- How To Write Unmaintainable Code – what not to do when programming.
- Computer de-evolution: Features that lost the evolutionary war –
ITworldComputerWorld (via Slashdot) - Two XKCD comics: First, “The Cloud” explained. Second, anyone who has used command-line utilities on Linux will appreciate Manual Override.
- International Usability – Big Stuff the Same, Details Differ (Jakob Nielsen’s Alertbox)
- Who really owns your photos in social media? (PBS/MediaShift, via This Is True)
- Smartphone marketshare: Android keeps growing, iOS passes Blackberry, and WP7′s on life support.
Tag: social networking
What’s behind Twitter’s Ban on Twidroyd & UberTwitter?
So, Twitter blocked access from Twidroyd and UberTwitter today, citing acceptable use policy violations, then classily pushing their own apps. IMO this would be similar to Google blocking Internet Explorer or Firefox from accessing their services, then telling people “oh, you can use Chrome.”
UberMedia has made some changes to appease the Twitter TOS guardians, and expects to be un-blocked soon.
Anyway, onto the accusations:
These violations include, but aren’t limited to, a privacy issue with private Direct Messages longer than 140 characters, trademark infringement, and changing the content of users’ Tweets in order to make money.
This is the most I’ve been able to find. Let’s break it down:
a privacy issue with private Direct Messages longer than 140 characters
“Privacy issue” is a pretty strong accusation (not that it seems to have actually hurt Facebook).
Here’s a thought: Twidroyd has built-in support for TwitLonger, which will let you route a longer message through a third-party service and then post it as a shorter tweet with a link to the full message.
My guess: this was enabled for all outgoing messages instead of just public tweets, including direct messages. This would make the message (a) visible to Twitlonger itself, and (b) potentially visible to anyone who obtained the URL to that message.
trademark infringement
According to UberMedia, they’ve been working on a name change for UberTwitter for the past three weeks. If that’s the case, it sounds like Twitter is just padding the accusations.
changing the content of users’ Tweets in order to make money
This is a serious accusation, if true. The whole purpose of a communication platform is for one person to convey a message to another person. If that message is altered in transit, it undermines the whole purpose.
But here’s the question: What do they mean by content? Do they mean the exact characters typed in? Do they mean the words? If Twidroyd shortens a URL so that it fits in 140 characters, does that count as changing the content? How about that twitlonger support?
If Twidroyd or UberTwitter prefers a particular URL shortener in exchange for money (just as desktop web browsers prefer a particular search engine), does that count as “changing the content of users’ Tweets in order to make money?”
Isn’t that essentially what Twitter plans to do by forcing all URLs (even those already shortened) through its t.co URL shortener in order to collect data which it can then…*gasp*…monetize?
Edit: And just as I finish the post, I find a post explaining exactly what the issues were. I was right about the privacy issue, though it was with tmi.me, not twitlonger.
As for changing content, the claim was that UberCurrent (the third app whose name I kept forgetting) was changing affiliate links to point to their own affiliate links instead of the author’s. UberMedia says that they “don’t currently do this,” implying that they may have at some time in the past, or may have been considering it. In any case, that’s a jerky thing to do, if not quite as severe as altering the meaning of a message. I remember a Firefox extension that would let you raise funds for an organization by changing Amazon links to use their affiliate links (eventually discontinued due to Amazon TOS violation), but I think even that made a point of not altering existing affiliate links.
Anyway, It’s a good thing they’re using the Android and Blackberry markets. I expect I’ll see an updated Twidroyd later today (or whenever it is that the phone checks for new apps). From what I’ve heard about the iPhone iOs App Store, it could take as much as a week to get the fixed version approved and out in the hands of its users.
Two “Critiques” That Aren’t
I am so tired of “critiques” that boil down to one of the following:
- I have no use for or interest in this, therefore no-one does or should.
- Pop culture was so much better during my formative years than the crap they put out today.
These are, to put it mildly, a load of bull.
1. So you don’t have a use for it. Other people have different interests than you do. They also have different needs than you do. You might not need a roto-rooter, but a plumber is going to find it very useful.
This one really infuriates me when it comes from supposed techies. So you don’t have a use for a touchscreen with your giant desktop setup with a wall of six monitors. That doesn’t mean touchscreens can’t be useful on, say, handheld devices, or a small wall unit in the kitchen. There’s a reason this xkcd strip rings true.
2. There was plenty of crap back in the day, too. You’ve just had time to forget the mediocre, while the good stuff has stood the test of time. Not everyone who wrote plays during Shakespeare’s time was a great playwright, and not every movie produced before Star Wars was a great work of art.
Plus, y’know, they were your formative years. Of course you’re going to like stuff from that era better, because that’s what shaped your tastes.
Social Bots
Amazing how many “people” are sending Facebook messages to the postmaster account, offering helpful links to resources for *ahem* improving uptime.
On a related note:
Google’s Social Graph thinks I own Cute Overload. It seems to treat all LiveJournal syndication feeds as one profile, and I linked to K2R’s LJ feed with XFN.
The REAL Problem with Twitter
Forget Ashton Kutcher and Oprah, forget #unfollowfriday, forget 25 Random Evil Things about Twitter — the key problems with the social media / microblogging / broadcast IM / whatever you want to call it service boil down to two problems:
- It asks the wrong question
- It was designed around limitations of cell phone text messaging
The Wrong Question
Twitter’s prompt is not something general like “What’s on your mind?” It’s “What are you doing?” That encourages people to post things like “I’m eating lunch” or “Just got into work,” or “Posting on Twitter.” Presumably what they mean is “What are you doing that you think people would find interesting?” but of course that’s too long a prompt from a usability standpoint.
The thing is, there’s no reason to broadcast the mundane to the world. Don’t tell me “I’m eating soup.” Tell me, “Just learned that gazpacho soup is best served cold. I wonder if they eat it in space?”
Unfortunately, that means the signal-to-noise ratio can get pretty bad at times.
Outgrowing its Limitations
Twitter posts are limited to 140 characters of plain text so that the your name and comments can fit in a standard SMS message. Now, this is great if you use Twitter via text messages on your mobile phone. It’s not so great if you use Twitter on the web, or through a smartphone app like Twitterific on iPhone or Twidroid on Android, or through any of the zillions of desktop apps.
I don’t have a problem with the 140-character limit itself (it can actually be liberating in a way), though it would be nice to have some formatting options beyond all-caps and *asterisk bolding*.
The real problem is that links have to share that limit. URL-shortening services have exploded lately as people try to squeeze links into the tiniest space possible to save room for their precious text. Even if you use something as short as is.gd, just including one link means you’re down to 122 characters.
Plus URL shorteners come with a host of problems, in particular the fact that they hide the destination. That’s no big deal if the target matches the description, or if it’s a harmless prank like a Rick Roll, but it’s all too easy to disguise something malicious.
Seriously, if you got an email that said something like this:
Look at this! http://example.com/asdjh
Would you click on that link? Even if it appeared to be from someone you know? That’s just asking to get your computer infected by a virus, trojan horse or other piece of malware. Or to see something you wish you could unsee.
Better Link Sharing: Facebook
I hesitate to bring up Facebook as a good example of anything, and I know the current layout is largely reviled by its users, but they really got posting links right.
When you want to post a link to your Facebook profile, you paste in the full URL. Facebook reads the page and extracts the title, a short summary, and possible thumbnail images. Then you have the normal amount of space to write your comment. Continue reading
Friends or Followers: Social Networking Terminology from LiveJournal to Facebook to Twitter
The Top 10 Reasons I Will Not Follow You in Return on Twitter is making its way around…well…Twitter today. Just reading the tile makes me wonder: why would someone expect to be followed in return? I guess it comes down to this question: What does it mean to follow someone? Is it different from friending them? And just what does “friend” mean in this context, anyway?
The way social networking sites use the term “Friend” has always bugged me. The actual software for Facebook, MySpace, or LiveJournal seems to use it to mean two distinct things:
- An actual friend, someone with whom you interact on a personal basis.
- An entity whose posts you’re following because you’re interested in the content, rather than invested in the person.
Wishful thinking aside, reading Neil Gaiman’s blog regularly doesn’t make me his friend.
Okay, so “Friend” is shorthand, but it brings in a load of connotations, blending the two meanings. People will freak out when a stranger “friends” them, will feel insulted if someone that they’ve friended doesn’t friend them back, or will feel rejected if someone de-friends them. I’ve heard it suggested that one reason people move from one social network to another is to start over with a clean slate of friends, and not have to worry about the drama of removing anyone from their current friends’ list.
Twitter, with the simple and direct term, “Follower,”, doesn’t seem like it would bring in the same level of baggage. To me, clicking “Follow” doesn’t feel like it has the same emotional weight as marking someone as a friend. I follow accounts that I find interesting, and that I actually have a chance of keeping up with. If someone follows me, I don’t feel obligated to follow them, and if I follow someone else, I don’t expect them to follow me.
So I was perplexed when I started seeing new followers showing up on my personal Twitter account who clearly had only done a keyword search on my latest tweet, or looked at who I was following. What were they expecting? That I would look at the “XYZ is following you!” email and trace it to their website? That I would follow them back?
It didn’t make any sense to me.
Of course, now I’m sure they were expecting me to follow them back. As this article suggests, a lot of people do see “Follow” as a synonym for “Friend”, and they were most likely trying to game that system.
In other words, despite the terminology, Twitter’s stuck with the same old baggage that clogs up other social networks.
5 Things I’ve Learned About Twitter
For the longest time, I figured Twitter was little more than a social toy. But after signing up two months ago, I’ve completely changed my view. Here are five lessons I’ve picked up.
1. There are many ways to use it.
Twitter asks the question, “What are you doing?” Some people answer that, and post things like, “eating dinner.” Some people ignore it and post other thoughts. Among the uses I’ve seen:
- Running commentary throughout the day.
- Random thoughts.
- Announcements, particularly bloggers announcing new posts, or news sites announcing new articles.
- Hey, look at this link I found. (The classic linkblogging post.)
- Conversations with other users.
- Even a story told one line at a time. (@Othar, a side story connected to Girl Genius)
It can replace a blog, or complement it. Mine started out just as another feed for updates, but I quickly realized I could post small stuff on Twitter and save the blog for the long posts like this one.
I’ve seen some people who post 20 times a day, and others who post once or twice a month.
2. Writing short posts can be liberating.
You don’t need to think of a catchy title. You don’t need to worry about structure. You don’t need to worry about fully developing an idea. And the rapid-fire nature of the site gives you a sense that you’re only worrying about now. No one expects you to be profound. All you have to do is jot down your thought and fire it off.
3. Writing short posts can be frustrating.
One of my high school teachers used to quote this adage: “If I had had more time, I would have written a shorter letter.” It’s easy to ramble. It’s hard to edit. And it’s really easy to run into that 140-character limit, especially if you’re including a link (even if you use a URL shortening service like tr.im).
Sometimes I think what I want to say is short enough to fit, but I find myself spending several minutes trying to rephrase it, use shorter words, cut out unnecessary phrases, and, if I have to, abbreviate words just to cram it into that tiny space.
On the plus side, the result is usually very concise.