Twitter used Direct Message instead of Private Message because they needed to establish that there is legally no understanding of privacy for DMs, because Twitter will surrender the contents of DMs to law enforcement / government / data collection. Fediverse should also use DM because there is again no guarantee of privacy (and you do not expect there to be).
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As if admins of the older forum softwares couldn't just query the database for anyone's private messages.
Didn’t they also switch the wording from “data protection” to “data usage”?
Still, the conversation is private, as in not public. Even if it is surrendered to the authorities, the'll probably never be released publicly (unless leaked).
I think Twitter might have been the first time I saw DM used but it stands for direct message.
Twitter is where it started.
And every 'hip' person started talking about sliding into someone's DM and it became the default application.
PM is still used in professional settings sometimes.
DM is direct message and seems to have started around the same time things culturally shifted away from forums and boards more toward social media.
And now people don't even understand me, like I wrote "I'll PM you" and they said "What 🤨" 🤦.
Guess I'll have to shift from using PM to DM... though it seems completely illogical to me, but hey, that's life I guess.
"I'll Prime Minister you"
"I'll prime meridian you"
"I'll post mortem you"
"I'll prima dona you"
"I'll Pringle Mingle you"
Gonna steal "pringle mingle", sounds like a great insult lol
"I'll dungeon master you"
"I'll deathmatch you"
That last one was probably used at some point in time though..
I somehow never realized it was a shift from forums. I've used both terms interchangeably with a bias towards DM. TIL
Same, but prefer PM. We both know what we mean :p
Yup, and that's what matters
I'll be you Dungeon Master any day ~~<3
Playing Tuesdays and Thursdays, bring a barbarian or fighter.
when did things change from people calling them PMs to DMs.
I don't think I've ever heard it called a "Pungeon Master"
You, are a pun-geon master.
PM means private message. Nothing on Facebook or Twitter ever suggested that personal messages were private, so they used direct message instead to make sure there was no legal confusion.
“Direct Message” , from Twitter.
I assume it's direct message. I also come from the forum scene and grew up with PMs. The cynic in me says maybe the big social media companies are shy of using the "private" word when their business model revolves around exploiting user data. Alternatively it's just language evolving over time.
DM stands for Dungeon Master, the person who makes up the story in the game Dungeons and Dragons
More like Dork Moron! Now give me your lunch money.
DM means Dungeon Master to me, so I go with PM, if I don't just say message.
I prefer the terms DM, especially if the messaging system doesn't rely on E2EE. If the server admins can read it, then it's not private.
Well, yes that is true, but still, it's not public either.
I might have to change my lingo to using DM instead of PM cuz some people don't actually know what I'm talking about.
Because of the phrase 'slide into the DMs'. I tried to 'slide into the PM' but the Prime Minister wasn't having any of that
Now it’s just the Dungeon Master of your local D&D group and apparently they were okay with it.
I rolled a 20, I don't make the rules!
Direct Message.
I've only really seen "DM" used this way with Twitter, so I have to assume that's what Twitter calls private messages.
Dude, everyone calls them DMs, on FB, here, Reddit... in fact, I've never seen anyone call them PMs, except for me.
Direct message became ubiquitous in the wake of "slide into your DM's" as a phrase.
At least in my experience.
DM/PM/IM all mean the same thing
It's what some people call a /whisper
Or /msg
i always preferred to /query
Just think of the P in PM as a D, but with a tiiiiiiny vertical line going down from the bottom left so it’s a P.
Good one 🤣.