Hi, I would like to request that JB people stop po...

# meta

[Didier Villevalois]

Hi, I would like to request that JB people stop posting X links without explicitly saying so and always add an alternative link to the official kotlinlang website.

[hhariri]

I've followed up on the original message, but happy to discuss here too. Can you please explain how posting a link to X is a breach of trust?

[Didier Villevalois]

I answered there. 😆 I'll copy here, as indeed this might be a better place to discuss that.

[Didier Villevalois]

Sure, I trust JB to not send me to wild websites without my consent. Kotlin has websites for announcing new releases. I expect links posted about new releases to go there.

[Didier Villevalois]

I think if you want to really have an X post to collect "blue thumbs" (or whatever they call it there) then that should be specified in parentheses (e.g. "X post") and that the real link should also be added.

[Kirill Grouchnikov]

Breach of trust? Wild websites???

[Didier Villevalois]

@Kirill Grouchnikov should I repeat myself? Or is this just trolling? 😆

[Didier Villevalois]

I am quite sure that I am not the only one who thinks that and surely not the only one that doesn't want to add traffic to a website owned by an openly assumed neo-Nazi.

[hhariri]

@Didier Villevalois We've been posting information about our releases and links to social media from the very beginning. I don't believe these are illegitimate website or wild ones as you claim, independently of what you or I may think of the site itself or its founder. Some would say similar things about Facebook.

In regards to why information is posted on social media and that link shared as opposed to a link to the site, I'll let the marketing folks respond to that. Cc @Daria Voronina [JB]

[Youssef Shoaib [MOD]]

My $0.02:
• navigating thru Twitter just to get a link to the Kotlin website is just inefficient. If it was an embed, then it'd be fine IMO.
• I don't fully buy the "breach of trust" argument. You can hover over a link to see where it's leading you. I don't see direct harm happening from clicking on a single Twitter post.
• Sharing tweets is normal. If it were a link to a YouTube community post, I'd probably be more upset since it's a worse experience due to unfamiliarity.

[hhariri]

@Ruckus Again, comprehensible, but let's please not talk about breach of trust. I think it's a far fetch from posting a social media link.

[Didier Villevalois]

We've been posting information about our releases and links to social media from the very beginning.

@hhariri I know and I've been caught in the trap multiple times already. Hence my request. Adding a notice in parenthesis (e.g. "(X post)") and adding the real link costs nothing and avoid disagreeable surprises.
@Youssef Shoaib [MOD] the "hover" doesn't work on phones.

[hhariri]

@Didier Villevalois Sure. And I'm sure @Daria Voronina [JB] and the folks from marketing can take this as feedback. However, I'd appreciate being cautious with words used. I started this slack with around 10 people and focused primarily on Ktor. It's grown to what it is today serving the entire Kotlin community. We run Slack for the community and to the best of our knowledge, have never abused our position. In fact myself and the marketing team have been adamant not to.

[Chrimaeon]

It's a long press - at least on iOS

[Chrimaeon]

Id never click any link posted on Slack otherwise 😂

[Didier Villevalois]

@hhariri I appreciate that and this Slack has saved me hours of web searches since I started using Kotlin. I am very grateful that it exists.

The "breach of trust" may be strong words and I am sorry if that shocked you. But I do not expect to have to verify links posted officially by JB. This is where the notion of trust applies.

Sometimes links posted in announcements go directly to the official website and sometimes they do not. When people post links, there usually is a "preview panel" and, if I am not wrong, you have to explicitely click the "remove" cross icon. Even then, I check the links from any non-JB person here. But I would expect links posted for announcements by JB people without a "preview panel" to link to the official website and not to some other social network.

So I am just asking for more transparency.

[Didier Villevalois]

@Ruckus I may be too trusting. But it makes sense to me that release announcement links on an official JB slack (administered by JB) point to the official Kotlin source of truth that is the Kotlin lang website. You now make me wonder if I should be that trusting! 🙂

[Didier Villevalois]

I will be more cautious then if that's what everyone does.

[Daria Voronina [JB]]

Hello everyone! We’ve seen your feedback, and we’ll definitely keep it in mind moving forward. I’ll also make sure to pass it along to my colleagues. Apologies for any inconvenience, and thank you for sharing your thoughts with us!

[Zac Sweers]

If there's a goal of getting signal boosting across social media, another option could be just including links to multiple posts. There's a lot of folks that understandably feel x.com is essentially a nazi bar problem now and are turned off by it being the only reference in posts, but would understand its presence amongst a list of multiple social media links. LinkedIn, Bluesky, Mastodon, etc etc. It's more work from the JB side of course, but just food for thought!