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Comment by Graffur | Hacker News Reader

You're not the person I replied to. It was intended to be dismissive in response to "You don't get to message someone and cry "spam" when he replies.".

As for the response, it would be unsolicited by the fact the original tweeter did not ask/want a response from the Meme-ster. They tagged the wrong account.

Take this example:

John says to the person he thinks is Brad: I can't believe the weather today!

Emily says to John: What the fuck did you just fucking say about me, you little bitch? I'll have you know I graduated top of my class in the Navy Seals.... etc....

John's reaction to Emily: WTF who the hell is this? Why is she saying these things to me?

Now imagine this happens to be a common mistake that multiple make and Emily responds in this way every time...

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> Take this example

That's an example of a reply that is "unsolicited" and "also irrelevant", by your criteria.

I'm not trying to defend that combo here. You said such a screed is "also irrelevant", right?

That means even if a reply wasn't irrelevant, even if it was a useful response, it would still be unsolicited. Right?

Is that what you intended to say? Am I misreading something?

I think your understanding is affected by whatever definition of unsolicited is. Can you share your definition of solicited and unsolicited?

It's basically a synonym for invited. Or from a dictionary: "asked or invited to do, provide, or contribute to something". Unsolicited is the opposite.

If you send someone an invite to a discussion, they're invited, whether you meant to or not. At least long enough to send a single reply (which may be multiple tweets).

Whether their response is a polite "you tagged the wrong person" or some awful screed does not change whether a solicitation happened. Especially because tagging someone is not a request for any specific sort of reply.

Relatedly, if someone is eavesdropping in public and steps into a conversation to make the most wonderful helpful and loved comment in the world, doing that was still unsolicited.

I disagree completely. If you got a wedding invite to your address and name but you _knew_ it was intended for a person of the same name and similar address.. would you argue that you had a right to go to the wedding by the fact that you received an invite? Yes, it would be helpful for you to notify the sender that you got it by mistake but it doesn't mean you're invited and your message back to the sender wasn't requested because the whole thing happened by mistake.

Also tagging does not necessarily request a reply at all.

This is silly and will go in circles so I will finish by just saying.. What the fuck did you just fucking say about me, you little bitch? ....

I would say that you're not invited to the wedding, but you're definitely invited to a brief conversation.

And that's what twitter is, brief conversations.

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