>>17915633 lb
Tyb
yo, do you want the timestamp on the screen shot?
I have the EST timestamp in writing
just thinking about how fast I can drop theses bad boys….
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
1. THREAD: The Twitter Files
THE REMOVAL OF DONALD TRUMP
Part One: October 2020-January 6th
6:04 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601352083617505281
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
2. The world knows much of the story of what happened between riots at the Capitol on January 6th, and the removal of President Donald Trump from Twitter on January 8th…
6:06 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/16013525658366402571601352565836640257
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
'3. We’ll show you what hasn’t been revealed: the erosion of standards within the company in months before J6, decisions by high-ranking executives to violate their own policies, and more, against the backdrop of ongoing, documented interaction with federal agencies.
6:07 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601352946163544065
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
4. This first installment covers the period before the election through January 6th. Tomorrow, @Shellenbergermd will detail the chaos inside Twitter on January 7th. On Sunday, @BariWeiss will reveal the secret internal communications from the key date of January 8th.
6:10 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601353543390486528
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
5. Whatever your opinion on the decision to remove Trump that day, the internal communications at Twitter between January 6th-January 8th have clear historical import. Even Twitter’s employees understood in the moment it was a landmark moment in the annals of speech.
6:14 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601354663265472513
=Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
6. As soon as they finished banning Trump, Twitter execs started processing new power. They prepared to ban future presidents and White Houses – perhaps even Joe Biden. The “new administration,” says one exec, “will not be suspended by Twitter unless absolutely necessary.”
6:19 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601355779474620416
=Matt Taibbi=
@mtaibbi
'7. Twitter executives removed Trump in part over what one executive called the “context surrounding”: actions by Trump and supporters “over the course of the election and frankly last 4 years.” In the end, they looked at a broad picture. But that approach can cut both ways.
6:24 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601357147178082305
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
8. The bulk of the internal debate leading to Trump’s ban took place in those three January days. However, the intellectual framework was laid in the months preceding the Capitol riots.
6:25 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601357417819754496
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
9. Before J6, Twitter was a unique mix of automated, rules-based enforcement, and more subjective moderation by senior executives. As @BariWeiss reported, the firm had a vast array of tools for manipulating visibility, most all of which were thrown at Trump (and others) pre-J6.
6:29 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601358396523184129
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601358396523184129
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
10. As the election approached, senior executives – perhaps under pressure from federal agencies, with whom they met more as time progressed – increasingly struggled with rules, and began to speak of “vios” as pretexts to do what they’d likely have done anyway.
6:31 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601358959507492864
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
11. After J6, internal Slacks show Twitter executives getting a kick out of intensified relationships with federal agencies. Here’s Trust and Safety head Yoel Roth, lamenting a lack of “generic enough” calendar descriptions to concealing his “very interesting” meeting partners.
6:35 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601359872528101376
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
12. These initial reports are based on searches for docs linked to prominent executives, whose names are already public. They include Roth, former trust and policy chief Vijaya Gadde, and recently plank-walked Deputy General Counsel (and former top FBI lawyer) Jim Baker.
6:37 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601360533168730112
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
13. One particular slack channel offers an unique window into the evolving thinking of top officials in late 2020 and early 2021.
6:38 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601360579683549185
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
14. On October 8th, 2020, executives opened a channel called “us2020_xfn_enforcement.” Through J6, this would be home for discussions about election-related removals, especially ones that involved “high-profile” accounts (often called “VITs” or “Very Important Tweeters”).
6:40 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601361141611270144
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
15. There was at least some tension between Safety Operations – a larger department whose staffers used a more rules-based process for addressing issues like porn, scams, and threats – and a smaller, more powerful cadre of senior policy execs like Roth and Gadde.
6:41 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601361391679856640
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
16. The latter group were a high-speed Supreme Court of moderation, issuing content rulings on the fly, often in minutes and based on guesses, gut calls, even Google searches, even in cases involving the President.
6:46 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601362658560995328
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
17. During this time, executives were also clearly liaising with federal enforcement and intelligence agencies about moderation of election-related content. While we’re still at the start of reviewing the #TwitterFiles, we’re finding out more about these interactions every day.
6:47 PM · Dec 9, 2022itter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601362905785860098
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601362905785860098
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
'18. Policy Director Nick Pickles is asked if they should say Twitter detects “misinfo” through “ML, human review, and *partnerships with outside experts?” The employee asks, “I know that’s been a slippery process… not sure if you want our public explanation to hang on that.”
6:51 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601363841417297921
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
19. Pickles quickly asks if they could “just say “partnerships.” After a pause, he says, “e.g. not sure we’d describe the FBI/DHS as experts.”
6:52 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601364081864495104
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
20. This post about the Hunter Biden laptop situation shows that Roth not only met weekly with the FBI and DHS, but with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI):
6:54 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601364807831425025
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
21. Roth’s report to FBI/DHS/DNI is almost farcical in its self-flagellating tone: “We blocked the NYP story, then unblocked it (but said the opposite)… comms is angry, reporters think we’re idiots… in short, FML” (fuck my life).
6:56 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601365295763193856
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
'23. Some of Roth’s later Slacks indicate his weekly confabs with federal law enforcement involved separate meetings. Here, he ghosts the FBI and DHS, respectively, to go first to an “Aspen Institute thing,” then take a call with Apple.
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601365711959441409
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
24. Here, the FBI sends reports about a pair of tweets, the second of which involves a former Tippecanoe County, Indiana Councilor and Republican named @JohnBasham claiming “Between 2% and 25% of Ballots by Mail are Being Rejected for Errors.”
7:00 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601366094584823808
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
The FBI's second report concerned this tweet by @JohnBasham:
7:02 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601366678042218496
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
25. The FBI-flagged tweet then got circulated in the enforcement Slack. Twitter cited Politifact to say the first story was “proven to be false,” then noted the second was already deemed “no vio on numerous occasions.”
7:03 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601366882938126336
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
26. The group then decides to apply a “Learn how voting is safe and secure” label because one commenter says, “it’s totally normal to have a 2% error rate.” Roth then gives the final go-ahead to the process initiated by the FBI:
7:04 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601367192033189889
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
27. Examining the entire election enforcement Slack, we didn’t see one reference to moderation requests from the Trump campaign, the Trump White House, or Republicans generally. We looked. They may exist: we were told they do. However, they were absent here.
7:05 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601367426129543169
Missing 28. 29. 30.
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
31. In one case, former Arizona governor Mike Huckabee joke-tweets about mailing in ballots for his “deceased parents and grandparents.”
7:07 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601367925050732544
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
32. This inspires a long Slack that reads like an @TitaniaMcGrath parody. “I agree it’s a joke,” concedes a Twitter employee, “but he’s also literally admitting in a tweet a crime.”
7:08 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601368195583344641
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
Replying to @mtaibbi @ShellenbergerMD and 3 others
The group declares Huck’s an “edge case,” and though one notes, “we don’t make exceptions for jokes or satire,” they ultimately decide to leave him be, because “we’ve poked enough bears.”
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601368595052736512
fuck off, I'm fucking busy
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
33. "Could still mislead people… could still mislead people," the humor-averse group declares, before moving on from Huckabee
7:11 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601369093764177920
TWO 33.'s
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
33. Roth suggests moderation even in this absurd case could depend on whether or not the joke results in “confusion.” This seemingly silly case actually foreshadows serious later issues:
7:14 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/160136979346>>17915932
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
33. "Could still mislead people… could still mislead people," the humor-averse group declares, before moving on from Huckabee
7:11 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601369093764177920
TWO 33.'s
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
33. Roth suggests moderation even in this absurd case could depend on whether or not the joke results in “confusion.” This seemingly silly case actually foreshadows serious later issues:
7:14 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/16013697934663680016368001
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
34. In the docs, execs often expand criteria to subjective issues like intent (yes, a video is authentic, but why was it shown?), orientation (was a banned tweet shown to condemn, or support?), or reception (did a joke cause “confusion”?). This reflex will become key in J6.
7:16 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601370231620136962
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
35. In another example, Twitter employees prepare to slap a “mail-in voting is safe” warning label on a Trump tweet about a postal screwup in Ohio, before realizing “the events took place,” which meant the tweet was “factually accurate”:
7:18 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601370784022564865
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
36. “VERY WELL DONE ON SPEED” Trump was being “visibility filtered” as late as a week before the election. Here, senior execs didn’t appear to have a particular violation, but still worked fast to make sure a fairly anodyne Trump tweet couldn’t be “replied to, shared, or liked”:
7:20 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601371334503968768
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
"VERY WELL DONE ON SPEED": the group is pleased the Trump tweet is dealt with quickly
7:23 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601371959023267840
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
-
A seemingly innocuous follow-up involved a tweet from actor @realJamesWoods, whose ubiquitous presence in argued-over Twitter data sets is already a #TwitterFiles in-joke.
7:24 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601372346413363201
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
38. After Woods angrily quote-tweeted about Trump’s warning label, Twitter staff – in a preview of what ended up happening after J6 – despaired of a reason for action, but resolved to “hit him hard on future vio.”
7:27 PM · Dec 9, 2022
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
39. Here a label is applied to Georgia Republican congresswoman Jody Hice for saying, “Say NO to big tech censorship!” and, “Mailed ballots are more prone to fraud than in-person balloting… It’s just common sense.”
7:28 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601373236532371457
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
40. Twitter teams went easy on Hice, only applying “soft intervention,” with Roth worrying about a “wah wah censorship” optics backlash:
7:29 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601373551893704705
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
41. Meanwhile, there are multiple instances of involving pro-Biden tweets warning Trump “may try to steal the election” that got surfaced, only to be approved by senior executives. This one, they decide, just “expresses concern that mailed ballots might not make it on time.”
7:32 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601374328670474240
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
'42. “THAT’S UNDERSTANDABLE”: Even the hashtag #StealOurVotes – referencing a theory that a combo of Amy Coney Barrett and Trump will steal the election – is approved by Twitter brass, because it’s “understandable” and a “reference to… a US Supreme Court decision.”
7:36 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601375333319868416
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
43. In this exchange, again unintentionally humorous, former Attorney General Eric Holder claimed the U.S. Postal Service was “deliberately crippled,”ostensibly by the Trump administration. He was initially hit with a generic warning label, but it was quickly taken off by Roth:
7:39 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601375904651182080
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
44. Later in November 2020, Roth asked if staff had a “debunk moment” on the “SCYTL/Smartmantic vote-counting” stories, which his DHS contacts told him were a combination of “about 47” conspiracy theories:
7:41 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601376457405911042
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
45. On December 10th, as Trump was in the middle of firing off 25 tweets saying things like, “A coup is taking place in front of our eyes,” Twitter executives announced a new “L3 deamplification” tool. This step meant a warning label now could also come with deamplification:
7:43 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601376948873482240
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
46. Some executives wanted to use the new deamplification tool to silently limit Trump’s reach more right away, beginning with the following tweet:
7:44 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601377383566946304
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
47. However, in the end, the team had to use older, less aggressive labeling tools at least for that day, until the “L3 entities” went live the following morning.
7:46 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601377860182511616
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
48. The significance is that it shows that Twitter, in 2020 at least, was deploying a vast range of visible and invisible tools to rein in Trump’s engagement, long before J6. The ban will come after other avenues are exhausted
7:48 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601378204778139649
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
49. In Twitter docs execs frequently refer to “bots,” e.g. “let’s put a bot on that.” A bot is just any automated heuristic moderation rule. It can be anything: every time a person in Brazil uses “green” and “blob” in the same sentence, action might be taken.
7:51 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601378939209134081
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
50. In this instance, it appears moderators added a bot for a Trump claim made on Breitbart. The bot ends up becoming an automated tool invisibly watching both Trump and, apparently, Breitbart (“will add media ID to bot”). Trump by J6 was quickly covered in bots.
7:54 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601379824294952961
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
51. There is no way to follow the frenzied exchanges among Twitter personnel from between January 6thand 8th without knowing the basics of the company’s vast lexicon of acronyms and Orwellian unwords.
7:55 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601380014578339842
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
52. To “bounce” an account is to put it in timeout, usually for a 12-hour review/cool-off:
7:55 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601380164981882881
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
53. “Interstitial,” one of many nouns used as a verb in Twitterspeak (“denylist” is another), means placing a physical label atop a tweet, so it can’t be seen.
7:58 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601380700955250688
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
54. PII has multiple meanings, one being “Public Interest Interstitial,” i.e. a covering label applied for “public interest” reasons. The post below also references “proactive V,” i.e. proactive visibility filtering.
7:59 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601380935773356034
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
55. This is all necessary background to J6. Before the riots, the company was engaged in an inherently insane/impossible project, trying to create an ever-expanding, ostensibly rational set of rules to regulate every conceivable speech situation that might arise between humans.
8:00 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601381237435744256
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
'56. This project was preposterous yet its leaders were unable to see this, having become infected with groupthing, coming to believe – sincerely – that it was Twitter's responsibility to control, as much as possible, what people could talk about, how often, and with whom.
8:00 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601381413642964992
SECOND 56.
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
56. When panic first breaks out on J6 there’s a fair share of WTF-type posts, mixed in with frantic calls for Twitter to start deploying its full arsenal of moderation tools. “What is the right remediation? Do we interstitial the video?” asks one employee, in despair:
8:03 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601381997108416513
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
57. The firm’s executives on day 1 of the January 6th crisis at least tried to pay lip service to its dizzying array of rules. By day 2, they began wavering. By day 3, a million rules were reduced to one: what we say, goes
8:01 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601381605733707776
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
58. Roth groans about Coudrey: “THIS asshole,” but still seems determined to stick at least superficially to rules, itching to act “if” this “constitutes incitement.”
8:05 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601382686609711105
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
'59. At 2:39 p.m. PST, a comms official asked Roth to confirm or deny a story that they’d restricted Trump’s ability to tweet. Roth says, “We have not.”
8:07 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601383112004767745
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
60. Minutes later, Roth executed the historic act of “bouncing” Trump, i.e. putting him in timeout. “I hope you… are appropriately CorpSec’d,” says a colleague.
8:09 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601383547230507009
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
This theme of Policy perhaps being stressed by queries from Communications executives – who themselves have to answer the public’s questions – occasionally appears. Two days later, you see chatter about pulling Comms out of the loop:
8:11 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601384083929845760
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
61. The first company-wide email from Gadde on January 6th announced that 3 Trump tweets had been bounced, but more importantly signaled a determination to use legit “violations” as a guide for any possible permanent suspension:
8:13 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601384492286898176
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
'62. “WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?” Safe to say Trump’s “Go home with love & in peace” tweet mid-riot didn’t go over well at Twitter HQ:
8:15 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601384986199805953
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
'63. A few last notes about January 6th. Roth at one point looked and found Trump had a slew of duplicate bot applications:
8:24 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601387286658093058
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
64. By the end of the first day, the top execs are still trying to apply rules. By the next day, they will contemplate a major change in approach. Watch @shellenbergerMD this weekend for the play-by-play of how all that went down.
8:26 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601387813358174208
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
65. By January 8th, which @BariWeiss will describe Sunday, Twitter will be receiving plaudits from “our partners” in Washington, and the sitting U.S. president will no longer be heard on the platform.
8:26 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601387906492694528
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
66. Lastly, people on the left, right, and in between want to know what else is in the #TwitterFiles, from suppression/shadow-banning of leftists to lab-leak theorists, or amplification of military propaganda or conservative accounts. We know everyone has questions.
8:28 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601388307450994689
Matt Taibbi
@mtaibbi
'67. And while we’ve stumbled on tidbits here and there about topics ranging from COVID to foreign policy, the reality is the data sets are enormous and we’re still working through them.
More is coming. Good night, all.
8:29 PM · Dec 9, 2022
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1601388537815105537
red handed
This is direct interference and collusion from the FBI telling twitter to suppress information from the people
fucking sauce your shit
>>17916225, >>17916246, >>17916248, >>17916260 Honestly it feels like Elon is clogging the MSM cycle.
mmm
yes, Taibbi is grossly underestimating the publics ability to follow conversations and threads
he sounds like an arrogant prick
I never will trust Elon Musk.
Taking all those billions of dollars from the people and not producing anything of value…
He is a charming cunt.