Thanks for the clarification, Doug. I can totally understand the trending topic abuse: I looked a trend the other day and was really surprised at the amount of crap that came up in the search.
I think it's pretty important to enumerate the triggers used for suspension. It doesn't need to be the exact algorithm (which could be used to defeat your efforts) but rather something like what you said above. Something that we all can point users to so they can say "ahh... that's why." -- which I'm sure Louie is doing right now. Anyone who's dealt with SPAM is aware of how frequently the rules change: the point is that users need to be kept apprised of how they are affected by these constant changes. I'd also suggest that you fix the link on the bottom of the <http:// twitter.com/suspended> page. The one that explains how to contest the suspension would be a good candidate (since that's the first thing a real person who's been suspended wants to know.) Maybe there's another link on the page that goes to a list of the suspension triggers. You could periodically update that page to reflect the current reasons for suspension. -ch On Jun 24, 10:25 am, Doug Williams <d...@twitter.com> wrote: > There are both automated and manual spam fighting tools we use in house. One > of the reasons for suspension is aggressively participating in multiple > trending topics within a short amount of time. It appears that Mantia was > flagged for this reason. > > If your users are suspended, it would be best to send them > tohttp://help.twitter.comand direct them to the official article [1]. Spam > and abuse are not a white and black issues, they are also far from static. > Both of these reasons make it difficult to give definite criteria for > avoiding a net. > > 1.http://help.twitter.com/forums/26257/entries/15790 > > Thanks, > Doug > > On Wed, Jun 24, 2009 at 9:57 AM, richardhenry <richardhe...@me.com> wrote: > > > As someone who followed Louie, this is very weird to me. Nothing he > > did looked remotely spammy/offensive/disingenuous. #freemantia > > > -- Richard (@richardhenry) > > > On Jun 24, 5:43 pm, Craig Hockenberry <craig.hockenbe...@gmail.com> > > wrote: > > > One of the guys I work with recently had his account suspended: > > > > <http://mantia.me/blog/twitter-suspension/> > > > > We've been having a bit of fun with it: creating a #freemantia hash > > > tag and even a website <http://freemantia.com> > > > > But at the bottom of it all, I realized that we (third-party > > > developers) don't really know what causes an account to be suspended. > > > And yet we all have users of our products/services who can have an > > > account suspended. I'd like to be able to tell them why it happened. > > > > I'm so clueless about what's going on that I don't know whether > > > suspension is an automated or manual process. In either case, the > > > decisions being made by man or machine appear to be flawed: Louie > > > Mantia may be prolific, but he's not a spammer or a robot. > > > > Can you guys shed a little light on the situation? > > > > -ch > > > > P.S. If anyone can speed up the process of reinstating the @mantia > > > account, I know it would make someone very happy :-)
