GMA News reporter and Palace correspondent Joseph Morong on Wednesday thanked the people who offered him messages of support after one of his now-deleted tweets went viral because its background that inadvertently captured an explicit image.
The broadcast journalist took to Twitter and Facebook to explain himself, as well as urged his followers to “relax” and move on to “more important things.”
“Relax guys haha thanks for the messages of support, labyah haha not my RT (retweet), happened to show in my TL (timeline). All good. hehe. there are more important things to do *wink* hehe,” Morong tweeted on Tuesday.
Relax guys haha thanks for the messages of support, labyah haha not my RT, happened to show in my TL. All good. hehe. there are more important things to do *wink* hehe pic.twitter.com/fTXfzziUKG
— Joseph Morong 🇵🇭 (@Joseph_Morong) June 16, 2020
Morong reiterated his explanation on his Facebook page that has more than 51,000 followers and said, “Thanks guys for your messages of support. It’s all good. It’s not my retweet. It just happened to show in my timeline. Relax hehe”
Online users continuously offered their words of support following his explanation. Morong’s name also topped the Twitter Philippines’ trending list from Monday evening until Tuesday.
“Salamat Sir Joseph, palagi mo kami ginigising sa tuwing inaantok na kami. And thank you rin sa call report na ginagawa niyo right after the briefing. Hahaha!” Mark Averilla, a social media personality, said.
“Hahahah! That’s why we like you bec of your composure in dealing the issue!” wrote a Twitter follower with a series of smiling emojis.
“Funniest honest mistake. Still one of the most credible journalist,” a Facebook user said.
Morong, who is known on social media for his detailed and outlined summary of President Rodrigo Duterte‘s addresses on COVID-19 matters, caught the local online community’s attention for tweeting a selfie while waiting for the chief executive’s speech on June 15.
His now-deleted tweet was captioned: “Kaway kaway sa buhay pa hehe waiting for the airing of Pres. Duterte’s address hehe.”
JOSEPH MORONG AVE MARIA PURISIMA. pic.twitter.com/oVbsQ7vSv9
— ALT KAPUSO (@AltKapuso) June 15, 2020
The selfie’s background was a screen of his laptop which featured an image of what appeared to be two naked men on his Tweetdeck timeline.
Morong said that he did not retweet the picture but it appeared on his Twitter timeline.
Tweets of an account you are not following could still appear on your timeline as Twitter allows its users to see the “liked” tweets of accounts they are following.
A post could also appear on one’s timeline if an account has retweeted or re-shared a post, even if the original poster or OP is not being followed by the user who saw the retweeted post.
Shortly after he took the selfie, Morong also joked if he should lessen the Twitter accounts he is following.
“Hahaha un malilinis at busilak na lang haha joke lang. but sorry about that,” he tweeted.
Morong also warned his followers about the retweet button on the platform and added that “you’ll never know what’ll show on your timeline.”
He previously went viral for telling presidential spokesperson Harry Roque to “relax” after the latter had a heated exchange with another reporter during a virtual presser last month.
