Amtrak Alerts and Notices

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daybeers said:
Don't worry, it'll certainly fail again. They need a long-term solution.
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Especially now the Mr. Musk is threatening to put up a general pay wall around X. At least I don't plan to pay real money to retain access to that garbage dump fire. It will be interesting to see what Amtrak does for their wobbly Alert system. I hope they have at least fired the crew that chose Twitter as their primary Alerting platform by now.
 
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TinCan782 said:
Just read on FB that Amtrak Alerts are back on X/Twitter.

Nevermind, still only seeing the two alerts when I first posted this.
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Honestly, as one who never has used X/Twitter etc, why would one want to Pay Musk to use it???( and to read all the garbage on it!!)

Remember when the Internet was going to be "Free" for everyone???
 
Amtrak has been piping the Amtrak Alerts and NEC Alerts into the Status portion on the website and it will show up even when the X/Twitter feed breaks. Of course the drawback is you have to lookup a specific train/station combination but if an alert exists in either feed it will show up under a heading "Amtrak Alerts." Still not in the mobile app yet. I wouldn't be surprised if long term Amtrak has a desire to move away from Twitter/X due to the numerous API and other controversial changes Mr. Musk has made in his quest to be a major political influencer and if they don't I hope they'll consider it.
 
PVD said:
You don't pay for a regular personal account, it is still free. You don't pay Musk. However, advertisers and data miners pay, as do corporate users (and some folks who want special status.) His policies have made it a less attractive company to do business with, hence the exodus of users, large and small.
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Musk, during a meeting with Netanyahu within the last few days, has said that he intends to institute a per account charge and remove all accounts that do not agree to pony up. It is just a question when, not if, at this point. His argument is that this will eliminate the scourge of bots, since they will also cease to be free, and at least a funding source will become visible.

Although if he does not require having an account to read some subset of stuff that might still work for Amtrak as long as it pays Musk to be allowed to post stuff.

Personally since I neither post nor like or retweet anything I don't care either way.
 
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MODERATOR NOTE: The "No Amtrak Alert Tweets" thread has been merged into this thread since both threads discuss pretty much the same topics.
 
Bob Dylan said:
Honestly, as one who never has used X/Twitter etc, why would one want to Pay Musk to use it???( and to read all the garbage on it!!)

Remember when the Internet was going to be "Free" for everyone???
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I don't pay to use Twitter; I'm subjected to advertising.
I only follow Amtrak, Amtrak Alerts, Amtrak OIG, Pacific Surfliner, Metrolink, National Weather Service so that reduces what I see. I dont like, comment or otherwise respond to any Tweet.
If pay-to-play on Twitter happens (as has been recently reported), I'll be out of there!
 
Bob Dylan said:
Remember when the Internet was going to be "Free" for everyone???
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TANSTAAFL
Someone has to pay. And access has never been free. Right now, my free-to-me is paid by advertising. (Yes, this makes me a product.) Rarely I convert free to paid. X-Twitter wasn't very high up on the list of "willing to pay for" services and is rapidly sliding down.

My issue with Mr. Musk-X is the very strong feeling of being jerked around. Like, y'know, he has no clue what he's doing, but he owns the company so he's going to do it anyway. I used to pay Microsoft for the privilege of being a beta tester. I'm not going to pay for the privilege of being a market study dummy.
 
I think "X" alerts for Amtrak will eventually go the way of the public timetable, Amtrak being too cheap, lazy, and inept to maintain it or pay for it or write their own reporting system. One of these weeks, it will go away and not come back. Why else would the left of political center Amtrak CEO stick with Musk? You will have to look up a specific tran to find out anything about its operation as you have to pretend to make a reservation to get a timetable.

Strange the NEC one stayed up most of the last few days, but the national system one was out consistently for nearly 2 weeks, or perhaps not so unexpected.

PATH rail system also relies on Twitter, a system as arrogant to and disdainful of the riding public as Amtrak.

Amtrak, PATH, X - misery loves company.
 
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I don't tweet (although the hubby does). When I needed to check train status for the trains my kids were coming home from college on, I'd use the Amtrak app (on my phone) or that third-party interactive map (on PC and phone) which shows the current location of each train, with further status details if you mouse over/tap on that train's number.
 
MccfamschoolMom said:
I don't tweet (although the hubby does). When I needed to check train status for the trains my kids were coming home from college on, I'd use the Amtrak app (on my phone) or that third-party interactive map (on PC and phone) which shows the current location of each train, with further status details if you mouse over/tap on that train's number.
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What many of us are looking for is the alerts that tell us why trains are running late (like due to downed trees, etc). Yes, we can all use Amtrak Status and the the 3rd party websites/apps to get the basic info (times), but some of us crave more info. ;)
 
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Devil's Advocate said:
US airlines can update conditions via text, email, web, and app, so why not Amtrak? I'm unaware of any other carrier that expects everyone to use TwiX.
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In fairness they are texting and sending alerts via the app when you have an active associated reservation and an active delay. I got multiple alerts on my most recent trips - most recently related to the New York flooding. Where its difficult right now due to inconsistencies with the twitter feeds is for us observers who wish to see whats going on with a particular train out of curiosity.
 
lordsigma said:
In fairness they are texting and sending alerts via the app when you have an active associated reservation and an active delay. I got multiple alerts on my most recent trips - most recently related to the New York flooding. Where its difficult right now due to inconsistencies with the twitter feeds is for us observers who wish to see whats going on with a particular train out of curiosity.
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Delta, American, & United publish updates via web and can push text updates to US/CA phones. DL & AA can also push updates to email. None of these options requires a reservation last I checked. Southwest offered a similar service in the past but has apparently disabled it.
 
Devil's Advocate said:
Delta, American, & United publish updates via web and can push text updates to US/CA phones. DL & AA can also push updates to email. None of these options requires a reservation last I checked. Southwest offered a similar service in the past but has apparently disabled it.
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I just found there is a new site where you can subscribe to email/text alerts for any train if one doesn't have a reservation. Its kind of hidden in the menu bar at the bottom - had never noticed it before. https://www.amtrak.com/tickets/delay-alerts.html
 

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