• Icytrees@sh.itjust.works
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    13 hours ago

    Mashable said it’s because users were reporting innacuracies for their own locations, and Raw Story doesn’t have any metrics to support their claim… as usual. I couldn’t find anything on the number of maga accounts from other countries.

    Not to say astroturfing isn’t happening, there’s foreign interference for sure and some of those screenshots are probably legit. It’s just more likely that Xitter’s broken and their new feature didn’t work.

    • Hinterwalder-65195@feddit.org
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      7 hours ago

      хеллоу феллоу тексанс, хау ду ю ду?

      Yes, it’s very likely that it’s broken in a very peculiar sort of way that thinks MAGA posts are from three specific countries, one of them being Russia.

      • Icytrees@sh.itjust.works
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        2 hours ago

        To quote what I just wrote:

        Not to say astroturfing isn’t happening, there’s foreign interference for sure and some of those screenshots are probably legit.

        Where can I find out how many maga accounts were from those three countries?

    • Zombie@feddit.uk
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      12 hours ago

      If this were 15 years ago, sure, I’d accept that “it’s just more likely that Xitter’s broken” but not now. Not after the shenanigans Musk has played over and over. The benefit of the doubt is gone for that fascist.

    • DandomRude@lemmy.world
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      12 hours ago

      Yes, it may well be that they have once again released an unfinished, flawed feature far too early.

      I’m not saying that it’s necessarily due to the possibly unintended transparency regarding right-wing extremist accounts. It’s just that it apparently led to some accounts being visible as being maintained from abroad, even though they insist so much on “America first” and so on. I just wanted to point out that it’s a strange coincidence that this feature was immediately withdrawn as soon as this apparently became visible to the users.

      Of course, there may be other reasons for rolling back this feature, but with Musk, I wouldn’t be surprised if he did it with regards to his political allies, since he clearly has an agenda that aligns with this kind of ideology (astroturfing or not).

      I can’t judge this myself because I stay as far away from xitter as possible. So I only know what I’ve seen in the media reports – and I don’t think there’s much reliable information out there.

      So yes, it’s speculation, but it doesn’t seem impossible at all that the situation is as described in the post. I just wanted to back this up with some other sources that aren’t xitter.

      • Icytrees@sh.itjust.works
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        4 hours ago

        My issue wasn’t with the claim, it was with the supporting evidence. Raw Story doesn’t have a great fact checking record, and I couldn’t find anything to support the number of maga accounts that turned out to be foreign.

        Not saying I don’t believe it, just saying I’m skeptical until I see credible data.