Musk offers to buy Twitter

[Brad]

This happened with Google and Eric Schmidt.  Eric was mouthing off about how good it was for Google to know so much about you, so somebody, using only Google published tons of publicly available info on Eric.  Eric had a temper tantrum.

There are different rules for little people and Big Shots.

[rcjordan]

He's making the front page of /r. We may need to rename it the "Musk Effect."

Jet HAS LANDED. Flight from San Jose, California, USA, took off at 12:13 PM local time (PST), landed in Luten, UK 5:41 AM local time (UTC). Tail #N628TS : ElonJetTracker

https://old.reddit.com/r/ElonJetTracker/comments/zorhdk/jet_has_landed_flight_from_san_jose_california/

+

A new subreddit dedicated to the Elon Musk jet tracker is one of the fastest-growing pages on the website, with almost 40,000 members in 2 days

https://www.insider.com/elonjet-jack-sweeney-twitter-bot-banned-elon-musk-reddit-2022-12

[rcjordan]

++

Congratulations to /r/ElonJetTracker for hitting 100,000 subscribers in just over 3 days!


Reddit admins suspended, then unsuspended, the tracking account. Admins confirmed it was a mistake (for now).  The account is a bot (or was on Twit) and used publicly available flight data.

[rcjordan]

Elon Musk's Twitter poll ends with users seeking his departure | AP News

https://apnews.com/article/elon-musk-twitter-inc-technology-business-8dac8ae023444ef9c37ca1d8fe1c14df

[littleman]

I am perplexed at how much a mess he has made of this so quickly.

[Brad]

Its like he's doing it on purpose but I can't see his endgame.

[buckworks]

https://twitter.com/FilipeMagellan/status/1605049540410855424

From a technical standpoint, if the owner of a publishing platform needs to get into tricks and publish lies to catch bots, he already failed his leadership over his tech teams and his user base before he even pressed the Post button.

[rcjordan]

Elon Musk says Twitter 'not on the fast lane to bankruptcy anymore' | Business News | Sky News

https://news.sky.com/story/elon-musk-says-twitter-not-on-the-fast-lane-to-bankruptcy-anymore-12774290

[rcjordan]

Just 0.2% of Twitter users pay for a subscription | The Independent

https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/twitter-blue-users-elon-musk-b2277207.html

[rcjordan]

Twitter's plan to charge for crucial tool (API) prompts outcry | Stars and Stripes

https://www.stripes.com/theaters/us/2023-02-13/twitter-plan-charge-api-9128250.html

[grnidone]

>I am perplexed at how much a mess he has made of this so quickly.

He just seems like a know-it-all dick.

[rcjordan]

Elon Musk says only verified^($$) Twitter users to show up in "For You" tab

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/03/28/elon-musk-says-only-verified-twitter-users-to-show-up-in-for-you-tab.html

[Brad]

>For You

Elon thinks of Twitter as only a means for people to grow business.  It will become dreck just like the Web has.

[rcjordan]

News orgs reject Musk's demand to pay for Twitter checkmark

https://www.mercurynews.com/2023/03/30/news-orgs-reject-musks-demand-to-pay-for-twitter-checkmark/

[littleman]

There seems to be a theme:


>"Some of you may be wondering whether or not the L.A. Times will pay for Twitter Blue subscriptions, and the answer right now is no, for several reasons: First of all, verification no longer establishes authority or credibility, instead it will only mean that someone has paid for a Twitter Blue subscription,"


> "will not pay for Twitter Blue service as an institution or on behalf of our journalists" because "it's evident that verified checkmarks no longer represent authority and expertise."

>"There are several reasons for this, but one outweighs them all: a blue checkmark no longer means the handle is 'verified.'"

The only thing the blue check mark means is that someone was willing to pay for it.  Kinda hard to build a business model on something that has no value other than that it costs money.  Right now the news outlets are providing free content in exchange for exposure.  Imagine what would happen if something like the NYT pulled out and demanded twitter start paying to display their content.  Just a few of those big organizations pulling out of twitter would greatly reduce twitter's consumer value.