Here’s a very simple Twitter feature that could make a huge difference in the quality of Twitter. It’s unlikely Elon Musk will ever see this but here’s hoping that someone will pass it along. Over the years I found that way too many fake, spam, and fishing Twitter profiles follow my account. I assume they’re doing this with the hope of getting a ‘follow back’ so they can spam more profiles and get into more news feeds. Unlike many people, I don’t care how many followers I have on twitter, but I do care that they spread like weeds, following profiles of each other, building a giant web of fake followers. If someone clicks on the “followers” link on a profile, they may see mostly porn chicks and spam bots, instead of real people – but often, you can’t tell them apart.
So here’s the simple twitter feature request: on the same line as the “Following” and “Followers” counts, add a new item that shows “Blockers” – which shows the number of profiles that have BLOCKED that profile. (see the mockup below)
If you open a profile and look at THAT number, and see they’ve been blocked by hundreds or thousands of people, there’s a good chance it’s because they’re a fake account, troublemaker, or spammer. That’s it. Very simple, but an effective use of the data.
Of course there’s plenty of narcissists that don’t care if half of their followers are fake – but it would be a great way to calculate the likelihood of a non-public figure being a real person.
