A Sense of Doubt blog post #1922 - TWITTER FAIL - no more SMS

A Sense of Doubt blog post #1922 - TWITTER FAIL - No More SMS

And how come this information isn't on Twitter's site or anywhere in their fucking FAQ?

So, I used Twitter SMS. I have "followed" so many accounts on Twitter that looking a feed without a filter is like drinking from a hundred fire hoses.

I have to look at my text messages (SMS) anyway because, well, people TEXT me, so I sent through a very select number of Twitter accounts that I like following to my texting app on the phone as a way to keep track more easily, as a time filler at the dentist, or just because I like the simple, bare text of it all.

Suddenly at the end of April the texts stopped. This had happened a couple of times before and re-started, so I didn't take immediate action. Eventually, I consulted Twitter to see if there was a reason given or if I could fix the problem. I even wrote Twitter in vain because the company has no infrastructure to help users, which is understandable because at recent count:

https://www.oberlo.com/blog/twitter-statistics

Yeah, so a lot.

I searched and searched Twitter for answers and NOTHING. Why wouldn't there be some notification? Or even an explanation in Twitter's FAQ for all the people surely hunting for the same reason that their SMS messages stopped??

Here's a thought. Maybe Twitter could have sent an SMS message to all SMS users informing them that they were shutting down there service. Even if they did and I missed it (since at times I might get 60+ messages a day if someone I followed really got on a roll), Twitter could have ensured that their notification was my last SMS message.

I almost never wrote messages via SMS. I usually just read messages, passively. How is that unsafe?

I see the settings are still active and so I am hopeful that Twitter may reverse its decision if it gets a a lot of crap from users.

We’ve now turned this feature back on for a few locations that depend on SMS to Tweet. It remains turned off for the rest of the world.

— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) September 5, 2019

https://www.theverge.com/2020/4/27/21238131/twitter-sms-notifications-disabled-jack-dorsey-hack

For the most part, you can no longer use Twitter as it was originally built to be used: over text message.

Last week, Twitter turned off the ability to receive SMS messages containing the text of new tweets. The feature was disabled in all but “a few countries” that rely on the feature.

This won’t be a huge deal for the vasty majority of Twitter users who access the service via the app or website. But there are already complaints from some people who still used SMS to read tweets. One business, DansDeals, said it relied on the feature to alert readers to sales.

The change largely marks the end of an era for Twitter: when the service launched, it was built around SMS. Its original 140-character limit was tailored to text message sizes, and you were meant to send and receive new tweets entirely over SMS. That hasn’t been the primary way to use Twitter for a long time, though, as more people bought smartphones and could use the mobile app.

Twitter disabled the ability to compose tweets via text last September due to security issues. Hackers gained access to the phone number of Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, at which point, they were able to use the SMS feature to tweet from his account. Twitter promptly disabled sending tweets via SMS for all but “a few locations.”

This latest update is also said to be about helping “people keep their accounts safe,” according to a Twitter spokesperson. It’s not entirely clear what the risk is when receiving tweets, rather than sending them, but Twitter has been interested in phasing this feature out for some time now. If people receive tweets over SMS, it can’t display ads to them, so it would much rather have people checking the app.

“We turned off the remainder of our Twitter via SMS feature, except for a few countries that rely on it to use Twitter,” the Twitter spokesperson said. Twitter will still send “important SMS messages” for securing accounts, like authentication codes.



Okay, so maybe I can do some things....

How do I organize my twitter feed?

4 ways to organize your Twitter stream

1. Follow only relevant users. The simplest way to make your Twitter stream more useful is to be selective about the users you follow. What interests you or your company? ...
2. Use lists. With Twitter's built-in lists feature you can organize users into easily-accessible groups, whether you follow them individually or not.

Apr 10, 2012

4 ways to organize your Twitter stream - Ragan Communications

How do you filter tweets on twitter?

To apply filter settings to your automated Twitter content:

1. Go to your stream's Write page and navigate to Automate > Twitter from the top of the page.
2. In your Filter settings, click on the checkboxes and fill in the applicable fields to apply your selected filters to your automated tweets.

More items...

•

Feb 3, 2020

Filter Tweets that are Automatically Pulled into Your Stream ...

ANOTHER ARTICLE ON THIS DEBACLE:

https://mashable.com/article/twitter-sms-changes-account-removals/



NOT TO END ON A SOUR NOTE - AND SO SOME XKCD

Because I often feature xkcd on Saturdays...

Twitter Bot

Twitter

Twitter Verification

This is just the latest one... it's not about TWITTER.

Great Attractor

Hi!

This Twitter account is me:

http://twitter.com/xkcd

Any other account claiming to be me
is not actually me.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++


- Bloggery committed by chris tower - 2005.23 - 10:10

- Days ago = 1785 days ago

- New note - On 1807.06, I ceased daily transmission of my Hey Mom feature after three years of daily conversations. I plan to continue Hey Mom posts at least twice per week but will continue to post the days since ("Days Ago") count on my blog each day. The blog entry numbering in the title has changed to reflect total Sense of Doubt posts since I began the blog on 0705.04, which include Hey Mom posts, Daily Bowie posts, and Sense of Doubt posts. Hey Mom posts will still be numbered sequentially. New Hey Mom posts will use the same format as all the other Hey Mom posts; all other posts will feature this format seen here.