Platformer - Twitter's other porn problem
Twitter's other porn problemImagine the company did want to monetize adult content. Would Apple let it?Programming note: I think I’m gonna have one more scoop for you this week, so I’m planning to take Thursday off the newsletter and hit you with a bonus edition on Friday. I. Yesterday Zoe Schiffer and I reported on Twitter’s delayed plans to roll out a competitor to OnlyFans, letting the platform’s many adult creators sell subscriptions to their work while taking a cut of the revenue. The company ultimately paused the project over problems identified by a red team it had convened: namely, it found, “Twitter cannot accurately detect child sexual exploitation and non-consensual nudity at scale.” Today, let’s talk about some of what we heard after we published. One, the red team rather conspicuously left out of its report an issue that had been raised to management as it considered the Adult Content Monetization (ACM)project, a former employee told me. The issue: that Twitter’s move would draw Apple’s attention to the significant amount of porn on the service, and potentially place new restrictions on its iOS app or even remove it from the App Store. These are not merely theoretical concerns. Last year Tumblr had to begin censoring a long list of hashtags that users add to posts, including “submission,” “girl,” and “sad,” amid concerns from Apple that those tags could lead users to “sensitive content.” Critics at the time called the list over-broad to the point of absurdity, but Tumblr had little choice but to comply. Its app was temporarily removed from the App Store in 2018 after child sexual abuse material (CSAM) was found on the platform. A month later, Tumblr banned adult content altogether. That puts the stakes of Twitter’s ACM project into stark relief. Researchers at the company say Twitter is already struggling to remove existing CSAM from the platform — something that could potentially trigger an existential ban from the App Store. But the bigger question might be why Twitter is allowed in the App Store despite the fact that the adult content on the app would seem to be in violation of Apple’s existing policies. App Store guideline 1.14 bans “overtly sexual or pornographic material, defined as ‘explicit descriptions or displays of sexual organs or activities intended to stimulate erotic rather than aesthetic or emotional feelings.’” And there’s plenty of that on Twitter. Of course, porn remains a minority use case for Twitter. (The core use case remains insulting people who have more followers than you.) And Twitter is recommended only for those 17 and older in the App Store, in an effort to keep kids away. But porn is very much a fact of Twitter, and I think Twitter will absolutely risk getting booted from the App Store should it pursue ACM in the future... Keep reading with a 7-day free trialSubscribe to Platformer to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives. A subscription gets you:
|
Older messages
🚨 How Twitter’s child porn problem ruined its plans for an OnlyFans competitor
Tuesday, August 30, 2022
Internal documents and Twitter employees reveal the need for massive investment to remove illegal content — but executives haven't listened
Why Reddit is still betting on the blockchain
Friday, August 26, 2022
CEO Steve Huffman on making the web more user-friendly — and his plan to "not use any crypto words"
Mudge blows the whistle on Twitter
Wednesday, August 24, 2022
It's a gift to Elon Musk. But how much will it matter?
How a viral NFT project survived the crypto crash
Friday, August 19, 2022
Loot's Dom Hofmann on outlasting the hype cycle, public-domain video games, and why Creative Commons is the future
Inside Facebook's encryption conundrum
Friday, August 12, 2022
The company is moving quickly to make Messenger more secure — but selling it to average users could prove to be a challenge
You Might Also Like
Moving debt up the agenda
Tuesday, April 30, 2024
Why young climate startups should consider debt, Getir exits Europe and Daniel Ek's Neko Health expands to the UK. View in browser Logo - Zoom_flagship (1) Good morning there, Vinted, one of
Preys, 67 hours, & Slightly Good News 🧽
Tuesday, April 30, 2024
And who am I without my card? View this email in your browser Prey To The Seven The US had over 8000 publicly traded companies in 1996, which has now fallen to approximately 4600 in 2022. That's a
🍰 Two Logo Sites Making $250k per MONTH??
Monday, April 29, 2024
Google search sucks, productivity mental models, how one bootstrapped entrepreneur is making $250k/mo with logos, and more!
Massive Acquisitions in Software Startups
Monday, April 29, 2024
Tomasz Tunguz Venture Capitalist If you were forwarded this newsletter, and you'd like to receive it in the future, subscribe here. Massive Acquisitions in Software Startups What drives the
Baxter, PocketPlan, OneNode, Canyon, Prosperly, and more
Monday, April 29, 2024
so you can unsubscribe from & clean out marketing emails BetaList BetaList Daily Prosperly Collect Google reviews and referrals on autopilot Email Tracker Free Email Tracker for Gmail Baxter so you
join me: Digital Health in Q1’24
Monday, April 29, 2024
data on deals, funding, mega-rounds, unicorns, investors and more Hi there, Anjalika here, Intelligence Analyst at CB Insights. Wanted to personally invite you to this digital health webinar tomorrow.
🦄 Global payments made instant
Monday, April 29, 2024
Mural makes it easy to manage payments and invoices for employees, contractors, and vendors worldwide.
Early bird pricing ends tonight. Have you subscribed?
Monday, April 29, 2024
Subscribe by midnight ET to get The Generalist's premium newsletter for $19/month. ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏ ͏
72 hours left to confirm your free seat
Monday, April 29, 2024
don't miss this , In just 72 hours from now, you're going to be missing your FREE spot in the 4-week E-commerce Kickstarter Coaching Program when it goes LIVE. Unless you take action now. At
📂 Guerrilla tactics leverage doing things that don’t scale (until they do)
Monday, April 29, 2024
Today's newsletter is proudly supported by Dofollow 🎉 In an era where content creation is easier than ever, content authority is the key to ranking high and maximizing SEO. And despite what