8 ms·

As an aside, why does nearly every Twitter link take you to a page not found thus requiring a reload? This is a terrible user experience that should be easy to

by mjfern 7y ago

As an aside, why does nearly every Twitter link take you to a page not found thus requiring a reload? This is a terrible user experience that should be easy to fix.

notelonmusk 7y ago
"We've detected that JavaScript is disabled in your browser. Would you like to proceed to legacy Twitter?" > Clicks button > Nothing happens > Right Click Inspect Element > Delete Delete Delete Delete Delete Revenue US$3.04 billion Operating income US$453 million Net income Increase US$1.2 billion Total assets US$10.16 billion Total equity US$6.8 billion > Hmm...
- JohnTHaller 7y ago
  $ to support non-JS users > $ revenue from non-JS users
  - catalogia 7y ago
    $ lost serving non-JS users < $ lost getting an engineer to spend his time implementing dark patterns targeting non-JS users It's spiteful.
  - gray_-_wolf 7y ago
    That is simply not true in this case. All I need to get twitter readable with no-script is this ublock origin rule: ! 7/24/2019 https://twitter.com twitter.com##form.NoScriptForm The data (tweets) are there already, they just intentionally hide it.
    - chance_state 7y ago
      Could you please explain how you add that (those?) rules to uBlock Origin? I use UBO to block js across the web by default and would like to include twitter but their "no-js" site is garbage.
      - notelonmusk 7y ago
        left click > options > filters
- mcv 7y ago
  Like Amazon is intentionally enabling counterfeiting, Twitter's website is now intentionally broken. Somehow Twitter forgot how to build a functional website.
throwawaysea 7y ago
I've wondered the same thing. It seems to only happen on mobile browsers, and on both iOS and Android. I wonder if people who are logged in are subject to the same?
- kadoban 7y ago
  It seems to happen at least much less often when logged in. But yes, it is by far the jankiest thing I've ever seen in a supposedly serious tech company. No idea what failure has allowed that to happen for so long, it seems to be a permanent feature at this point.
alienallys 7y ago
Holy moly. I thought it was a thing with my phone and not a wider problem...
- dilyevsky 7y ago
  This has been going on for years. Twitter is just really bad at this software thing
ryanlol 7y ago
This has been going on for so long they simply must not give a shit.
andyfleming 7y ago
I’ve specifically noticed it when using the embedded browsers in apps. If I “open in safari”, it will load.
2ion 7y ago
Oh, when I open Twitter in Firefox on Android tweets fail to load in 95% of the cases, however the Twitter site itself loads fine enough to show me a Retry button I can press to fail at loading the tweet again. All the while accessing via 'app' and even embedded tweets on 3rd-party sites load fine. Can't recall when this started; must have been some time in 2018. On the desktop (in Firefox also, same addons and addon config too) things always work (as far as that can be said for a site as horribly slow as theirs). They have been completely below the bar in terms of UX for a long time now, at least for me. They used to have a lean, good/available and fast site, and now they don't.
- shantly 7y ago
  I'd assumed it was on purpose to push you toward the app. I don't see it as much on desktop.
- tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago
  On Reddit, I almost always downvote the "broken" link, just to make Twitter marginally less visible. At this point, the platform is so full of horrible UX and dark patterns that I want it to die.
mffnbs 7y ago
I always thought this was some sort of rate limiting that twitter applies to visits from aggregators like reddit or hn. I'm not sure how I originally made that assumption, though.
ikeboy 7y ago
They implemented a mitigation for an issue that had this as a side effect. See https://blog.twitter.com/engineering/en_us/topics/insights/2018/twitter_silhouette.html https://blog.twitter.com/engineering/en_us/topics/insights/2... and the last time this came up at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20123942 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20123942 Terrible engineering on their part.
- swang 7y ago
  thanks for this. when they released their new twitter version, i started getting all these pages where it would error out and none of the reload buttons would work. couldn't search the cause for this very well. i can't believe the resolution to this is to force users to reload yet again to load the site... ugh.
  - jakobegger 7y ago
    Whenever I get that error on my iPhone, I can just press the browsers reload button, and it works. (The reload button displayed on the page does not work)
    - lmpostor 7y ago
      lmao and I thought it was just the apps I was using, glad to know it is Twitter
axaxs 7y ago
It's worse than that...they provide a reload button even that does absolutely nothing, requiring you to manually reload the page. With all the money they've spent on engineering, it's mystifying why their system is such a dumpster fire.
Scramblejams 7y ago
Firefox on iOS simply won’t show me Twitter any more, even in private mode. Always says “something went wrong,” no matter how many times I reload. Oh well, didn’t need it anyway.
- Marsymars 7y ago
  I think it has something to do with their cookie requirements. Not too sure, I just stopped opening Twitter links rather than debugging why I couldn't load their contents anymore.

by mjfern 7y ago

As an aside, why does nearly every Twitter link take you to a page not found thus requiring a reload? This is a terrible user experience that should be easy to fix.

notelonmusk 7y ago

"We've detected that JavaScript is disabled in your browser. Would you like to proceed to legacy Twitter?" > Clicks button > Nothing happens > Right Click Inspect Element > Delete Delete Delete Delete Delete Revenue US$3.04 billion Operating income US$453 million Net income Increase US$1.2 billion Total assets US$10.16 billion Total equity US$6.8 billion > Hmm...

JohnTHaller 7y ago
$ to support non-JS users > $ revenue from non-JS users
- catalogia 7y ago
  $ lost serving non-JS users < $ lost getting an engineer to spend his time implementing dark patterns targeting non-JS users It's spiteful.
- gray_-_wolf 7y ago
  That is simply not true in this case. All I need to get twitter readable with no-script is this ublock origin rule: ! 7/24/2019 https://twitter.com twitter.com##form.NoScriptForm The data (tweets) are there already, they just intentionally hide it.
  - chance_state 7y ago
    Could you please explain how you add that (those?) rules to uBlock Origin? I use UBO to block js across the web by default and would like to include twitter but their "no-js" site is garbage.
    - notelonmusk 7y ago
      left click > options > filters
mcv 7y ago
Like Amazon is intentionally enabling counterfeiting, Twitter's website is now intentionally broken. Somehow Twitter forgot how to build a functional website.

throwawaysea 7y ago

I've wondered the same thing. It seems to only happen on mobile browsers, and on both iOS and Android. I wonder if people who are logged in are subject to the same?

kadoban 7y ago
It seems to happen at least much less often when logged in. But yes, it is by far the jankiest thing I've ever seen in a supposedly serious tech company. No idea what failure has allowed that to happen for so long, it seems to be a permanent feature at this point.

alienallys 7y ago

Holy moly. I thought it was a thing with my phone and not a wider problem...

dilyevsky 7y ago
This has been going on for years. Twitter is just really bad at this software thing

ryanlol 7y ago

This has been going on for so long they simply must not give a shit.

andyfleming 7y ago

I’ve specifically noticed it when using the embedded browsers in apps. If I “open in safari”, it will load.

2ion 7y ago

Oh, when I open Twitter in Firefox on Android tweets fail to load in 95% of the cases, however the Twitter site itself loads fine enough to show me a Retry button I can press to fail at loading the tweet again. All the while accessing via 'app' and even embedded tweets on 3rd-party sites load fine. Can't recall when this started; must have been some time in 2018. On the desktop (in Firefox also, same addons and addon config too) things always work (as far as that can be said for a site as horribly slow as theirs). They have been completely below the bar in terms of UX for a long time now, at least for me. They used to have a lean, good/available and fast site, and now they don't.

shantly 7y ago
I'd assumed it was on purpose to push you toward the app. I don't see it as much on desktop.
tgsovlerkhgsel 7y ago
On Reddit, I almost always downvote the "broken" link, just to make Twitter marginally less visible. At this point, the platform is so full of horrible UX and dark patterns that I want it to die.

mffnbs 7y ago

I always thought this was some sort of rate limiting that twitter applies to visits from aggregators like reddit or hn. I'm not sure how I originally made that assumption, though.

ikeboy 7y ago

They implemented a mitigation for an issue that had this as a side effect. See https://blog.twitter.com/engineering/en_us/topics/insights/2018/twitter_silhouette.html https://blog.twitter.com/engineering/en_us/topics/insights/2... and the last time this came up at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20123942 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20123942 Terrible engineering on their part.

swang 7y ago
thanks for this. when they released their new twitter version, i started getting all these pages where it would error out and none of the reload buttons would work. couldn't search the cause for this very well. i can't believe the resolution to this is to force users to reload yet again to load the site... ugh.
- jakobegger 7y ago
  Whenever I get that error on my iPhone, I can just press the browsers reload button, and it works. (The reload button displayed on the page does not work)
  - lmpostor 7y ago
    lmao and I thought it was just the apps I was using, glad to know it is Twitter

axaxs 7y ago

It's worse than that...they provide a reload button even that does absolutely nothing, requiring you to manually reload the page. With all the money they've spent on engineering, it's mystifying why their system is such a dumpster fire.

Scramblejams 7y ago

Firefox on iOS simply won’t show me Twitter any more, even in private mode. Always says “something went wrong,” no matter how many times I reload. Oh well, didn’t need it anyway.

Marsymars 7y ago
I think it has something to do with their cookie requirements. Not too sure, I just stopped opening Twitter links rather than debugging why I couldn't load their contents anymore.