Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt
from the musk-in-the-air dept
This week, as you might expect, the comments are dominated by responses to Elon Musk’s ongoing craziness at Twitter. On the insightful side, our first place winner is an anonymous summation of the ElonJet situation:
Twitter: It’s really, really bad if you share other people’s location information. If you do, we will ban your account.
Also Twitter: We are going to force you to share your location information with our advertisers.
In second place, we have a double-winner (the first in a while), taking first place on the funny side as well. It’s an anonymous comment about the purge of journalist accounts:
For all the people who came and screamed that Twitter was moderating based on political viewpoints, will come here and admit that it never was and this is what true viewpoint discrimination looks like.
But alas, I haven’t seen a flying monkey yet.
For editor’s choice on the insightful side, we start out with a comment from xyzzy suggesting some next steps for Elon’s hasty policy changes:
Constructive suggestion
Based on this I’m gonna guess the “What is in violation of this policy” section is going to get much longer over time. I suggest changing it to the more accurate “anything that gets under Musks thin skin” then never have to change it again, just trying to help.
Next, it’s Thad passing on a simple quote that’s relevant to Elon’s understanding of free speech:
“Freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.”
– A J Lieblin
Over on the funny side, we’ve already had our first place double-winner above, so it’s straight on to second place, which is Toom1275 with a more contemporary quote, this time about Elon banning the Mastodon account:
“I guess they were banned for revealing the location of where all the Twitter users were going.”
-Jason Goldman
For editor’s choice on the funny side, we start out with Ninja on a post that’s not about Twitter (but with a comment that is). Specifically, it’s about Marco Rubio’s bill to ban TikTok:
A much easier way to implode TikTok would be to have Elon Musk buy it.
Last but not least, it’s David with a quick comment about Twitter’s user exodus:
Last to leave switch off the Likes.
That’s all for this week, folks!
Comments on “Funniest/Most Insightful Comments Of The Week At Techdirt”
Given the new rules around users advertising where they can be found on other social media networks that dropped today, that’s a bit closer to reality than it was a few days ago.
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As usual, there’s a tweet for that:
https://arstechnica.com/civis/attachments/1671392711563-png.49020/
Transcription:
Re: Re:
Really, there is no point in reviewing statements of Musk B.T. in the light of Musk A.T. behavior. That’s like confronting the epiphanatic Paul with the statements of Saul.
Now that Musk has seen the darkness, he is not the same.
Re: Re: Re:
What do you mean “Now”? This is what he’s always been. Twitter exodus only opened the lid for everyone to clearly see it.
Re: 'No you can't leave, the only social media platform is MINE!'
I’d ask if anyone has told him that desperately trying to keep users from leaving like that is just going to speed up the exodus but as that would only matter if he listened I suppose it’s a moot question.
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Update: The new rules have been rescinded—the Twitter Support account deleted its posts announcing the policy change, the link in my original comment now 404s, and Musk apologized for making a major policy change without running a poll first.
I’d like to think that @dril basically asking for a ban was what changed Elon’s mind, but I know better.
Re: Re:
I would be more interested in the “Vote Musk out of the CEO position” poll (or even the effect it would have on the company) if I saw a way for Twitter to survive the debt load Musk loaded it with. I don’t, so…
Re: Re: Re:
Your wish has been granted.
Re: Re: Re:2
‘A former Twitter member of staff, who left the company recently, told the BBC that Mr Musk was “showing himself to be the incompetent fool we all knew he was”.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, they added: “His investors are surely looking at this now and questioning whether he was the right horse to back.
“I imagine he’s getting pressure from investors to step down and is using this poll to make it look like he’s following the will of the people instead of the will of those paying his bills.”‘
Using a poll to justify an action he wanted to do anyway? Nooo, that’s crazy talk…
Re: Re: Re:3
It’s also the most pathetic narcissism (yeah, I know…)
He has control over the platform, which means that any poll about what he does is way less trustworthy that any banana republic election. He’s counting the votes, he has access to control whose vote “counts” even if he doesn’t order a change to the databases directly, he could conceivably even alter the results as presented between the backend and frontend.
That he’s not doing this, but instead making excuses when the results don’t do his way is just pathetic. He’s not just looking for the result he wants, he’s looking for personal validation, and like other recent narcissists he can’t quite deal with the reality that other people might just have other ideas.
I think the safe bet is that when he was spotted at the World Cup final with Jared (also $2 billion in debt to the Saudis under suspicious circumstances), that he was told he had to change what he was doing, but then got surprised by an alternative viewpoint being displayed like he has at concerts recently.
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I can’t help but laugh at how much of a coward he is to still be using ‘polls’ to provide cover for what he does/plans to do.
‘Don’t blame me, the owner of the company for this change, blame the people who voted for it, and pay no attention to the fact that the polls always seem to end up on the result I wanted.’
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And even if that isn’t his intent, he’s still a moron for making major company decisions through user polls.
Re: Re: Re:2
Final talley: A bit past 57% in favor of Musk leaving.
Re: Re: Re:3
…which some people have predictably been saying is because of “bots” or because they should only count paying users or whatever.
I know it’s a self-selected sample, but I struggle to think of anyone I follow personally who wouldn’t be happy for him to disappear instantly, and most of those are only the people who haven’t quite mastered Mastodon or another alternative in a way that would allow them to easily take their followers with them.
Re: Re: Re:4
I’m sure they said exactly the same thing about the previous polls whose results they liked.
Re: Re: Re:3 Oh, he's not leaving...
“It’s interesting, these titles,” Musk said. “You know that there’s actually only three titles that actually mean anything for a corporation? It’s president, secretary, and treasurer. And technically they can be the same person. And all these other titles are just basically made up. So CEO is a made-up title, CFO is a made-up title. General counsel, a made-up title. They don’t mean anything.” – E. Musk, WSJ interview, Dec. 8, 2021
It’s a meaningless poll from the Troll-in-Chief.
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Isn’t that what the commenters here believe? Whenever I say that large generic speech platforms should not be censoring opinions based on viewpoint, they miss the point and tell me correctly that since those platforms are private property, they are free to censor as they wish.
So are you trying to mock Musk with this quote, or explain him?
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You can criticize bad moderation, but it still doesn’t make it censorship.
Not sure how this is so difficult.
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That’s glossing over the fact that Twitter got the most flak not for moderation but for flagging.
Which is not even “but I really want my bullshit to be amplified” but rather “but I really want my bullshit to be amplified without getting called out”.
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“…what I’m really saying is I should be allowed to shit-talk trans people and other marginalized groups on Twitter to their faces by using all kinds of insults and slurs—and all without receiving criticism, pushback, or consequences of any kind.” — Hyman Rosen, probably
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Even if you were right, which you are not, how is that relevant to the quote about freedom of the press?
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[Projects facts not in evidence]
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Given everything you’ve said about trans people and how you believe you have to continually confront them with the truth and confront them even harder whenever they try to “force their gender ideology down people’s throats” (i.e., ask you politely to use their correct name and pronouns)? I’m right and you’re afraid to admit it.
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You missed the followup sentence “but, of course, anyone who opposes my viewpoint should be met with immediate retribution, even if what they say is verifiable fact”.
I’ve seen more people banned for linking to factual evidence on “free speaking conservative sites” than I have bigots banned for hate speech on mainstream sites. That’s self-selecting sample, but they don’t seem to take kindly to opposing views so much as they claim when the opposition is against them.
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Everyone else realizes that “censoring opinions based on viewpoint” is your bad-faith gaslighting.
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All the more so as they’ve slipped up a few times and made clear what those ‘viewpoints’ are and in the process shown that platforms have very good reasons to moderate them.
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“Slipped up”, my foot. I’ve freely stated them when asked. Just visit the Musk threads, unflag the censored posts, and look.
Re: Re: Re:2
And in so doing shot your argument in the back and ensured that only fellow bigots will agree with you by making clear that when you say ‘platforms shouldn’t moderate viewpoints’ what you actually mean is ‘harassment, dehumanization and bigotry should not be moderated’.
There’s a reason the likes of Koby always get noticeably quiet anytime someone asks them to list what exactly they don’t want to see moderated Hyman and it’s because they at least are smart enough to understand that answering that question isn’t helping their/your argument.
Re: Re: Re:2
Impossible, as no posts have ever been censored on this site.
Re: Re: Re:3
I think he meant “uncollapse the flagged posts”.
Re: Re: Re:3
With the exception of spam, and non-spam accidentally deleted as spam (I was a victim of that in the past, and I hold no grudges against Mike for that. Mistakes happen.)
Re: Re: Re:4 And sometimes...
It takes techdirt a few hours to decide if my post is spam, and they miss my accidental double-posts, and all that is OK too.
Re: Re:
“censoring opinions based on viewpoint” sounds more ominous than “pointing out crap based on shittiness”.
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‘Pointing out crap (aka shittiness)’ doesn’t have nearly so much impact as does the word ‘censor’, when attempting to make a reader ‘feel bad’ for the writer. After all, who’s going to say, outright, “Wahhh, I just got shitcanned for being a lying asshole!” Even the dumbest of the RWNJ’s aren’t quite that low on the IQ scale….. yet.
Handy tip: whenever someone is alluding to his/her feelings while indiscriminately distorting reality, check your BS detector – it’s probably wailing at 110dB, minimum.
Re: Re: Re:2
I used to have my BS detector increase pitch as the BS got deeper. I had to stop that after losing every glass object in the house (wine glasses, window panes, even my neighbor’s glass eye) from resonance.
… I also forbade the TV to be tuned to the local Fox affiliate.
Re: Re: Re:2
‘Pointing out crap (aka shittiness)’ doesn’t have nearly so much impact as does the word ‘censor’, when attempting to make a reader ‘feel bad’ for the writer. After all, who’s going to say, outright, “Wahhh, I just got shitcanned for being a lying asshole!” Even the dumbest of the RWNJ’s aren’t quite that low on the IQ scale….. yet.
To that I would add ‘If someone complains about being kicked off of private property(online or off) one or more times but gets really dodgy and vague when it comes to why it’s probably a good bet that it’s not because more details would help their case and make listeners more sympathetic to them.’
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How are those “so popular I can’t describe them” opinions treating you bro?
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Mock. Definitely mock.
You have kept track of Musk’s record on free speech, the dichotomy between what he preached before buying Twitter, and his behavior now?
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Yes, Hymman, we’re mocking Elon here.
Even THOSE FINE CONSERVATIVE SITES YOU WERE BANNED FROM have that right to MODERATE.
You’re still able to say your fine opinions, aren’t you?
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Re: Re:
When I say that large generic speech platforms should not be censoring opinions based on viewpoint, the universal response here is that since the platforms are private, they may censor as they wish. (Which misses the point, of course, but never mind that for now.) In other words, you are saying that freedom to speak on a platform exists only for owners of that platform; everyone else is at their mercy and can say only the things the owners permit them to say, and this is right and good and protected by the 1st Amendment. Thus, you are validating the quote, which was obviously meant ironically.
So then tell me how this quote mocks Musk? He is doing just what you say that the large generic speech platforms are doing correctly, censoring opinions based on viewpoint.
It is as I have always said. When you enjoyed the censorship the large generic speech platforms were providing for you, you were happy to say that what they were doing was legal and good. Now that you hate the censorship that Musk is committing, all of a sudden that private freedom to censor doesn’t look so good at all, and TechDirt runs article after article on just how awful this censorship is.
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… you are being deliberately disingenuous.
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If you can’t make an argument without otherwording you don’t have an argument to begin with.
It’s almost like you ignore reality. When Musk has declared himself a free speech absolutist and that was the reason for buying Twitter, and then he goes on a rampage banning people left and right for whatever nebulous reason of the day it’s worthy of mocking.
No, it’s not always what you said. If you actually bothered to read the articles the common theme is how fucking stupid Musk acts, there is no real logic behind what he is doing – it’s always emotional clap trap in one way or another and at no point have any article said that Musk couldn’t run the platform as he wished, quite the contrary.
Considering how you have complained about “viewpoint discrimination/censorship” or whatever term you usually use, I thought you would be incensed about the current state of affairs but instead you try to make up strawmen arguments so you can gloat at some imagined emotional state the people have that have been pointing out Musk’s sheer idiocy.
Also, if you have missed it many people who didn’t like the direction Twitter took after Musk’s take over actually went to other social media platforms like Twitter instead of screaming about victimhood and viewpoint discrimination like you have done repeatedly. Sane and reasonable people know when they aren’t welcome and move on while reserving the right to point out the hypocrisy of a self-avowed “free speech absolutist”.
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Again, YOU ARE SPEWING YOUR WHITE SUPREMACIST OPINIONS HERE, HYMAN, YOU FUCKING TERRORIST.
Instead of THE FINE CONSERVATIVE SPACES YOU WERE FUCKING BOOTED FROM. THE SAME FUCKING CONSERVATIVE SPACES THAT DO THE SAME FUCKING THING. And how ELON IS DOING THE SAME FUCKING THING.
We are mocking Musk because he’s a rich fuck who claims to be FOR free speech, free expression and whatnot, but upon owning a “printing press”, he does WHAT YOU WANT.
He is enabling TERRORISTS like you. OE, FREE SPEECH FOR ME, BUT NONE FOR THE REST OF US.
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Your otherwording aside? Yes, that is true: You don’t have the right to use a platform you don’t own. Posting on such a platform is a privilege that was voluntarily extended to you—one which can be revoked if you break the rules of that platform. You can refer to the consequences for breaking those rules as “viewpoint discrimination” or “censorship” if it makes you feel more like a victim, but it won’t make your privilege any more of a civil right. (It also won’t make you any more “censored” than you were before you started using that platform.)
Two things.
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Re: Re: Re:2
So just as you woke ideologues use Orwell as a manual rather than a warning, you also take that quote about owning the press as ideal rather than ironic.
Woke ideologues are so busy braying their idiocy that they never seem to stop to listen to what they are saying.
Re: Re: Re:3
Jesse what the fuck are you talking about
also, rack up one more donation for the Trevor Project
Re: Re: Re:3
Meanwhile, authcap assholes regularly use 1984 as a fucking playbook and keep building on what 1984 expounded on.
AND I LIVE IN ONE OF THOSE AUTHCAP SHITHOLES, ASSHOLE.
FUCK YOU, AND EVERYONE OF YOUR TERRORIST SUPPORTERS.
Re: Re: Re:3
“woke ideologues use Orwell as a manual”
Lol, yeah read that book by a firmly committed socialist at some point. You might find that the parallels are not on the side of people saying that gays and brown people deserve equal rights (which is really all “woke” means, despite the right’s attempts to redefine the term. Redefining words being one of the bad guys’ tactics in that book by the way.).
Re: Re: Re:3 Give till you hurt
“woke ideologues”
Hot damn son you are giving my checkbook a workout. Keep em coming!
Re: Re: Re:3
[Projects facts contrary to evidence]
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Re: Opposite of advertising
If you spam an unrelated thread on an unrelated website, how does that act as advertising for the company?
All it does is tell people how crappy that company is, and acts as the opposite of advertising – it’ll drive business away. Nice job, Rekhtabooks.
GOOD
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Some context would help!
Is it one of those change “GOOD” to “EVIL” in less than 10 moves games perhaps?
Musk is saying what every straight person secretly wants to say, but doesn’t: the subjugation of everyone who is different. Thankfully some have seen the light and readily stand with us at pride events, but it’s not nearly enough.
The good news is that each and every one of Musk’s actions is turning people away from the dark side.
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“Musk is saying what every straight person secretly wants to say”
No, he’s not. I know it makes you people feel better to project your worst impulses on to everyone else in order to pretend you’re in the majority and not hateful scum that most people do not wish to associate with, but that’s not the case.
The reason so many people don’t agree with you in public is not because they’re afraid to speak out. It’s because they don’t agree with you.
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I’m straight, treat women, LGBT+ folks, and minorities like humans, and I don’t want to subjugate anyone who disagrees with me so…
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What are you scared of those who only ask that they be treated as people? Are you scared you might find out you are not as straight as you claim to be?
Re: Re:
Exactly. Every straight person you meet is secretly a gay who hasn’t come out of the closet yet. If anything, WE should be the majority.
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Can’t wait until January. The precedent set by the Jan 6 investigations should make for a very entertaining and informative next couple of years. My only hope is that the Right gives the same amount of effort the Twitter Files and Hunter Biden laptop investigations as the Left did Jan 6. Jan 6 investigations were good, but this next bit is going to be FANTASTIC. POPCORN!!!! GONNA NEED A MOUNTAIN OF POPCORN!!!
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They spent God knows how long on investigating Benghazi and didn’t end up with anything substantial to show for it. What makes you think this time will be any different?
Re: Re:
What makes you think that anonymous troll thinks?
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They got a silly Michael bay movie out of Benghazi, so there’s that.
I can almost forgive the Twitter stuff since it’s all so tied up in with Musk attempting to destroy as much credibility and money as possible in a short amount of time, even if a level-headed look at the whole thing doesn’t give you anything other than it being the right set of decisions for the most part.
I’m still mystified by the laptop. Even if you can trust the claimed contents of the device when it ended up in Rudy’s hands (and you really shouldn’t), the sequence of events that ended up there is absolute nonsense. Then, the claimed problems are that a traumatised rich kid liked hookers and blow and might have got a leg up from his dad? Cool, now do the last administration. Even in their wildest fever dreams, it doesn’t match up with “Jared gets $2 billion from the Saudis after the botched COVID response he was allegedly heading” or the documents hoarded after Trump’s term in office levels of corruption and nepotism.
Benghazi ended with a lot of wasted money, confirmation of things people already knew, and Republicans remaining convinced of accusations that were disproven. But, hey, at least they can waste time then blame the Democrats when nothing happens with other issues.
Re: Re: Re: 'Your guy just jaywalked!' 'Yours just shot someone.' 'Stop changing the subject!'
I’m still mystified by the laptop. Even if you can trust the claimed contents of the device when it ended up in Rudy’s hands (and you really shouldn’t), the sequence of events that ended up there is absolute nonsense. Then, the claimed problems are that a traumatised rich kid liked hookers and blow and might have got a leg up from his dad? Cool, now do the last administration. Even in their wildest fever dreams, it doesn’t match up with “Jared gets $2 billion from the Saudis after the botched COVID response he was allegedly heading” or the documents hoarded after Trump’s term in office levels of corruption and nepotism.
I suspect you can explain the disparity of reaction by those freaking out over the laptop story with a line I’ve seen bandied about once or twice: ‘It’s okay when a republican does it’.
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It’s not about the outcome. No one really cares that a couple of thugs got slapped on the hand or put in time out for a few months right or left. It’s about the nonstop media circus. It’s about the countless hours of committees and hearings. It’s about dragging this thing on for years and years pointing out the absolute moral bankruptcy of the left with the same vigor the left used to point out the same on the right.
Eventually, the American people will get fed up with this shit. That’s when we’ll see real change.
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Remind me, which “side” on this particular dichotomy botched the overall response to COVID-19, created the conditions that led to an insurrection against the federal government, and allowed the man who ended up inciting that insurrection to use the office of the White House for the personal gain of himself and his family? Because the last time I checked, that wasn’t “the left”.
The Democrat Party has a lot of issues. That much is easy to admit (and anyone who won’t is a fool or a liar). But acting like the Democrat Party as a whole is on the same level (or at greater levels) of moral bankruptcy compared to the GOP is a ridiculous farce of a premise. I didn’t see the Dems voting against bare-minimum federal protections for same-sex and interracial marriages, after all.
Re: Re: Re:2
He said “moral bankruptcy”, which presumably means more “gay people have rights” and “black people are allowed to complain about executions” rather than “poor people are allowed to die for profit”.
“The Democrat Party has a lot of issues”
The biggest being that while the Republican party over-represents a certain type of right-wing ideology, they are expected to represent everything from what would be centre-right in most other democracies to the actual left and even far left.
Unfortunately, while there’s still a stark rural vs. urban divide in the way voters are comprised and the emptier areas have more representative power per voter than where people actually live, there’s going to be problems. I’m not sure of the best solution, but when one party consistently loses the popular vote yet can control the way things are run, there are questions to be answered.
I’m not sure of the solution, but I think part of it has to be how people define the “left”. Not just on social issues, but in all areas it seems to be used to dismiss so many things that wouldn’t get a self-proclaimed conservative elsewhere concerned, and with politics being treated as a team sport, there’s actual conservative solutions being rejected in so many areas.
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It’s also worth mentioning that the Trump administration absolutely stacked the deck in their favor during their time in power. They got sexual deviants and harassers in charge of the courts. They threw people under the bus and pardoned them when it became convenient. And yet they couldn’t find anything. The best case scenario was that they didn’t care enough, the worst case scenario being there wasn’t anything there. Of course, this idea that they didn’t care enough is not exactly much of a “best case”.
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Shh honey the adults are talking.
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They had four years of unchecked, unrivaled power to put Hilary in jail and make Mexico pay for the wall. What they got was a lot of toadies who Trump had to pardon, and Mexico telling Trump to go fuck themselves. After which they said they were joking about their campaign promises and didn’t actually mean any of what they said. Well, until Trump got found with classified documents at Mar-a-lago and suggested the FBI was there looking for the Hilary emails. Which apparently are supposed to be important again?
Sustained effort is not the strong suit of the Republicans, my guy. It hasn’t been for a long time.