There used to be a page here that had all my tweets from that micro-blogging site Twitter. In January 2023 I deleted my entire Twitter account. It was not a happy place to hang out and I decided that for my mental health it was time to leave. One thing that stopped me leaving twitter for a while was the fact that many of the communications on this site had embedded tweets and linked to twitter. Once I deleted my account it turned out that the embed code still kinda works and you can see the text of my old tweets, but you can’t access the actual look of them. I can live with that.
Trying To Work Out What I’ll Do
So, I’m going to use Mastodon but I’m not sure what for. I’m going to try and avoid all the hated and politics that I saw on Twitter and I think I’ll just follow stuff that I’m interested in: games, films, music, sport, aircraft, that sort of thing. The thing now is to find those sources of enjoyment. I’m also going to use Mastodon to exhibit my photographs I think. I’ve got plenty of pretty neat photos and so I will spend some time tooting those.
I’m currently thinking about deleting myself from Twitter but I think there’s too much stuff on this actual site for me to be able to do that without spending days cleaning up all the links and embedded tweets. I’m working on finding a solution.
A Nice New Place
I’ve spent much of the time since 2016 avoiding Twitter at times and being dragged back in because I’ve missed understanding what’s going on. Now the evil overlord has taken control of Twitter I’ve followed many to Mastodon. Musk has overleveraged himself because he was pissed off and I find that hilarious. He is such a funny person to observe.
So, I’ll keep my Twitter account going because loads of things send stuff to that. I think this website sends notifications there, but I’ll be looking for a Mastodon posting plugin at sometime. In the meantime I think I’m going to mostly look at Mastodon and hope that it’s a lovely place with decent moderation.
As far as I understand it you can see me on Mastodon using @[email protected]
Tweeting About Sunk Cost
There’s been quite a lot of people leaving Twitter because Elon Musk has decided to try and buy the platform. I’ve been thinking what to do about this and whether I care or not. I’m no fan of Elon Musk. I’m pretty sure he’s a disingenuous fool who says lots of things but it’s all self-serving promotion. I don’t even think he’s a business genius. So, when all the news broke about him buying Twitter I did have a few thoughts about whether I should stay on the platform. But then, what’s the difference between him owning it and a bunch of faceless investors owning it? I don’t think it will make a difference to me and my uses of twitter.
Then there’s the concept that he’ll allow “free speech” on the platform. Well, that’s interesting because in my experience that just means racists will be racist. As a private company Twitter can set whatever rules it wants given the current status of “things being said on the internet are not the responsibility of the platforms on which they are said”. Can you imagine having to moderate all the gigabytes of data that gets sent to these platforms for dodgy content? Who would be doing the monitoring and what would the rules be? At the moment Twitter is like advertising in the UK. It’s fine until someone complains about it. There are rules but you only have to follow them if someone raises an issue.
I’ve got quite a lot invested in Twitter in terms of this website. If I delete all my data then every tweet that I’ve embedded over the years on my communications will be removed and to be honest it will change the look and feel of this site. If there’s an option to download all my tweets and images and try to then re-link every tweet on this site then that’s something I could look into but the time and challenge to do that might make it not worth it. I am invested – time wise – into twitter and so removing that would bother me. I am aware that this is the “sunk cost” fallacy. It wouldn’t matter to anyone but me if I left twitter. That place has been a rabid discourse of racists and arseholes for over eight years now [everything went shit in the middle of 2016] so leaving now wouldn’t change much.
Me And Twitter – It’s Complicated
Many years ago I can remember opening a Twitter account to try and follow Formula 1 stuff as it kept being mentioned on the telecasts. I knew I wasn’t really into social media and had avoided Faceshit before then. I only kept that account open for a few days before shutting it down as I knew it was a rabbit hole I didn’t really want to enter. Not long later I had another go and got into Twitter. A while later I then decided to have a second Twitter account so I could follow all the stuff I was interested in while keeping one account for close friends and stuff I really wanted to see. Back in those days I definitely used Twitter as a distraction, a thing to look at now and then and while away some time, a thing for finding information and following the news.
I think I was reasonably happy with the system. I could see what friends were saying on one account and follow all the shit on another so I had it all nicely organised. Then. 2016 happened. In terms of a crock of shit year 2016, I think, still rates as the worst I’ve experienced. The lies and propaganda spread for the two big plebiscites that year really got to me. It was when I realised that this country [UK] is full of people who are a “little bit racist”. Actually, most of the things that have happened since that vote also confirm that the majority of people in this country are a “little bit racist”. Then, there was the presidential election in the USA where citizens of that country proved that they are definitely “quite a lot racist”. The comments and commentary on Twitter slowly got to me emotionally. There always seemed to be shit happening and people would jump on to make comments and yet, when I listened to the news on the radio, these things weren’t mentioned.
Twitter and other social media sites seem to spend too much time reacting against things rather than actually consider them. There is an instantaneous effect where rage flies around and then the storm dissipates quickly enough. I got caught up in this and it did not help my mental health to be confronted with all that confrontation. I eventually made the decision to get rid of my “other people” account and keep the personal account. This stopped me looking at all the shit that people decided to commentate on. I haven’t had Twitter on my phone for quite a while as I got into some trouble at work following a tweet at the beginning of the current pandemic. I’m still not sure whether that tweet should have got me in trouble and I ponder that a lot, trying to work out my responsibilities.
A part of me would like to remove myself completely from Twitter. But, it is too ingrained in this website. Every communication I write tweets a thing out to let the world know there is new content. There are also a large number of links within this site that go to Twitter along with quite a few embeds. So, in the interests of sanity in keeping this site working I won’t be shutting down the Twitter account. I only comment on Twitter now and then. I use it to keep track of my current #roundtheworldtrip in X-Plane. Twitter is with me now, but I only look at it once a week or so in normal working times and so I feel mentally stable with that relationship.
See my Twitter feed on this site.
This is communication number 1935, there are reasons here, this is what happened in that year:
- There’s a coup attempt in Greece.
- The king of Siam abdicates.
- The north American Texan first flies.
- Air Mail from San Francisco to Hong Kong.
Pow!
I was a little shocked yesterday after I wrote a tweet that kinda blew up. Normally there’re not many who view my words and thoughts and I understand that. Who would be interested in what I have to say? I am not a regular tweeter who has a particular theme. I’m not in a position of power. So, I just say stuff that comes to mind. Below is my tweet as of 0650 GMT Mar 23 2020.
Thinking about what I wrote there is one main reason it went viral and that is Whitstable was trending at the time and probably also Skegness. This means this tweet would appear in those selective areas of twitter when people browsed. I didn’t do this deliberately but if you wanted a tweet to “hit it big” then I guess including trending hashtags and words is the best way. You have to deliberately write a tweet with all the right ingredients to make it go viral [or just be a cunt like Piers Morgan].
My phone kept pinging with all the notifications that I turned off those notifications for Twitter. It was actually annoying. I also scanned a few of the comments that people wrote in reply but didn’t really take them in. Much like I don’t allow comments on my YouTube videos or these communications I’m not interested in your opinions, you won’t change my mind unless I know you and I don’t need the emotional mess that some comments can create.
If Whitstable and Skegness were [in reality] busy yesterday then I am once again amazed at how stupid people are. Mind you, the country keeps voting Tory so I should already know.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) March 22, 2020
I think what I want to do is explain what the tweet means. I had some people comment that Skegness doesn’t have tory voters and that it’s not just tories out in Whitstable. I’d like to point out that I didn’t say that. I hedged my bets on whether the news was reliable first using the [in reality] bit. This allows the trending tweets to be not true and allows me to still say what I want to say. If the reports were true then I explained that I am amazed at how stupid people are. I am amazed at that. It freaks me out just how much people don’t listen or do the best for themselves. I know about it a bit because I’m a human too [believe it or not] and we all do stupid things at times but I have to say, gathering in large groups at the moment is really fucking stupid.
After explaining the stupidity I placed a full-stop. This means that sentence has now stopped. I start a new one explaining that I already know people are stupid because they keep voting tory. I even capitalised the word tory and I often don’t capitalise words that I don’t respect, thank god. I’m not calling tory voters stupid, I’m sure they have their reasons [mostly selfish] and I wasn’t calling anyone at Whitstable or Skegness tory although I was calling them stupid. I am consistently amazed that this country keeps voting the tories into power. I was chatting recently and that person said “you don’t have to be stupid to vote tory just greedy”.
I am glad that as I get older I get more and more left wing. I think we should be helping each other more. I think we should have certain things in state ownership. I’m not a communist or anything like that and I even think businesses should be able to run themselves within a strongly regulated framework. I think we should all act and behave in ways that benefit society and treat people humanely. I don’t think we do that at the moment. Anyway, it was interesting seeing a tweet blow up [a little]. I am amused it has 499 likes. Not quite the 500, but that’s just an integer which is half of a power of our number base system. 245 would have been nice.
Shootings
So, there’s been a shooting in the USA. There are always going to be shootings in the USA while guns are so easy to access. It’s really that simple. If you make guns easy for any idiot to purchase and use then they are going to use them. There should be a cooling off period and background checks. Oh, that and Mr Trump-Cunt removing the rules about the mentally ill buying guns.
It’s important to make sure that when news is presented that it is accurate and (preferably) unbiased. Even BBC R4 annoys me nowadays with John Humphries’s leading questions and stupid un-scientific knowledge. If I can shout at the radio “irrelevant” or “leading” or “biased” then the interviewer isn’t doing their job well.
I screen grabbed this from twitter:
I am not trying to point out that there haven’t been enough school based shootings, but I do want to point out that if you are trying to make an argument then you should be correct in your figures. I do not know what the actual number is for school shootings. Honestly, the fact that there is a number for JUST THIS YEAR means something is fucked. But all news people surely have a duty to represent the truth as best as they can find it. It doesn’t take much research to get that the 18 figure is misleading and that’s when the NRA will fuck you over.
Perfect Timing
Sometime last week I noticed that the number of tweets I had sent was nearing 10,000. I’m not a massive user of Twitter and a lot of those would be to do with the automatic tweets generated by this website. Every communication I write creates three tweets to catch most time-zones around the world. I’ve just over one thousand communications and so that’s around three thousand tweets.
The automatic tweets look similar to this:
A new https://t.co/djGFgCEBYq communication: M’era Luna 2017 – https://t.co/3b64UTxpNF #mera17
— Ian Parish (@iparish) August 17, 2017
Here’s what I wrote when I noticed 10,000 was coming:
I think I need to plan the next few tweets quite carefully. I’m coming up on a total of 10,000. Around 3000 of these have been automated.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) September 16, 2017
While keeping an eye on the count I had a few twitter conversations and was pretty sure I had got through the 104 barrier. I can’t see where in the iOS app there is a count so I had to wait to get to a PC to see how many I had done and count back if necessary. This morning I did that and the count was 10,011. The number on the website said 10k but you can hover and see the real number. So, I counted back and I am so very proud. My ten thousandth tweet was:
Being as plain as I can, Ress-Mogg is a cunt. He has antiquated views which he backs up with “faith”.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) September 21, 2017
When I wrote this I was aware it could be the barrier breaking tweet and my next tweet was:
If that last one was my 10,000 tweet I’ll be ultra pleased!
— Ian Parish (@iparish) September 21, 2017
I am so chuffed. What a brilliant comment to have as a power of ten tweet. In case some of you aren’t sure why I think that, then read this about his comments on gay sex and abortion. You could also read this for his views on foodbanks.
There is a slight controversy here though. I recently requested my twitter archive as I keep a copy for your interest here. Within this there is a csv file which I have looked at and counted the number of rows. It only comes to 9975. So, there’s a discrepancy between my archive and what the twitter website says. I’ll use the website as I don’t think I could have planned my breakthrough tweet much better.
Minor Break
I had a minor melt down on Twitter last night. Everything had got to me.
I don’t think I can follow the news anymore.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
I mean, I know I should be informed, and I want to be informed. But it depresses me so much.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
from looking at the news I know that my country [I’m not that patriotic] is screwed and being led by incompetents.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
Brexit is a bad thing for the UK. It already is a bad thing. It saddens me so much that we have no sense of society.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
We have no sense of cohesion with our fellow man. The 20 miles of water between UK and the mainland seem so much more now.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
The idea that we would want to be part of something bigger, some society of people, a gang with common interests, that idea is lost.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
Parliament MUST vote for the best interests of the country. They must stop this utter madness.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
If Brexit depresses me then the actions of the [soon to be] most powerful man on earth make me suicidal.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
He is a proven liar. An immoral, racist, misogynist, a child, a narcissist. The rest of his team are largely no better.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
Trump is a liar and a pompous prick. Theresa May hasn’t a fucking clue what to do.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
I just feel sad at it all. Sad for the loss of humility and humanity.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
There have been many times we have needed a strong press, the freedom to investigate, a sense of purpose.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
We need a strong press more than ever. But, I fear, the press is dying and there will be little or no “keeping the bastards straight”.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
And then:
So, I’m off to watch something funny. Because everything else is just sad.
— Ian Parish (@iparish) January 9, 2017
Psych
I recently completed watching the entire run of Psych. That might make it sound like I did a complete binge-watch of eight seasons but I have completed the show over seven years. I watched some on terrestrial TV, I recorded some from ITV4 and I also bought the DVDs when I got to the last four series.
After nearly seven years I have finished Psych. It’s helped me through kids, divorce and down times. Thanks guys. @DuleHill
— Ian Parish (@iparish) October 6, 2016
I have enjoyed the show thoroughly. It is well acted, written and photographed. I consider it a good use of my time. Like many of the TV shows I have loved it mixed developed characters with fun, jokes and seriousness. I even sat on my sofa and laughed out loud on occasions. Dulé Hill and James Roday were perfect in the lead roles and this is the second series I have watched with Dulé Hill, the previous being The West Wing, a show that left me with similar feelings to this one. Anyway, Mr Hill responded to my message:
@iparish 👊🏾 Boom
— Dulé Hill (@DuleHill) October 6, 2016
So this was a nice touch from someone who I assume is a nice person. However, I would also add that I have no wish to meet my heroes as they would all too easily disappoint.
In other news, but not new news, as this happened ages ago I got followed on Twitter by John Forbes Nash. Yes, that John Forbes Nash. I have no idea why he followed me or how he found me on Twitter. I was quite excited by this. I was also very saddened when he died in May 2015.
