Elon Musk: Always A Douche

[The Brain]

Why did he delete it? I don't think Daddy Putin had a problem with it.

[The Larch]

At least he was self-aware enough to delete it.

Or some aide or PR stooge snatched his phone and deleted it for him. 

[Berkut]

Musk becomes harder to defend everyday. FFS dude.

At least he was self-aware enough to delete it.

I just quit trying. 

I just shut up and tell myself that if he actually gets us closer to less reliance on fossil fuel, or advances our exploration of space, it is worth all the fucking assholeness bullshit.

I mean, it is, right? Right?

[Tamas]

Only thing I give him real credit for is space exploration. He was smart enough to make himself the face of drive toward electric vehicles but I don't think he was or going to be that instrumental for that.


Seeing him worshipped by what seems to me a lot of cross-section with incels and similar fools reminds me of that comparison that people worshipped Steve Jobs -a certified massively selfish asshole- as a god while considering Bill Gates -a ruthless businessman who has been trying to do something decent with his wealth- the Devil.

A lot of people just cannot help melting from the most destructive "alpha male" attitude.

[Sheilbh]

Yeah I think the political angle on Musk that I find interesting is some of the weird silicon valley ideology that you have with him, with Peter Thiel and others - because I think that massive fandom of a certain type of entrepreneur/business leader is precisely part of that politics.

I think it is odd but I think it does also tie in with some of the weird politics of certain tech billionaires - and it does seem like a very specifically tech thing. Other sectors have billionaires but their politics seem more normal/just don't want to be regulated or taxed.

[The Larch]

I think it is odd but I think it does also tie in with some of the weird politics of certain tech billionaires - and it does seem like a very specifically tech thing. Other sectors have billionaires but their politics seem more normal/just don't want to be regulated or taxed.

I guess it has to do with Techies seeing themselves as ahead of the curve/disruptors/paradigm shifters/whatever. As their sector doesn't follow traditional business patterns, they don't see themselves beholden to traditional ideological ones.

[Sheilbh]

I guess it has to do with Techies seeing themselves as ahead of the curve/disruptors/paradigm shifters/whatever. As their sector doesn't follow traditional business patterns, they don't see themselves beholden to traditional ideological ones.

That sounds right - also it seems particularly susceptible to the idea of a single animating genius which again links to their politics. But I think also taps into something very uniquely American in the idea of the CEO as hero.

[The Larch]

I guess it has to do with Techies seeing themselves as ahead of the curve/disruptors/paradigm shifters/whatever. As their sector doesn't follow traditional business patterns, they don't see themselves beholden to traditional ideological ones.

That sounds right - also it seems particularly susceptible to the idea of a single animating genius which again links to their politics. But I think also taps into something very uniquely American in the idea of the CEO as hero.

Yeah, tech must be the only sector where there's still a large degree of genious worshipping and idolization of their industry leaders, as well as a certain mythology linked to it (the "coder in the garage" kind of creation story, for instance).

[The Larch]

So it seems that Musk plans to turn Twitter's "blue tick" into a kind of premium membership, rather than a system to show who is a confirmed real person and who is not.

Musk proposes charging $8 for verified Twitter account despite user backlash
The new owner justified the measure saying 'we need to pay the bills somehow'

Elon Musk has indicated that a verified account on Twitter in the future could cost $8 a month, despite facing a user backlash over proposals to charge for the feature.

The new owner of Twitter described the current system for allocating blue check marks – which verify a user as a trustworthy source – as "bullshit" in a Twitter post to his more than 110 million followers on Tuesday.

"Twitter's current lords & peasants system for who has or doesn't have a blue checkmark is bullshit. Power to the people! Blue for $8/month," he wrote, suggesting that a tick could be given to accounts that subscribe to the platform's premium service, Blue, for $8 a month.

Musk added that the price could fluctuate according to country. Twitter's Blue service operates in a handful of countries: the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. It costs $4.99 a month in the US and in its current guise the service offers a narrower suite of perks such as being able to undo or edit tweets.

In the Twitter thread, Musk said subscribers to the new Blue service would also get priority in replies, mentions and search, which he said was "essential to defeat" spam accounts. Users will also see half as many adverts and will be able to post long video and audio clips. No timing for the changes was announced.

The changes would affect about 400,000 blue tick accounts on Twitter. Advertising, which would be reduced for Blue subscribers under the plans, accounts for 90% of Twitter's $5bn in annual revenue.

Hours before, Musk justified his plans to charge for verification by tweeting that "we need to pay the bills somehow", adding that it was the only way to "defeat the bots and trolls". Musk made the comments in an exchange with the author Stephen King, who had tweeted that if a $20 tick-charge were implemented "I'm gone like Enron." "How about $8?" Musk responded.

Musk's plans to charge for verification had leaked on Monday, sparking a backlash from some users including King. A Twitter poll floating the idea published by the tech investor Jason Calacanis, a Musk associate who is part of a team brought in by the multibillionaire to help run the business, had an 80% response for the option "wouldn't pay".

The blue tick verification process was brought in by Twitter in 2009 in response to celebrity concerns about impersonation. The programme ran into trouble when Twitter withdrew the verification status from controversial users such as the rightwing personality Milo Yiannopoulos and it was paused for a number of years before resuming it in 2021.

Musk closed a $44bn deal to buy Twitter on Thursday last week and has wasted no time in ringing the changes. He fired senior executives including the CEO, Parag Agrawal, and made himself sole director of the company. He has also reportedly installed a team of associates to help him run the business including Calacanis and his personal attorney, as well as drafting in employees at Tesla to look at Twitter's code.

[Jacob]

I think the "if you're not paying for it, you're the product" thing is very true when it comes to Twitter. If you're the average Twitter nobody, your data and your attention is being sold. If you're a somebody on Twitter your data and your attention is probably not of significant value, but the content you generate is the product that is used to keep the Twitter nobodies engaged.

With the subscription fee it looks like Musk is going to try to get (at least a subset of) the product to pay for privilege of being product. There's a bit of structural conflict, I think, but he may be able to pull it off... though I think he'd be better off if he had a solid plan for how to roll it out rather than just rely on "if I say it, people will come on board."

Though I do have to say I'm keeping my Twitter account to see how this unfolds.

[Sheilbh]

I think the "if you're not paying for it, you're the product" thing is very true when it comes to Twitter. If you're the average Twitter nobody, your data and your attention is being sold. If you're a somebody on Twitter your data and your attention is probably not of significant value, but the content you generate is the product that is used to keep the Twitter nobodies engaged.

With the subscription fee it looks like Musk is going to try to get (at least a subset of) the product to pay for privilege of being product. There's a bit of structural conflict, I think, but he may be able to pull it off... though I think he'd be better off if he had a solid plan for how to roll it out rather than just rely on "if I say it, people will come on board."

Though I do have to say I'm keeping my Twitter account to see how this unfolds.

This is true - but working in data (and media) Twitter is genuinely the least of our worries on that front. Facebook and Google are vastly bigger and dodgier in what they're doing with data. I don't think that will change with Musk because ultimately Twitter is comparatively niche compared to them. I know I'm a broken clock on this but Facebook and Google and dishonest on an industrial scale in what they're doing with people's data - and underpin that entire ecosystem in a way that Twitter doesn't.

The missed opportunity I think for Twitter were things like Patreon and Substack because Twitter is used by everyone with a podcast or a newsletter to promote - but the monetisable product is somewhere else. I think a subscription model could maybe a step in that direction.

But I think, as you say, it's a very different business. I also think there's a bit of a disconnect in that shift from what Twitter is if you follow politics or if you've got a high follower count like Musk and, I suspect, what Twitter is for the vast majority of users which is BTS stans. So I slightly wonder if Musk is leaning into the product based on how he experiences Twitter and not how it is, which strikes me as a risk.

[Jacob]

On google, just saw this thing on Pro Publica about Google: https://www.propublica.org/article/google-alphabet-ads-fund-disinformation-covid-elections

Haven't given it more than a cursory skim, but it seems to make the case that Google fuels misinformation and worse.

[Admiral Yi]

I know I'm a broken clock on this but Facebook and Google and dishonest on an industrial scale in what they're doing with people's data - and underpin that entire ecosystem in a way that Twitter doesn't.

Please educate me, particularly as regards Google.

[Jacob]

But I think, as you say, it's a very different business. I also think there's a bit of a disconnect in that shift from what Twitter is if you follow politics or if you've got a high follower count like Musk and, I suspect, what Twitter is for the vast majority of users which is BTS stans. So I slightly wonder if Musk is leaning into the product based on how he experiences Twitter and not how it is, which strikes me as a risk.

Yeah, I was going to say something similar - that I think Musk has a very real lived experience of what the problems and painpoints are for Twitter users, and some ideas of how to fix them... but they're the perspective of someone with 110 million followers and however many billions of net worth.

And the risk for Musk, I think, is that in his previous successes as an executive he could rely more on his own deeply felt set of priorities - driving a car or launching a rocket is not something where there's massive variation between desired user experiences. Optimizing the organization for producing those products - for which he could always refer back to his own deeply held product owner experience - is obviously not trivial, but still relatively simple... compared to social media, where there are many many different desired user experiences - people making a living from social media, politicians, people getting news, trolls (professional and hobbyists), ideologues, marketers, folks looking for social connection, journalists, academics - and they don't necessarily map closely to Musk's own experience.

[Sheilbh]

On google, just saw this thing on Pro Publica about Google: https://www.propublica.org/article/google-alphabet-ads-fund-disinformation-covid-elections

Haven't given it more than a cursory skim, but it seems to make the case that Google fuels misinformation and worse.

Google's ad business is on basically every news website in the world (and more). It and the other middle men capture most of the revenue. It doesn't need to be doing personalised ads because the Google code is basically the easiest, most straightforward way to even display ads so they are integral to the entire system (there are a few alternatives).

They flagrantly ignore what they are saying around "purpose limitation" of not using data for any other reason beyond the reason it was collected - which is a breach of European law - and there is so much sharing within and across all Google properties it's just a nightmare. I think Wolfe Christie has done really good work on that. So even if you as a publisher don't display personalised ads, and have the most vanilla, simple Google code you can there's really strong evidence that Google is still harvesting data about your users which are then going into their personalisation models.

To that I'd add that on that site Google does have brand safety tools - but again there's no purpose limitation. So you sign up to brand safety - you don't want your brand against inappropriate content or you don't want inappropriate ads next to your content. I've never seen it fully confirmed but there's been lots of signs that Google is basically scraping those sites for their own commercial purposes (e.g. to further their ads business) as well as just brand safety.

I work in the field so I am very ethically compromised (though I'm not at a bad place compared to some very ad-heavy news sites) - but adtech is just fundamentally contrary to any concept of data protection or fundamental rights around data. It is currently based on broadcasting what Google knows about any impression on a site to the entire adtech ecosystem, which then analyses you to identify if they've got relevant ads and then the entire ecosystem bids on that bit of space. There are so many parties getting personal data from every single click on a page it's incredible - I've seen one activist, in my view, rightly describe it as the biggest data leak in the world and it's just a permanent flow.

And we know that people don't want this if they're asked. We know from Google and Facebook's earnings that every time Apple makes a change to their design that requires consent for adtech, or European regulation does that an awful lot of people say no and Google/Facebook take a big hit. We can see the adoption of more privacy-centric browsers or plugins precisely to stop this from happening. It's also evidenced in surveys and in focus groups. But it's the core business of some of the world's biggest companies (and it feels telling that so many of the world's biggest companies fundamentally sell ad space).

I'd also add the computing power behind that - again Google is a core part - is hugely carbon intensive. Globally online advertising is a bigger emitter than aviation. It's like bitcoin - just imagine the server power of every impression on everyone of the Google's 2 million clients selling inventory about that individual visitor.

There are changes in the industry - regulation is helpful in trying to push things along, publishers are desperately looking at ways to claw back some revenue and climate concerns are rising for big brands. But it's really not good on so many levels and Google especially is the absolute heart of the industry.