'Hate speech' tweets painted at Twitter HQ in protest
A German satirist who claims Twitter is failing to delete hate speech has captured the firm's attention offline - by stencilling the offending messages outside its Hamburg office.
Shahak Shapira, who is Jewish, said he had reported 300 incidents of hate speech in six months, but Twitter had responded to just nine.
A YouTube video has emerged showing Mr Shapira stencilling 30 tweets.
"Germany needs a final solution to Islam," reads one.
"Let's gas the Jews," says another, in reference to the Nazis' murder of six million Jews during World War Two.
"If Twitter forces me to see these things, then they'll have to see them too," the artist said in the video, posted on Monday.
He described the comments as "not just plain insults or jokes, but absolutely serious threats of violence".
They include statements that are homophobic, xenophobic, or involve holocaust denial.
YOUTUBE/SHAHAK SHAPIRA
He said the nine responses he got from Twitter said the tweets did not violate the site's rules.
"I haven't received a single mail telling me a tweet was actually removed," he said.
Mr Shapira explained in the video, titled #HeyTwitter, that he had made stencils of the hate-filled messages, then travelled to Hamburg to paint them in front of the platform's headquarters.
"Tomorrow," he said, "they will have to look at all the beautiful tweets their company loves to ignore so much."
Hate speech is an especially sensitive subject in Germany due to the crimes committed by the Nazi regime in World War Two.
In June, the country passed a law which could force social media companies to delete racist or slanderous posts within 24 hours or face a fine of up to €50m ($58m; £45m).
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