June 20, 2017 - Sargon of Akkad - Carl Benjamin
05:27
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| Time | Text |
|---|---|
| So I'm currently out of my office and I'm recording videos in this format because it's easier to do so. | |
| And I wanted to rip off the, you know, I can't do the wiggly eyebrows, but what are you going to do? | |
| Anyway, so I saw this on Twitter by Twitter co-founder Biz Stone. | |
| Twitter is founded on the idea that freedom of expression is a human right. | |
| We work for that. | |
| Biz, I have to pull you up on a few things that I find very, very contradictory about your position. | |
| You link to this document that you wrote or co-wrote in January of 2011, and in it you say, Our position on freedom of expression carries with it a mandate to protect our users' right to speak freely. | |
| Discussion on topics from geopolitical events to wardrobe malfunctions make Twitter both important and fun. | |
| Providing the tools that foster these discussions and following the policies that keep them alive is meaningful work for us. | |
| It's quite interesting you say that after you at Twitter had systematically suspended the accounts of alt-right people. | |
| As far as I can tell, on the basis that Twitter top brass disagreed with their politics. | |
| I mean, I don't agree with Richard Spencer either, but I don't see him tweeting things that are worthy of suspension. | |
| Unless you can give me an example that actually does contravene your rules. | |
| As far as I can tell, it's just him giving an opinion that you don't appreciate. | |
| Am I wrong? | |
| I'm guessing that I'm not wrong after you caved to public backlash and restored these accounts because you knew what you had done had come from a position of ideological bigotry. | |
| You were not interested in discussing the other side of the argument with the people on the other side of the argument. | |
| And I'm not on their side either. | |
| But I think they should have the right to speak. | |
| And I don't think they should be deplatformed on the basis that I disagree with them. | |
| And since we're talking about Twitter's ideological preferences, let's talk about the unverification of Milo Leonopoulos. | |
| This was before his account was banned, of course. | |
| And I don't necessarily agree with his account banning, but I don't necessarily disagree with it either. | |
| I can see that you have your reasons. | |
| I don't agree with those reasons, but you at least have reasons that you will cling to till the end. | |
| But you do at least have some justification that is based in something Milo did. | |
| Again, I don't agree with it. | |
| And it's not like Leslie Jones isn't as much of a troll and provocateur as Milo is, but you can cling to it. | |
| And it gives you the facade of saying, look, we weren't banning him because we hate Milo, because Milo makes a mockery of us. | |
| We were banning him because of a tweet he sent to Leslie Jones. | |
| In fact, did he even send it to Leslie? | |
| I should probably have looked that up before I recorded this. | |
| Anyway, why did you unverify Milo? | |
| That was, as far as I can tell, the stupidest thing you could possibly do. | |
| And that's what this video is going to be about. | |
| Talking about the verification process on Twitter. | |
| You say, as noted here by Business Insider, that the tick is a verification badge, which signifies that Twitter has proven the identity of the person holding the account. | |
| Do you think Milo's identity suddenly changed? | |
| You know that you de-verified him for political reasons, because he's not playing ball with you. | |
| And that brings us to why you won't verify me. | |
| Now, I've put in another verification request, and I put this in about a week ago, and it's still in review. | |
| That's very interesting. | |
| I do want to know what the criteria are, because according to the criteria as you put in your verification forms, I should have been verified a long time ago. | |
| I mean, there are other anti-SJW YouTubers like my friend Blair White. | |
| She's verified. | |
| She has a large YouTube channel. | |
| She's got a large Twitter following. | |
| It's about half of mine on both YouTube and Twitter. | |
| So it's not by the numbers, isn't it? | |
| And conversely, you've got someone like Mundane Matt, who's got 30,000 followers. | |
| He's got a YouTube channel with 139,000 followers and he's not verified. | |
| But Matt doesn't do anything particularly controversial. | |
| Blair White can be a provocateur on Twitter and she enjoys it and I appreciate her work. | |
| But you haven't verified Matt, but he is exactly the same, just with fewer followers and less provocative tweets. | |
| And so what I want to know from you, Beers, and presumably Jack as well, is your reason for not verifying me. | |
| I know what it is. | |
| And you know what it is. | |
| And I could tell people if you like. | |
| But I would like your statement. | |
| Why won't you verify me? | |
| Is it because, as you can see from my Twitter account, I don't really take your platform all that seriously? | |
| Honestly, I'd like you to tell me what the reason is. | |
| I mean, I have a Wikipedia page. | |
| That's more than most of the people who have been verified on Twitter. | |
| Does Anissa Sueba have a Wikipedia page? | |
| She's got 2,500 followers. | |
| And she's verified. | |
| Why? | |
| Because she works for the BBC. | |
| That's why. | |
| But I, as an independent content creator, have been refused verification twice now and will probably get refused a third time. | |
| So all I'm saying is that I want you to tell everyone why you won't verify me. | |
| And Mundane Matt and any other people who have significant online followings and are in exactly the same position as other verified YouTubers and independent content creators. | |
| What is the reason for this discrimination? |
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