[Air-L] A Question About Twitter Suspensions

Tue Apr 20 12:15:53 PDT 2021

Hi Sarah,

Does it? I deleted @stuartwshulman then tried to get it back a year later.
I could not. I just searched for it on Twitter just now and saw remnants of
old Tweets where that handle was tagged but the link is gone. Is there a
Twitter court? Do people appeal and get restored? I have no idea, but the
mystery remains. Are the policies documented in public?

~Stu

On Tue, Apr 20, 2021 at 9:56 AM Sarah Ann Oates <soates at umd.edu> wrote:

> Is it just me or does it seems a fundamental problem that a user name that
> is banned can be available again? It sounds like a video game in which you
> can respawn with multiple lives, which I would think is a bad thing if
> you're trying to moderate speech. I know there are all sorts of problems
> with social media platform moderation, but this one seems particularly
> naive. Sarah
>
>
> Sarah Oates
> Pronoun: she/her
>
> Professor and Senior Scholar
> Philip Merrill College of Journalism
> iSchool Affiliate Professor
> University of Maryland
> College Park, MD 20457
> Email: soates at umd.edu
> Phone: 301 455 2332
> www.media-politics.com
> Twitter: @media_politics
>
> *Support the UMD Student Crisis Fund
> <https://giving.umd.edu/giving/showPage.php?name=crisis-funding> today. *
>
>
>
> On Tue, Apr 20, 2021 at 7:42 AM Stuart Shulman <stuart.shulman at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
> > Marco,
> >
> > Thank you for the excellent and thought provoking paper. I have been
> > digging into the data and the story is somewhat complex. There are
> accounts
> > from December 2017 that have the "from_user" showing as suspended, while
> > the same user on the same week generated Tweets that remain live on
> Twitter
> > today. I have also found live RTs where the "from_user" account is
> reported
> > as "does not exist" and there are other permutations that seem to defy
> the
> > logic of account suspensions and account deletions.
> >
> > I hand labeled 1,500 Q-likely Tweets from the December 2017 set as
> follows:
> >
> > Code, Count, Pct.
> > Suspended Account, 711, 47.40%
> > Deleted Tweet, 509, 33.93%
> > Q Signals, 165, 11.00%
> > No Sign of Q 115 7.67%
> >
> > I have documented this research in the first 7 of the 33 videos here,
> but I
> > feel there are still many unanswered questions:
> > https://vimeo.com/showcase/7543134
> >
> > ~Stu
> >
> > Dr. Stuart ShulmanU.S. Soccer Federation C-Licensed Coach
> > (#boycott #thebigsix)
> >
> >
> >
> > On Sun, Apr 4, 2021 at 10:29 AM Marco T Bastos <toledobastos at gmail.com>
> > wrote:
> >
> > > Hi Stu,
> > >
> > > Are you checking the usernames or the user IDs?if you’re checking the
> > > usernames, chances are the live accounts were recreated after being
> > removed
> > > (new user ID, same username). When Twitter removes an account the
> > username
> > > is offered again in the pool of available handles, so banned users can
> > > create a new account and take over their previous username. Suspension
> > is a
> > > bit different and AFAIK it doesn’t remove the username, but you may be
> > > coming across a single username that existed over several user IDs. You
> > may
> > > find this piece helpful:
> > >
> > > https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002764221989772
> > >
> > > HTH,
> > > Marco
> > >
> > > On Sun, 4 Apr 2021 at 14:48 <air-l-request at listserv.aoir.org> wrote:
> > >
> > > >
> > > > Date: Sat, 3 Apr 2021 12:05:45 -0400
> > > > From: Stuart Shulman <stuart.shulman at gmail.com>
> > > > To: "air-l at listserv.aoir.org" <air-l at listserv.aoir.org>
> > > > Subject: [Air-L] A Question About Twitter Suspensions
> > > > Message-ID:
> > > >         <CAJd4SndAuhOoiwVS1W7=
> > > > oXjdCgBAzkSinLhPqVfMH3x7TNzq0w at mail.gmail.com>
> > > > Content-Type: text/plain; charset="UTF-8"
> > > >
> > > > When I try to display Tweets from December 2017 with clear QAnon
> > signals
> > > > (hashtags, buzzwords, other markers) many return the message "cannot
> > > > display tweet - account is suspended," which makes sense given what
> we
> > > are
> > > > living through. However, I then go search for some of those same
> > > suspended
> > > > Twitter handles and find while some are indeed suspended, others are
> > not
> > > > suspended. Some usernames with hundreds of thousands of tweets that
> go
> > > back
> > > > to 2011, and were spreading #QAnon, #TheStormIsHere, #WhoIsQ, and
> > > > #FollowTheWhiteRabbit and related content between December 8-12,
> 2017,
> > > are
> > > > alive and well on Twitter. I have not seen this before and I cannot
> > > explain
> > > > it. My question is: Can a Twitter account show as suspended for
> certain
> > > > content on the same day it is live with older and more recent
> content?
> > > Have
> > > > others encountered this? Can an account suspension be revoked or else
> > > > applied to only certain content? One example of many I ran into
> today:
> > I
> > > > have a record of a Q-centric Tweet from a suspended account but the
> > > account
> > > > itself is in fact live and following current other live Q-related
> > > accounts
> > > > that also are not suspended. It follows only 72 accounts (a dazzling
> > > > collection of Q-related conspiracy experts) but has almost 5,000
> > heavily
> > > > MAGA-leaning followers, which takes a certain Internet dexterity to
> > > > achieve. Is there a good paper out there on the legal and procedural
> > > > actions related to suspended, semi-suspended, or suspended but then
> > > > restored Twitter users?
> > > >
> > > > Dr. Stuart ShulmanU.S. Soccer Federation C-Licensed Coach
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > ------------------------------
> > > >
> > > > Subject: Digest Footer
> > > >
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> > > > End of Air-L Digest, Vol 201, Issue 5
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-- 
Dr. Stuart W. Shulman
Founder and CEO, Texifter
Editor Emeritus, *Journal of Information Technology & Politics*