For what it's worth, I'm as anti-Trump as they come. Trump was at the top of my "can't wait to read about his passing" list until Putin decided to "de-Nazify" Ukraine by emulating Hitler. However, I'm pretty "meh" about whether Musk's Twitter allows him back on the platform in six months (how long folks are expecting for the deal to close).
Thoughts I posted over at Facebook that explain why (I hope you don't mind the repost):
I think that the fundamental issue in evaluating the "Future of Twitter" is that the pundits are projecting their visions of Musk's free speech views on Dick Costolo's Twitter.
Who is Dick Costolo? He was the CEO that decided to turn Twitter from being a tech company into the media company it is now. Prior to Costolo, Twitter had a robust application programming interface (API) that allowed third-party developers to build on top of its infrastructure, and we saw a lot of useful innovation in that space in the form of better Twitter clients for different audiences, easier access to public data, and so forth.
Costolo shut that down under his leadership[1], resulting in a single uniform Twitter experience that ran through Twitter and one that Twitter could monetize through ads and other feed manipulations. I just pulled up the Fresh Comics Twitter page, and it was encouraging me to check out "The Real Housewives of Lagos" (?!?!).
People's complaints about harassment and other issues on the (current) platform are the outcome of Costolo's Twitter deciding that it and it alone decided what The Twitter Experience would be (and what it had to be to hit its quarterly numbers). If Twitter under Musk reverts to a pre-Costolo state where third-party developers can meaningfully access the platform, that opens up whole vistas of opportunities to deal with the issues that folks are concerned with.
Worried that you'll be harassed by right-wing trolls? Use a third-party client that supports block lists that filters them into the spam bin.
Worried about false information being spread on the platform? Add a plugin that hooks into reputable fact-check sites that adds context to single tweets.
If Musk reverts Twitter back to an open platform, he also opens up the space for creating innovations to address problems on the platform to its community. Twitter on its own - operating in its ad-imposed silo - haven't proven to be doing that good of a job on that front themselves. Why not crowdsource some of the problem solving to the folks most affected themselves, and be ruthless about assimilating the useful innovations back into the core platform?
Interesting days are ahead of us, should Musk follow-through (and I have ZERO reason to doubt that he will).
Absolutely on point. Twitter as a tech company with an API and “bootstrap” JavaScript/browser CSS environment spawned a thousand startups. Learning how to do microblogging at scale invigorated multiple industries. Then Twitter decided to go for ads and eyeballs. I agree Musk needs to go back to architecture and structure. It can be done without sacrificing social media ideals. And I actually trust Musk to do it because he has an end state vision.
A pal of mine over at Facebook (John L) had the following interesting speculation:
"-Starlink successfully fended off Russian jamming attempts. It's a low bandwidth LEO network which does not rely on terrestrial infrastructure."
"-Tesla are interconnected vehicles in which a Starlink node might conceivably be built. 'The new rectangular dish is 12-inches wide and 19-inches long and weighs 9.2 pounds, which is a little over 4 Kg.' Sounds like a Tesla roof panel to me. Maybe anchors for a mesh network?"
"-Twitter is a low bandwidth, mobile friendly communication platform with global reach."
"Global telecommunications independent of traditional fixed and mobile telecom providers?"
Normally, that sounds like a reach, but this is Elon Musk. He's the only reason right now, we can tell Russia to go to hell with respect the the ISS and other manned spaceflight because he had the vision for a useful private space industry and saw it through to the Dragon capsules that are splashing down with humans these days. I've literally missed out on a million dollars betting against the guy (sold my 2011-era TSLA position back when he was having a Twitter slap fight with the cave diver - I made a GREAT return on that sale, but nowhere near what it would be had I held on).
John L's observation came up in the discussion of another speculation (via JVL at The Bulwark) that Musk needs Twitter to keep valuations of the rest of his stuff afloat:
"My mini-grand theory is that this entire sequence of events: The Twitter purchase, the SEC escalation, Tesla’s blowout quarter - it’s all about the next giant package. Musk saw an opportunity at the beginning of the year. Tesla’s business was on a roll, his pay package was almost complete, the SEC was threatening his Twitter account, and Tesla’s stock had stalled out for six months. Every great entrepreneur understands the importance of momentum and he decided to capitalize on this confluence of events."[1]
Or it can all be a dick-measuring contest with Jeff Bezos who already owns a streaming company, a network backbone that powers half the internet, a worldwide distribution system, and the Washington Post. It’s good to have Robber Baron wars like in the days of the Carnegies, Rockefellers and Vanderbilts.
Go to any right wing social media site and tell them your Jewish. And then watch what "free speech absolutist" is going to do to twitter. I honestly don't think its going to happen. Musk isn't stupid and the last thing he wants is a mass exodus from twitter and that is what will happen if it becomes a cesspool. I'm not really bugged by the buy, I really don't understand it but whether I stay on twitter isn't worth stressing over. But it is just like twitter for everyone to jump to conclusions and hyperbole about the sale.
If the leftists who built Twitter don’t like what Musk wants, they can bail, get funding, and build something better/more acceptable to them. Musk’s accountability is built-in.
For what it's worth, I'm as anti-Trump as they come. Trump was at the top of my "can't wait to read about his passing" list until Putin decided to "de-Nazify" Ukraine by emulating Hitler. However, I'm pretty "meh" about whether Musk's Twitter allows him back on the platform in six months (how long folks are expecting for the deal to close).
Thoughts I posted over at Facebook that explain why (I hope you don't mind the repost):
I think that the fundamental issue in evaluating the "Future of Twitter" is that the pundits are projecting their visions of Musk's free speech views on Dick Costolo's Twitter.
Who is Dick Costolo? He was the CEO that decided to turn Twitter from being a tech company into the media company it is now. Prior to Costolo, Twitter had a robust application programming interface (API) that allowed third-party developers to build on top of its infrastructure, and we saw a lot of useful innovation in that space in the form of better Twitter clients for different audiences, easier access to public data, and so forth.
Costolo shut that down under his leadership[1], resulting in a single uniform Twitter experience that ran through Twitter and one that Twitter could monetize through ads and other feed manipulations. I just pulled up the Fresh Comics Twitter page, and it was encouraging me to check out "The Real Housewives of Lagos" (?!?!).
People's complaints about harassment and other issues on the (current) platform are the outcome of Costolo's Twitter deciding that it and it alone decided what The Twitter Experience would be (and what it had to be to hit its quarterly numbers). If Twitter under Musk reverts to a pre-Costolo state where third-party developers can meaningfully access the platform, that opens up whole vistas of opportunities to deal with the issues that folks are concerned with.
Worried that you'll be harassed by right-wing trolls? Use a third-party client that supports block lists that filters them into the spam bin.
Worried about false information being spread on the platform? Add a plugin that hooks into reputable fact-check sites that adds context to single tweets.
If Musk reverts Twitter back to an open platform, he also opens up the space for creating innovations to address problems on the platform to its community. Twitter on its own - operating in its ad-imposed silo - haven't proven to be doing that good of a job on that front themselves. Why not crowdsource some of the problem solving to the folks most affected themselves, and be ruthless about assimilating the useful innovations back into the core platform?
Interesting days are ahead of us, should Musk follow-through (and I have ZERO reason to doubt that he will).
[1] https://slate.com/technology/2012/08/twitter-api-changes-social-network-cracks-down-on-third-party-apps-outrages-developers.html
Absolutely on point. Twitter as a tech company with an API and “bootstrap” JavaScript/browser CSS environment spawned a thousand startups. Learning how to do microblogging at scale invigorated multiple industries. Then Twitter decided to go for ads and eyeballs. I agree Musk needs to go back to architecture and structure. It can be done without sacrificing social media ideals. And I actually trust Musk to do it because he has an end state vision.
A pal of mine over at Facebook (John L) had the following interesting speculation:
"-Starlink successfully fended off Russian jamming attempts. It's a low bandwidth LEO network which does not rely on terrestrial infrastructure."
"-Tesla are interconnected vehicles in which a Starlink node might conceivably be built. 'The new rectangular dish is 12-inches wide and 19-inches long and weighs 9.2 pounds, which is a little over 4 Kg.' Sounds like a Tesla roof panel to me. Maybe anchors for a mesh network?"
"-Twitter is a low bandwidth, mobile friendly communication platform with global reach."
"Global telecommunications independent of traditional fixed and mobile telecom providers?"
Normally, that sounds like a reach, but this is Elon Musk. He's the only reason right now, we can tell Russia to go to hell with respect the the ISS and other manned spaceflight because he had the vision for a useful private space industry and saw it through to the Dragon capsules that are splashing down with humans these days. I've literally missed out on a million dollars betting against the guy (sold my 2011-era TSLA position back when he was having a Twitter slap fight with the cave diver - I made a GREAT return on that sale, but nowhere near what it would be had I held on).
John L's observation came up in the discussion of another speculation (via JVL at The Bulwark) that Musk needs Twitter to keep valuations of the rest of his stuff afloat:
"My mini-grand theory is that this entire sequence of events: The Twitter purchase, the SEC escalation, Tesla’s blowout quarter - it’s all about the next giant package. Musk saw an opportunity at the beginning of the year. Tesla’s business was on a roll, his pay package was almost complete, the SEC was threatening his Twitter account, and Tesla’s stock had stalled out for six months. Every great entrepreneur understands the importance of momentum and he decided to capitalize on this confluence of events."[1]
We live in interesting days.
[1] https://www.readmargins.com/p/elons-giant-package
Or it can all be a dick-measuring contest with Jeff Bezos who already owns a streaming company, a network backbone that powers half the internet, a worldwide distribution system, and the Washington Post. It’s good to have Robber Baron wars like in the days of the Carnegies, Rockefellers and Vanderbilts.
Go to any right wing social media site and tell them your Jewish. And then watch what "free speech absolutist" is going to do to twitter. I honestly don't think its going to happen. Musk isn't stupid and the last thing he wants is a mass exodus from twitter and that is what will happen if it becomes a cesspool. I'm not really bugged by the buy, I really don't understand it but whether I stay on twitter isn't worth stressing over. But it is just like twitter for everyone to jump to conclusions and hyperbole about the sale.
If the leftists who built Twitter don’t like what Musk wants, they can bail, get funding, and build something better/more acceptable to them. Musk’s accountability is built-in.