Crary
b_fungDoes Twitter blocking Mastodon links constitute anticompetitive behavior against a nascent rival? I asked a couple of legal experts, including Bill Baer, the former antitrust chief at DOJ and FTC in two US administrations. Here's what they say: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/16/tech/mastodon-twitter-links/index.html
haxploited 🇺🇦@b_fung if we'll block Twitter incoming requests - they will not know that's mastodon.
RyunosukeKusanagi@b_fung rregardless... they *STILL* have that consent decree.
Kitz@b_fung This is absolutely anti-competitive behavior. Musk is going to get hauled before Congress, no doubt.
Blackout The Conspiracy@b_fung It's probably not limited to just Mastodon.
GenXJamerican 🇯🇲 🇺🇸@blackoutTC @b_fung This seems like it wouldn't be hard to check. Is Twitter branding Reddit links as unsafe? Or Instagram? Or Facebook?
acm@acm_redfox @blackoutTC @b_fung I saw that. Still waiting to see if my account gets suspended for having the name be the same as my Mastodon handle but no trouble yet.
@acm_redfox @genxjamerican @b_fung Lol, yeah, it got a little nutty … Once Paul Graham got his account suspended, some of Elon’s people lost it, so I guess he reverted things back. As long as it’s not spammy and used solely for the purpose of promoting a competitor of theirs, I guess is the marker …
@blackoutTC @acm_redfox @b_fung There’s still no real policy except whatever doesn’t offend Elon. I read yesterday that the journalists he suspended then supposedly unsuspended still can’t post anything unless they remove tweets critical of him.
@genxjamerican @acm_redfox @b_fung So he's BS'ing on that ... Sigh. I wonder if it has to do with the release of more Twitter Files? I've seen some people come back, but unsure how many or which journalist have come back or not.
@blackoutTC @b_fung I heard one of the biggest social media network in Indian has also been blocked.
Blanding S Turtle@b_fung I have "Hey guys, is this obvious foul play a foul?" fatigue.
Blake C. Stacey@b_fung Would the decentralized nature of Mastodon (and the wider fediverse, even more so) complicate any legal case?
Martin@b_fung Would imagine that this could become an issue in the EU. Seems comparable to preventing someone from using a different browser on an OS. And the EU took care of that during the browser wars.
Martin Vermeer FCD@b_fung 'Deceptive business practices' seems more like it. I mean, they are lying through their teeth. And commercial speech - what these lies are - enjoys a lot less first-amendment protection.
Hans-Cees@b_fung well it's not a rival, because it's not a company.
But blocking because of "malware" is desinformation toward your own users.
But blocking because of "malware" is desinformation toward your own users.
@b_fung Maybe I missed something, but testing whether the "no Mastodon links" rule causes harm to Twitter and/or Mastodon seems beside the point. It harms me and others who want to put a link in our posts on Twitter. How come we, the people, aren't the important part of this? Don't I have a basic right to wander any legal, accessible site I want without arbitrary barriers?
pchestek@b_fung What about product disparagement? Claiming they are spam when they are not
kkeller@b_fung the article says that Mastodon has one million users, but the Mastodon Users account tracker reports over 8.5 million:
https://bitcoinhackers.org/@mastodonusercount/109525598859985808
Is the article counting only one or a small number of instances compared to Mastodon Users?
Mastodon Users (@[email protected])
Attached: 1 image 8,531,393 accounts +3,391 in the last hour +71,472 in the last day +221,879 in the last week
@b_fung ...obviously both 1 and 8 are small compared to Twitter's 238 million, so the gist of the article is unchanged.
NH-Lycan
Jonas Voss@b_fung but, Mastodon is hardly a rival. No company, no board, just users and contributors. Who would sue Twitter for this? Except for individuals, and how would that even be accepted in any courtroom, with the TOS being what they are?
Kirsty's Old Account@b_fung
Just wondering, what was the basis for the assertion of Mastodon having one million users?
@mastodonusercount latest post shows 8.5 million accounts were reached in the last 24hrs’ influx of new accounts.
🙂
https://bitcoinhackers.org/@mastodonusercount/109525834815358648
Just wondering, what was the basis for the assertion of Mastodon having one million users?
@mastodonusercount latest post shows 8.5 million accounts were reached in the last 24hrs’ influx of new accounts.
🙂
https://bitcoinhackers.org/@mastodonusercount/109525834815358648
Mastodon Users (@[email protected])
Attached: 1 image 8,534,865 accounts +3,472 in the last hour +74,016 in the last day +224,103 in the last week
clacke: exhausted pixie dream boy 🇸🇪ðŸ‡ðŸ‡°ðŸ’™ðŸ’›@adminkirsty @mastodonusercount @b_fung One million sounds like Monthly Active Users, but last month.
JJ Peterson@b_fung
No, it doesn’t.
No, it doesn’t.
demi7en 🎗🇪🇺
Amateur Human@djstreethawk @b_fung @Gargron
The suggestion was slightly tongue-in-cheek, with an additional pinky-mouth embedded, but 1) actions such as anti-competitive behaviour should have consequences, and 2) there are probably lawyers in the US who'd love to take the case. In any case the #EU *is* looking at #Musk's apparent deranged behaviour so we'll see how they deal with this.
The very-selective-free-speech crusader's banning of all links and mentions of #Mastodon is, as you say, 'good publicity' (also see: 'all publicity').
It is somewhat ironic that people in the free world need to resort to word-morphing and alternative expressions (see: #PRC #China ) to express something positive that the Dear Dictator is afraid of and wishes to eradicate...
AdamGoldberg@b_fung more citing Public Knowledge folk, please!
SecureCompliance 
@b_fung Hey Brian, Your article at CNN today stated that Mastodon has 1 Million users. Currently the number of Mastodon accounts is over 8.5 Million, and over 2 Million active accounts. Wikipedia is way out of date for data on this 😉​
Good to see you here though...
Good to see you here though...
Greg Hills@b_fung The CNN article says Mastodon has about 1 million users - that's about right for the largest instance, mastodon.social, but the Fediverse's current count is more like 8.5 million users according to @mastodonusercount
#twitter #mastodonmigration
#twitter #mastodonmigration
Daniel Jonsson@winterknell daddy Elon is scared
David@b_fung Whether or not its "anticompetitive", it's certainly defamation.
Dante Mercurio
Doug Forbes@b_fung
Sure sounds like tortious interference and libel, as well as FTC deceptive practices purview.
Sure sounds like tortious interference and libel, as well as FTC deceptive practices purview.
JohnW@b_fung I'd like to tag @GreenFire on this because it is something we were just talking about yesterday.
@b_fung Please stop trying to get the government involved.
Oran Magal@b_fung Even if US authorities don’t take action, Twitter could be made to answer to regulators in other major markets, especially the EU, who are much less lenient than the US in how they treat big companies. These are things that take time, months to years, but the bill comes due eventually.
Médecine Libre Jérôme Pinguet@b_fung Hi! Interesting article. This account suggests there are now 8.5 million users on Mastodon (accounts). https://bitcoinhackers.org/@mastodonusercount/109526778329246442
According to https://joinmastodon.org/servers there were 2.1 million users active during the last month.
Thank you for your attention.
According to https://joinmastodon.org/servers there were 2.1 million users active during the last month.
Thank you for your attention.
Mastodon Users (@[email protected])
Attached: 1 image 8,545,157 accounts +2,192 in the last hour +77,732 in the last day +229,985 in the last week
yunchtime@b_fung excellent piece of reporting! for me the key sentence is: "If Twitter misled the public with its statements about Mastodon links, saying they were spam or malicious when the company knew they were harmless, the FTC could argue that Twitter acted unfairly or deceptively."
It's patently obvious that the links weren't harmful!
It's patently obvious that the links weren't harmful!
@b_fung Hey Brian! We couldn't work together to take down Parler, but maybe we can figure something out to take down Twitter! 🤣😉
Walt Campbell@b_fung Appreciated your article. For me, at least as worrying as Mastodon's (temporary) Twitter ban was the marking of links to Mastodon profiles as unsafe. I hope Twitter is pressed to explain how they came to regard them as unsafe.
Runemeisterin IncognitoI'm no expert but it sure sounds like anti-trust stuff to me.
Reed Mideke@b_fung Interesting twitter blocks a bunch of mastodon domains entirely, but on IG, only the elonjet page is blocked. You can can even tweet individual elonjet posts since the URL is just a random string, not under the user name, though presumably you might get banned for it
Obviously blocking all of IG would cause a lot of blowback, but hard to argue twitter is pursuing a consistent policy
@b_fung I believe this does constitute anti-competitive behavior as it makes it more difficult for more Twitter users to know that there is an alternative to Twitter.
Shadmia@b_fung Does Twitter now being privately owned company have an impact on how much oversight it is subjected to?
James Willis@b_fung I have assumed that the blocking of rivals on Twitter was a violation of the FTC or Sherman Act. I’ll be interested to see what else happens.
Pontificator.OMF@b_fung Technically, I'm not sure it would, if my instance were blocked I would not consider it anticompetitive, for example, as I'm not a commercial entity.
@b_fung Tweets from large Twitter accounts like WSJ have comically low like/retweet counts when they mention Mastodon. It should be investigated whether they are being hidden from Twitter users. They must have very advanced analytics services/experts, it should be easy to figure it out.
Trey@b_fung One million? Where did you source that from? We're around 8.5 million last I checked, but it depends on how you count. @mastodonusercount is a nifty bot that'll tell you some interesting stats.
Khloe_the_Red@b_fung anti-competitive behavior is the modus operandi of all US corporations, especially social media platforms. Meta is a prime example of this with their acquisitions of instagram and whatsapp.
vegangster@b_fung Khan has definitely taken a more aggressive stance on antitrust. See Microsoft-Activision deal.
@b_fung I'm able to link to Mastodon from Twitter using https://www.shorturl.at/
Justin Bauer@b_fung yes it certainly does. Dictatorship in government, journalism or business is wrong. I joined and am now engaged for just that fact. I would like to see what this platform can do for society, rather than do harm in the interest of profit.
Only ThÑ—ng Matters@b_fung hooo, good old monopoly, huh?
Rimko@b_fung - Musk : Look what Twitter did, they censored the link of the article about Hunter Biden Laptop!
- Also Musk : Let's ban journalist that I don't like and censore Mastodon...
- Also Musk : Let's ban journalist that I don't like and censore Mastodon...
@b_fung mastodon links are a poor way to share handles anyway IMO
In my experience of trying several, when the clicker has a mastodon a/c on a different instance, they are invited to join the other host without any alternative offered...
Philipp Hacker@b_fung great job! Reason number 1.879 to quit Twitter's hate platform :)
MechanÑ—calTurk@b_fung illegal or not, that move is what finally pushed me to take the plunge (created my account some time ago, but never used it). Elon managed to add some urgency, and the fact that he's worried shows where the real party is at.