So here's a follow-up to why @Twitter not having a functioning appeals process really matters, re: the new birdwatch announcement.

Two weeks ago I was wrongly tagged for spreading misinformation when I was in fact discussing misinformation. I thought, well I'll appeal it. But it turns out appealing decisions on Twitter takes weeks during which time you're locked out of Twitter. https://hapgood.us/2021/01/21/twitter-should-cancel-the-appeals-process-or-make-it-work-also-im-in-twitter-jail-in-case-youve-missed-me/

Some people wondered why one would need to appeal it. Just take it down and move on. Because there's no functioning appeals process, I eventually did. I cancelled the appeal and removed the tweet, which was talking about the history of political/medical conspiracy intersections.

Today Twitter announced birdwatch, a collaborative fact-checking program. It could -- depending on the implementation -- be a useful place for students to do work on fact-checking, and given I run a lot of large student fact-checking projects I thought I'd check it out.

You know what's coming next right?

There's actually a requirement for no recent Twitter rules violations. Now, interestingly, it tells me that I don't have any rules violations, but I'm left wondering what that means then?

My point is this -- all of this stuff is starting to get more interconnected. Multiple strike rules, availability of features, etc. Weak links in the process are going to have more and more unintended consequences.

And there's a good chance that they may actually eliminate some of their better partners in this effort if they don't fix those weak links in the process.