it IS censoring trending topics. A
highly selective, possibly first case, of word censoring. It's also censoring
#gaza, #israel along with #flotilla.

This sort of selection is apparently based on an operator action/directives
rather than automated one (#israil - Turkish for #isreal is not censored).

Now, this is turning highly political and opinionated as Twitter hasn't
previously censored #iran or other politically charged words.

------
mindcreek
I'm from Turkey which the ships sailed out from. IDF attacked unarmed ships in
international waters, They killed about 19 on board and forced the ships into
an Israeli port, so far injured is rejecting medical aid from israeli
hospitals and medical staff, I'm afraid there can be more loss of life.

It's very sad that they are still manipulating the news and trying to change
the world's perpective on the subject.

It's plain and simple, they are actively trying to kill a nation of people,
they are attempting genocide, which they should be aware of more then most of
the world is the most awful atrocity mankind can inflict.

Support the humanitarian peaceful effort of good people.

God be with them.

~~~
ilcesco
Even if I agree with you mindcreek here, if possible, I'd invite anyone to
keep political discussions out of HN. This just isn't the right venue imho.

~~~
mindcreek
you are rigth i also hate politics...

