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[Nobody_Important]

I’d only use twitter for business at this point. If twitter somehow becomes less of a hellhole because of elon, then good

Musk would have to buy the whole thing in order to make any serious changes and even then it would still be a hell hole. There is a reason why every single social media outlet is plagued with issues.


People in general just kind of suck. The only way to have a social platform and have it not go to complete shit is to have it be small enough to where there is not enough people to ruin it. To use a video game reference for this kind of thing it's why smaller guilds in MMOs generally last longer and/or operate better then the mega guilds that are only caring about member counts. Less people means less drama. Less drama means less conflict.


So long story short social media will always suck because when you get enough people together and throw sports, politics, and media into the mix you are always going to get a shit show every single time.

 

[n0razi]

Yup... Twitter is not the problem... anything that becomes popular enough will eventually go to shit

 

[BigBooper]

Yes, it is unfortunate that people cannot divorce from social media. It's basically a drug addiction. I could see social media becoming like the tobacco industry eventually as we learn more about the harm it does to society. Until that day, at the very least, you won't catch me on any social media accounts.

I agree with your wanting to keep government out of business in such things. One thing I think needs to not be ignored though is Twitter actively removes information about hot social issues that it doesn't like and labels it disinformation. Lots of the things they remove are disinformation, plenty aren't.

I really wish the momentum was still going to hold Twitter and social media accountable for the things that are published on their platform if they allow it to stay up. If they are moderators of what is "true," then take them at their word and hold them partially responsible for libel, terrorist activities, criminal conspiracies, etc that take place on their platform.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

More than anywhere else? It's not even the second largest social media website. Hell it isn't even the third most popular. Facebook, Instagram, and Reddit all have more daily activity and traffic than Twitter does. Calling it "the public square" is ridiculous. It's a private platform that is entitled to impose it's own ToS. If you want to use it then just follow the rules. If you break them you get suspended or banned. That's not a free speech issue. Also the narrative that Twitter only allows one viewpoint or bans everyone of a certain political opinion is also nonsense.

I imagine the railroad tycoons of the 19th century said similar things about competing forms of transportation. "Just take a boat if you have issues with our policies."

 

[DeepBreath87]

Musk would have to buy the whole thing in order to make any serious changes and even then it would still be a hell hole. There is a reason why every single social media outlet is plagued with issues.


People in general just kind of suck. The only way to have a social platform and have it not go to complete shit is to have it be small enough to where there is not enough people to ruin it. To use a video game reference for this kind of thing it's why smaller guilds in MMOs generally last longer and/or operate better then the mega guilds that are only caring about member counts. Less people means less drama. Less drama means less conflict.


So long story short social media will always suck because when you get enough people together and throw sports, politics, and media into the mix you are always going to get a shit show every single time.

I don’t disagree. But as long as our political leaders and large corporations are active and taking the platform seriously, it matters. Twitter isn’t going to scale back to manageable numbers anytime soon. So while Twitter still has public relevance, anytime it toward allowing more free discussion will be welcomed.

I don’t have a Twitter account anyway, so I’m not heavily invested, but like I said, if Twitter is a little less blatantly ideological due to this, I’m going to be pleased because Twitter has cultural relevance, even if I wish it did not.

 

[Halo is Back]

Twitter is not a public square.

No, but it's a virtual square for weirdos

 

[Ozzy Onya A2Z]

That's funny. I just saw a video last night on youtube talking about how he was considering building his own social media platform. One of the hosts said, "well why not just buy Twitter and change it that way?"

Why do that when you can make a town square statement about starting a competing product, tank their share price and then just buy a nice chunk now primed to return on your investment. He's very good a walking the lines about insider trading stuff combined with social influence and even better at investing with solid timing. Looks like he was probably in around $38-39 a share and with his news jumped to a 6 months high of $49 a share. Dude already made bank if he just dropped his holdings right away. We all should start an ETF called Friends of Elon.

 

[Nobody_Important]

I imagine the railroad tycoons of the 19th century said similar things about competing forms of transportation. "Just take a boat if you have issues with our policies."

Not even remotely similar.

 

[AnotherDayAnotherDollar]

Twitter is really undervalued IMO. Facebook is almost at 700B. Youtube is estimated to be worth 200B or so. Twitter is at 30B. Gettr, truth social, etc are all doomed from the start since their main goal is political talk. People are on twitter for memes and quick news/clips.

They haven't be able to monetize their product correctly while doubling down on banning right wing folks and turning a blind eye to left wing folks. At 9.2% and the biggest shareholder Elon will have a major voice on what goes in the company. Surprised he didn't get more, but maybe that's still to come.

Don't be surprised if Twitter's algorithm becomes Open Source in the near future while at the same time allowing dissenting voices to be heard. Unbanning some popular members who were banned will cause a major uproar too which I'm looking forward to lol.

 

[dr_octagon]

nor do I have online 'enemies'

 

[DeepBreath87]

Twitter is really undervalued IMO. Facebook is almost at 700B. Youtube is estimated to be worth 200B or so. Twitter is at 30B. Gettr, truth social, etc are all doomed from the start since their main goal is political talk. People are on twitter for memes and quick news/clips.

They haven't be able to monetize their product correctly while doubling down on banning right wing folks and turning a blind eye to left wing folks. At 9.2% and the biggest shareholder Elon will have a major voice on what goes in the company. Surprised he didn't get more, but maybe that's still to come.

Don't be surprised if Twitter's algorithm becomes Open Source in the near future while at the same time allowing dissenting voices to be heard. Unbanning some popular members who were banned will cause a major uproar too which I'm looking forward to lol.

What was the Twitter clone that AWS suspended back when it was starting to gain steam? Was it Gab or something else?

Never mind. It was Parler. Probably wasn’t going anywhere anyway, but that was shady business. There was a small window where it was having explosive growth and the door was closed on them.

 

[clem84]

Imagine if Musk was just about as woke as you can get... Scary times.

 

[Unknown?]

It is a business.

That's a stretch... If it takes censorship suggestions on behalf of the government, it isn't private.

 

[Fake]

Good luck.

 

[DragoonKain]

Twitter is a problem. Character limits are a poor way to communicate. Not saying it would be better without character limits, it serves a purpose. But it was inevitably doomed to be toxic as long as it had limits.

 

[ManaByte]

Twitter is a problem. Character limits are a poor way to communicate. Not saying it would be better without character limits, it serves a purpose. But it was inevitably doomed to be toxic as long as it had limits.

Nah character limits are needed to an extent. You haven’t seen the walls of text that are a certain former President’s Telegram feed.

 

[DragoonKain]

Nah character limits are needed to an extent. You haven’t seen the walls of text that are a certain former President’s Telegram feed.

Two things can be true. They're needed for that specific platform, but limited text also perpetuates poor discourse, poor communication, misunderstanding.

 

[EviLore]

 

[Boss Mog]

Already covered it. See my posts in the thread.

Yeah, up $750M already, he's a real dope for sure...

 

[Nobody_Important]

Yeah, up $750M already, he's a real dope for sure...

Because that's what I meant. Mhm.

 

[Ionian]

How? On paper or cash?

You don't make money off what you can't sell.

No doubt he will though. Musk the savior of Twitter.

The twerk videos have been preserved for generations!

 

[Star-Lord]

Twitter is a problem.

No, social media as a whole is a problem. And you can’t really blame the platforms solely; it wouldn’t be such a problem if the collective IQ of the people who used it was at least in double digits.

 

[Nobody_Important]

Twitter is a problem. Character limits are a poor way to communicate. Not saying it would be better without character limits, it serves a purpose. But it was inevitably doomed to be toxic as long as it had limits.

The character limit is the only reason that Twitter is not even worse than it already is. If you gave every single self righteous activist and sheltered conservative the ability to share their nonsense with no posting limits you would have a tsunami of stupidity overtake the whole platform within an hour. It would be chaos. The character limit at the very least forces the idiots involved to measure their message and their words. They have to look at it more than once. They have to try to make their message shorter and more succinct.



That Character limit is literally the only reason the entire platform is still standing. Without that limit the whole thing would have burned itself to the ground years ago.

 

[Ionian]

No, social media as a whole is a problem. And you can’t really blame the platforms solely; it wouldn’t be such a problem if the collective IQ of the people who used it was at least in double digits.

MySpace
Bebo
Instagram
Facebook


List goes on and on ...

FORUMS

They predate any of those.

Hell BBS boards, mIRC channels. Dial-up from a low baud modem on a phone line to download.

New user-base is more profitable. As a new market.

I remember having to queue in the college library and spend spend my 30 minutes loading a webpage. In an internet cafe took me half an hour (or an hour, was ages ago) to load a Chili Peppers song I had on VHS at home anyway.

Bloody thing was 10 seconds long and I think cost me 20 pounds.

Now, things are instant mostly. There's your profit. Fast upload, smack an ad on it. Profit! (Oh and if you make effort, people might use your sponsor).

Point being times have changed, over and over and over again. Yet people get surprised.

I miss going into to the YAHOO! live chat rooms and using my Digital Delay pedal for karaoke. They thought my connection was screwed (dial-up times).

And Twitter isn't an evolution, it's what kids use as it's easy so the cycle starts again.

Smart phones should have an IQ test. (now there is a sell-able idea).

In conclusion: The printed press had social contacts, church, villages, phone, television, internet you name it.

And they were all SOCIAL MEDIA.

 

[DragoonKain]

The character limit is the only reason that Twitter is not even worse than it already is. If you gave every single self righteous activist and sheltered conservative the ability to share their nonsense with no posting limits you would have a tsunami of stupidity overtake the whole platform within an hour. It would be chaos. The character limit at the very least forces the idiots involved to measure their message and their words. They have to look at it more than once. They have to try to make their message shorter and more succinct.



That Character limit is literally the only reason the entire platform is still standing. Without that limit the whole thing would have burned itself to the ground years ago.

Removing Character limits would not serve the format of that platform, but character limits are also the reason why everyone is so angry, bitter, and crazy in there and IMO why that platform more than any other is causing a social divide. Character limits encourage zingers, hot takes, attention posts. Because of character limits, everyone knows it’s not the platform to debate stuff, so it’s basically everyone trying to outzing the other person or own the other person with one liners.

And I think the character limit nature of it also entices people to just post things when they’re bored and stuff that isn’t well thought out. Leading to misunderstandings that can’t possibly be corrected due to the nature of the platform.

While the platform would be unusable with no characters limits and aesthetically horrendous, I also think people wouldn’t be at each other’s throats as much. People tend to be more civil to one another if it’s a platform that allows for longer dialogue, I’ve found personally.

So basically what I’m getting at is Twitter would be a worse user experience with character limits removed, I believe platforms that don’t have character limits are generally friendlier places with better discourse.

 

[BigBooper]

How? On paper or cash?

You don't make money off what you can't sell.

No doubt he will though. Musk the savior of Twitter.

The twerk videos have been preserved for generations!

That could be a tactic to take them down. Buy em up, wait for the herd, sell, then the price drops below where it started. Rinse and repeat. Illegal I'm sure, but it'd be a fun story.

 

[p_xavier]

And I thought "journalism" couldn't get lower.

Prolific Shitposter Now Owns 9.2% of Twitter

Elon Musk is now Twitter’s largest shareholder.

www.vice.com

 

[Ionian]

That could be a tactic to take them down. Buy em up, wait for the herd, sell, then the price drops below where it started. Rinse and repeat. Illegal I'm sure, but it'd be a fun story.

I wouldn't be surprised. Dude is super busy with his hyper-loop. He hasn't missed a deadline yet!

He's the ultimate troll and one of the richest (trolls) man on the planet.

Imagine being in his phonebook and getting a tip-off before he buys? Ultimate riches. Not even joking, Elon, call me back!

 

[Ionian]

And I thought "journalism" couldn't get lower.

Prolific Shitposter Now Owns 9.2% of Twitter

Elon Musk is now Twitter’s largest shareholder.

www.vice.com

Ha, posted as I made my previous reply. Are they wrong?

He's proven over and over that there is no such thing as bad publicity. He'll bust his ass laughing at that.

 

[Ionian]

Double post but the screenshots at the end cracked me up.

What billionaire are you? /Que SF2 music

 

[OmegaSupreme]

And I thought "journalism" couldn't get lower.

Prolific Shitposter Now Owns 9.2% of Twitter

Elon Musk is now Twitter’s largest shareholder.

www.vice.com

Vice gonna be Vice.

 

[Bragr]

Even the guys who made Twitter is starting to dislike it.

 

[Ionian]

Even the guys who made Twitter is starting to dislike it.

Good. They profited off the sale.

Call a spade a spade.

EDIT: irc is a low blow. Nobody using it at this stage is involved.

 

[HoodWinked]

Even the guys who made Twitter is starting to dislike it.

Ya that is an interesting consideration. That it is not necessarily that the platform getting too large it's the consolidation of thought and identity. You see the same dullards mindlessly conforming with pronouns in profiles, resist, blm, and now Ukraine flags.

 

[ManaByte]

 

[dcll]

Can you imagine if Trump is allowed back on

 

[Chaplain]

Can you imagine if Trump is allowed back on

I can. I can also imagine the US government going after Musk if he did this.

 

[ManaByte]

Can you imagine if Trump is allowed back on

They allow Putin and the Taliban.

 

[Valedix]

rich people buying dumb things

 

[NickFire]

The reaction to this news is amazing but not surprising. Tons of the same exact people who screamed fascism fascism fascism for a period of time are now complaining that Musk might force changes that allow people they disagree with on twitter. I give it a month before the NYT, WaPo, and various other one-sided outlets begin calling to treat twitter like a publisher. Two months tops.

 

[ManaByte]

The reaction to this news is amazing but not surprising. Tons of the same exact people who screamed fascism fascism fascism for a period of time are now complaining that Musk might force changes that allow people they disagree with on twitter. I give it a month before the NYT, WaPo, and various other one-sided outlets begin calling to treat twitter like a publisher. Two months tops.

He has a lot of work to do though. It’s not just the banning of people it’s the shadow banning of wrongthink as well. There’s a social media platform in beta right now with a fraction of the users Twitter has and they’ve been able to show the Twitter suppression in action where the same post is made on both platforms and Twitter suppressed it so it got no engagement where on the beta platform it got a ton, again with a tiny fraction of the users that Twitter has.

 

[NickFire]

He has a lot of work to do though. It’s not just the banning of people it’s the shadow banning of wrongthink as well. There’s a social media platform in beta right now with a fraction of the users Twitter has and they’ve been able to show the Twitter suppression in action where the same post is made on both platforms and Twitter suppressed it so it got no engagement where on the beta platform it got a ton, again with a tiny fraction of the users that Twitter has.

It sounds like he's hitting the ground running. He just got appointed to the board. https://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/twitter-appoints-elon-musk-to-board

I imagine there's gonna be some extra therapy in store for some of the employees this week.

 

[ManaByte]

It sounds like he's hitting the ground running. He just got appointed to the board. https://www.foxbusiness.com/technology/twitter-appoints-elon-musk-to-board

I imagine there's gonna be some extra therapy in store for some of the employees this week.

He’s going to need to rebuild it from the ground up to tear out all of the authoritative controls they’ve implemented over the last six years. The entire platform is built on the idea of silencing those who disagree with the danger hair children who run it out of San Francisco.

 

[LordCBH]

Things I’d like to see happen:
1) all the tumblr transplants banned
2) all the pedos banned (the few that didn’t get banned with the tumble purge from step 1)
3) terrorist organizations banned (taliban, Russian government, official Iran accounts)

 

[GermanZepp]

Social media showed us how fucking crazy and stupid people can be

 

[Mistake]

The CEO of Babylon Bee had this to say

I know Elon is a fan of their work, so this might have had something to do with it

 

[dcll]

They allow Putin and the Taliban.

That is ridiculous

 

[ipukespiders]

A rebuild of Twitter could be not unlike the rebuild of GAF in late 2017 - early 2018.

 

[EviLore]

 

[SlimySnake]

The guy is so wealthy, he can probably force his way into the boards of many silicon valley companies.

Thats too much power for one man to have.