Becoming a Twitter trending topic is an achievement mass media commonly cites as a way of proving their relevance. It's not enough saying 'Hey, I'm great!' these days, but to have people saying 'Look, they're great!' what matters.
Twitter is still having trouble making that privileged position profitable, though.
With great power comes great responsibility, so Twitter has had to introduce and continually update policies in its terms of use and in the way its tools work.
People and some businesses have found and crafted ways to use Twitter working in their own benefit, but sometimes in ways it was not intended to and may not be desireable. One example are bots that mimic individuals but are actually legions of mass posting outlets centrally commanded that seek to influence trending topics.
Among the 4,000 most influential @Twitter users are 400 (!) bots.#DisinfoWeek pic.twitter.com/7x5CzejkLK— Jessica Weare (@JessicaWeare) June 26, 2017
Another example is posting content which has not much relation (or none at all) to the trending topic itself, but as search results include those tweets, many might see them and engage. While some may argue against this practice, it's one of the few resources individuals and small groups (ignored or banned by mass media) have to get their message through.
Twitter has taken this into account and developed policies that filter out these behaviours: Why am I missing from search?
These policies, ruled by algorithms, are not always 'clever enough' to tell what is effectively appropriate or inappropriate use or behaviour.
Twitter, along with Facebook and other social media, have also had to undertake the burden of fighting fake news. Fake news that may come from everywhere, even official sources may produce inaccurate, biased or partisan information, so it's really hard to tell. Many organizations (especially universities) are developing initiatives aiming to shed light.
Mass media, governments, NGO's and many others are then competing for trust. Trust has turned into an asset which will not necessarily be used for the truth to prevail, but may be used to push an agenda. It gets really messy.
Activists have therefore a hard time jumping into this information flow and getting people to become interested and aware of the disinformation state they were in.
Mass media may not be completely trusted by people, but they still hold a strategic status: it's "the news". And while one can hope that ethical journalism will prevail, sponsors and politicians do have a strong say into what ultimately gets published, how and when, and what not.
Twitter should reconsider the process for "filtering out" accounts (people) from search results. The way it works now, along with bots and fake news, they are also wiping the resistance and leaving only the Empire to rule.
Many times the Empire fails but decides to write history to its own benefit, such as in the Chilean Argo.
'Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi. You're my only hope.'
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