Glacier Bay Books – a N. American publisher of independent and alternative manga – was inexplicably suspended from Twitter (less commonly known as X) in August.
In a tweet, Emuh Ruh of Glacier Bay Books explained that the official account for the publisher had been suspended suddenly, with no apparent reason given for the suspension.
FYI the @glacierbaybooks account has been suspended (no reason given lol)
— エマ・clay bird in mourning (@Quanticat) August 17, 2023
Since the initial suspension, Glacier Bay Books have made numerous attempts to reach out to support. In a direct message with Ruh, they explained the situation:
It was very difficult losing access to our publishing Twitter account @glacierbaybooks . At no point have we received an explanation or notification from Twitter about the suspended account, only discovering it had been locked when we tried to log in.
We used our Glacier Bay Books Twitter account for communicating with authors and readers and for sharing information about our current and forthcoming titles and publishing plans. We had built a vibrant comics-connected community on Twitter that we engaged with regularly. When this happened, I carefully checked the Twitter ‘X Rules’. Our account was not engaging in any behaviors that would violate their terms of use.
The suspension of the Glacier Bay Books account on our primary social media communication platform coming right as we were launching two new titles, and just weeks before we participated in 3 different festivals in September, was horribly timed. It has made it exceedingly difficult to promote our titles and presence to readers and connect with new fans. The loss of our account has also limited our ability to connect with authors who use Twitter as their primary means of communication.
At the time of publication, the Twitter account is still suspended with no official reason given. Since then, there has been strong support for the reinstatement of the account, with numerous fans retweeting and tagging Twitter’s official support account in hopes of speeding up the review process.
Once again asking @Support to please check the support ticket for our frozen book publishing account @glacierbaybooks . It has been locked for over a month now, for no / unknown reason.
— エマ・clay bird in mourning (@Quanticat) October 2, 2023
Earlier this year, the French animation website Catsuka also had issues with prolonged lack of tech/customer support from the social media website due to losing a phone with 2-factor authentication access and backup codes. They were able to tweet using a 3rd party app in the interim.
[Help!]
I can't log into my Twitter anymore since 1 week & @TwitterSupport is not responding.
I lost my phone (& 2FA app).
My backup codes didn't work.
I can still tweet using 3rd party tool.
But I can't comment, DM, etc.
If you're a Twitter employee/hero: https://t.co/tuO4m28ayC pic.twitter.com/OkGBq8nFtF— Catsuka (@catsuka) June 26, 2023
Fortunately, Catsuka regained access to their account at the beginning of October, citing that Twitter’s Support team finally helped them access the account.
I'm back!
I regained access to my Twitter/X account.
X Support finally answered me today, 4 months after contacting them & without being able to log into my account since June due to X 2FA bug.
I was still able to post using a 3rd party tool, but it stopped working few days ago. https://t.co/QeOI8T1L0b— Catsuka (@catsuka) October 1, 2023
Glacier Bay Books was founded in 2019/2020, and publishes a wide range of independent & alternative manga. Some of their works include the Glaeolia anthologies, Children of Mu-Town (Masumura Jushichi), F (Imai Arata), Rabbit Game (Miyoshi), Invisible Parade (Mississippi), and many more. Recent Glacier Bay Books releases include Mothers (Kusuhara Umi), Give Her Back To Me (Hana Chatani) and a reprint of the first issue of the popular Glaeolia anthology.
