So "X" - nothing to see here. Elon's in control - Part XXX

Timberrrrrrrr

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120506539#Comment_120506539

They have done this for government agencies/representatives.

The pope for example now has a grey tick, I'm not sure if this is paid for or given out by yet witter for free.

I agree that they could have done a whole range for users though.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120506539#Comment_120506539

Celebs and accounts of importance (and eventually even minor accounts of 'influencers' and the like could apply for it if they verified their account) were always given a blue tick. Some people felt this gave those accounts an air of superiority. When Musk took over, he announced there would no longer be such a "princes and paupers" system, and that anyone could apply for a blue tick through the new Twitter Blue system, so long as they paid for it (making it an actual princes and paupers system rather than one which just helps verification). Musk fans, and even many here on this exact thread, were delighted that Hollywood elitists would no longer be so special, and would be forced to pay for their blue tick.

Instead what's happened is that Musk fans have bought their blue ticks, and most Hollywood elitists were fine with losing the blue tick, because it was never about any kind of showing superiority or elitism, it was a feature Twitter historically used so when you saw a tweet or account from a celebrity, you knew it was actually from them. That helps keep regular users engaged on the site knowing they're following and can tweet at the actual person or organisation they're following. Hell there were even celebs who didn't want to be on or use Twitter who got verified accounts just to prevent people pretending to be them.

So the blue colour of the tick was important, because it was the one historically used, and it was the one some people felt meant Hollywood elitists gave them importance. Now, Musk fans have bought blue ticks, and Hollywood elitists have happily abandoned theirs, and now Musk fans are complaining that the Hollywood elitists are so elitist that they won't even pay the $8 they could easily afford because they think not paying it means they're better than those who do.

Because ultimately, it was never about the blue tick, it was just petty resentment and their own preconceived notions of celebs feeling special every time they opened Twitter and saw the blue tick beside their name.

Timberrrrrrrr

So according to some the space x launch failed because Musk made the decision not to include flame diverters on the launch pad which caused the launch pad to basically disintegrate and fling debris into the engines.

https://twitter.com/Tazerface16/status/1649443447164776450?t=o_LxojleQG2P-NRTB89biQ&s=19

Musk always seems to think he knows best.

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120506056#Comment_120506056

Agree with much of what you say but the times they are a changin. Advertising is all well and good if it's producing revenue but it also become white noise after a while and easily ignored. Product placement and paid influencing is more effective but also has a limit. So subscription is where it has to go.

You say "The vast, vast majority are never going to pay for Twitter, because ultimately there are still numerous other avenues for them to get the same stuff for free".

Yessss but those sources will come to be perceived as unreliable and full of junk and spam.

The industry is maturing and the bigger players realise that 'free' was of it's time and now they need to monetise it on a firmer basis. With subs.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120506865#Comment_120506865

Agree to a point, but Twitter isn't offering anything worthwhile for its subscription. Ability to edit tweets? Basic feature that should have been implemented long ago anyway, but even then people can just delete tweets and correct them, or post a clarification. Longer tweets? Goes against the benefit of twitter that forces people to be more concise. Longer videos? Tiktok and Instagram have shown that shorter videos get more engagement, and for anything longer people can just link to a YouTube video.

The only real benefit is promoting your tweets above non-Twitter Blue users. But of course, the more people who have Twitter Blue, the less benefit that has.

What you think Twitter needs to become in terms of subscription model etc, is never going to happen to the scale that Twitter was at, or needs. These are huge changes to the fundamental core of the site that people have been using for 10+ years, and is likely to drive the majority of users away the more and more the benefits of the site become locked behind a subscription model.

Subscription may be where some sites need to go, but not social media sites, because the entire core design around them is being able to easily and freely discuss with, engage with, or even just follow other people's accounts, share things with them, discuss with them. Twitter Blue is doing everything it can to reduce that. It doesn't work for what Twitter is, and will never generate the income Twitter needs it to to balance the debt Musk has landed the company with. Especially with the stigma now attached to the blue tick.

Penn

Have to agree with this thread

https://twitter.com/hugorifkind/status/1649440745470795780?t=pyXvA0BFa2XghuyQDzCy1g&s=19

Timberrrrrrrr

Musk again shooting himself in the foot.

https://twitter.com/SouthpawLeftist/status/1649586553809674240?t=4-N7WppQAlBzWfqSz0vzlQ&s=09

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120506539#Comment_120506539

...never came across this one myself, but the disorder is a funny one, i dont give a sh1te myself, but so what if some have a fixation with it, and if those obsessed with it also dont give a sh1t, maybe its not 'an issue'!

VinLieger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120507018#Comment_120507018

Completely agree also got my first blue tick blocks from the replies.

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120506970#Comment_120506970

"because the entire core design around them is being able to easily and freely discuss with, engage with, or even just follow other people's accounts, share things with them, discuss with them."

But it's this source of information that is of value, that's it's intrinsic worth and why media organisations, political parties, influencers, campaigners, commercial entities all use a platform like Twitter. This data/ information has considerable value and use.

As observed above, the likes of boards here need to and must be looking at a subscriber model and seeing how it can be implemented. I suspect there will be a slow transition at first, a growing acceptance and then a rush as various platforms heave a sigh of relief and jump on it. What's left free will be junk and spam in time. IMHO!!

VinLieger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120507188#Comment_120507188

A subscriber model would kill the likes of boards for the same reason. People come to boards as it contains multitudes and the reason it contains multitudes is because its free, you can ask questions on everything, read answers on everything, discuss opinions on everything and all for free. If it was subscriber based I doubt even 10% of current users would continue to subscribe and be active and then the reasons other people come here would vanish as it would be a very small subset of people who only care about their very specific niche topics and the less people there are to discuss things with the more echo chambery it becomes and then less people subscribe as its boring and poof its gone.

But it's this source of information that is of value, that's it's intrinsic worth and why media organisations, political parties, influencers, campaigners, commercial entities all use a platform like Twitter. This data/ information has considerable value and use.

But twitter isnt the source of the information, its users are, twitter supples a platform for people to add and consume information nothing more, that's yours and seemingly musks fundamental disconnect from how this all works. The less users it has the less valuable its information is.

Bass Reeves

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120507188#Comment_120507188

You can choose between advertising and subscription you cannot have both. Yes you could set up a specialist subscription based services but trying to charge a d have advertising is not possible.

On Twitter if you charge content providers you slowly alienate them. Musk decided on arriving at Twitter that he would tear it down to rebuild it. But he had no plan it was seat of the pants stuff

IMO Twitter will struggle with Mush in charge. He lost 70%+ of his advertising revenue I am not sure how much of that he is getting back. Ordinary subscripers will not pay in large numbers, content providers will leave.

It's the same with boards if they are not getting significant numbers of subscriptions in the present model they will not under a decideted subscription service

odyssey06

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120506622#Comment_120506622

Impossible! Multiple posters on this thread have assured us that under Musk Twitter is a bastion of free speech.

Of course it was utter nonsense, and here is more proof it is a fiction.

PeadarCo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120507253#Comment_120507253

The other factor to remember also is that people will/can only subscribe to so much. By going a subscription model you are suddenly going up against Netflix/Amazon/anything that demands a subscription. People have only so much disposable income. Any site/service that has a subscription service generates its own content. Twitter doesn't as you have explained very well users create Twitters content.

A perfect example of the difference between a subscription model and advertising model is YouTube versus Netflix. Both are in the same industry ie internet video streaming and have very different ways of generating money which is directly caused by how their content is generated respectively.

YouTube relies on user generated content and is largely free but uses advertising to pay the bills as a resultThe primary benefit of YouTube plus is to get rid of the ads. But most people are not interested in doing that.

Netflix on the other hand either buys content or makes its own. It doesn't rely on users generating content and as a result can charge a subscription. It's only recently began experimenting with advertising.

Netflix and YouTube despite being in the same industry have very different business models. You couldn't use YouTubes model at Netflix and vice versa.

If Musk wants to go for a subscription service the company will have to generate its own content. But that would move Twitter into a different industry.

mcmoustache

From looking on Twitter today (and probably the last few days), the blue tick is becoming something of a joke. The users that actually attract people to twitter have no interest in it so the blue tick has mostly come to signify a willingness to suck elon off. Outside of some users who paid to be able to post longer videos, most of the blue ticks now belong to edge-lords and nazi-adjacent types and despite being noisy, these aren't the types that brands want to be associated with in a free market.

This is of course leading to impotent frustration among those edge lords who paid to be on the same level as Lady Gaga but instead have ended up back in the laughing stock that many attended in their formative years. All it's done is single them out as insecure little shíts who thought that by paying, they might be popular. And now they have a badge to prove it. It's quite funny when you think about it.

pjohnson

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120508453#Comment_120508453

Its worth remembering Musky only bought Twitter by accident. He has no great plan on what to do with it and has been trying to make it up as he goes along.

I had thought of the youtube vs. netflix comparison as a great example of the no mans land Musk is splashing about in. He still doesn't seem to understand what he accidentally bought.

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120506865#Comment_120506865

When anybody can buy a blue tick then twitter will become full of junk and spam. Junk and spam that will be at the top of your twitter feed.

As mentioned above, blue ticks are all just Musk minions yearning for Daddy's approval and they have paid for the privilege of being easily identifiable and blocked.

Elon burying his own boys.

Will his next move to make it so that you cannot block blue ticks?

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509025#Comment_120509025

You don’t have the full story on the blue ticks, according to the media

https://twitter.com/thenytime/status/1649636483215552518?s=46&t=3l1OhjvjsuAh4w9RMjlH8g

silliussoddius

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509222#Comment_120509222

Whoa, if true.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509372#Comment_120509372

Well the account name says it's the New York Times, and now that proper verification signs like the blue tick are gone, I see no reason to believe it's not the New York Times and is therefore completely true.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509222#Comment_120509222

Wonderful to see the NYT getting back into investigative journalism.

francois

Hilarious to see #blockTheBlueChecks trending...best description I've seen of the Musk stans is Eight Buck Cucks

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509650#Comment_120509650

Dril was one of the popular accounts who got it trending. In the past hour, Musk had a blue tick added to Dril's account. So Dril changed his name because it automatically triggers the verification system and removes the blue tick. Within a few minutes, Musk added the blue tick to Dril's account again. Think it went back and forth a few times. Dril trying to make the most of it anyway.

https://twitter.com/dril/status/1649895619350364160?t=tJIyHPGvqWoXkWvgjBPkkg&s=19

https://twitter.com/dril/status/1649896510543527936?t=ennrz6Orvu7qMMHNruO6IQ&s=19

https://twitter.com/dril/status/1649897621421703169?t=n37DQwWHVt9EtW7KifWNnw&s=19

Imagine being lauded as such a genius, and Musk's big idea is to actually make Twitter Blue a punishment.

silliussoddius

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509461#Comment_120509461

QAnon cultists will probably believe it.

pjohnson

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509777#Comment_120509777

It just shows how stupid he is.

VinLieger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509777#Comment_120509777

Once again proving the edgelord really has no clue about what twitter is or how people us it

As soon as I heard Elon Musk saying that Thomas Edison was a better inventor than Nikola Tesla I knew he was total spoofer.

The man with the financial backing that bought other's ideas/patents was better than the actual inventor...

Sounds familiar.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509940#Comment_120509940

He begged for Trump to come back to Twitter. I don't respect Trump for much but I respect The Donald for telling Elon to piss off and sticking to his own echo-chamber.

And it's mad because not too long ago I thought Trump would have to cave in and return to Twitter in his run for presidency, but I think The Donald might have been ahead of us all on even that haha.

As a WOKE, far-left, communist (mmm borderline), I'd honestly sign up to Truth Social before I'd rejoin Twitter. It'd be much more fun.

Quin_Dub

And in another display of brilliance, Musk had restored the blue tick to the majority of high profile accounts.

After approximately two days of purging “legacy checkmarks,” Twitter CEO Elon Musk appears to be waving the white flag

Across Twitter on Saturday, some of the platform’s biggest names, from Stephen King to Chrissy Teigen, expressed surprise when their fickle checkmarks suddenly reappeared

Has there been a single one of his "ideas" that they haven't had to roll back after a few days because they were really really stupid??

AndrewJRenko

You’d have to wonder

https://twitter.com/reallyndacarter/status/1649978485790711811?s=46&t=3l1OhjvjsuAh4w9RMjlH8g

Penn

Yep, turns out Musk is giving the blue tick back to accounts with 1m+ followers, including accounts who never had the blue tick before, and accounts of dead people. Either that or Jamal Khashoggi really has subscribed to Twitter Blue and verified his phone number.

VinLieger

He really is just a child desperately pushing all the buttons trying to make his favorite toy do something it was never designed to.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120510243#Comment_120510243

It's amazing how his whole argument opposing the blue tick system from the start was that it created a princes and paupers system, and yet everything he's done since, from the design and implementation of Twitter Blue, has made it far more of a princes and paupers system than ever before.

And now the argument about how it needs to change to a subscription model is gone, because by automatically giving the blue tick back to accounts with over 1m followers, you're giving all the benefits of Twitter Blue for free to the majority of accounts who could both easily pay the subscription fee or who use to Twitter the most to have gained such a following.

An exploding rocket is the highlight of Musk's week.

PopePalpatine

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509650#Comment_120509650

Speaking of which:

https://twitter.com/bestofdyingtwit/status/1650083694064070658

Penn

An unexpected but hilarious consequence of Musk requiring all advertisers to be verified

https://twitter.com/TheMcKenziest/status/1649988025676627969?t=tgoGuAaOSm7my-I9bPR2GQ&s=19

AndrewJRenko

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120510600#Comment_120510600

His back story is even funnier. Cute dog though.

https://twitter.com/chudsoftiktok/status/1650009853572546560?s=46&t=3l1OhjvjsuAh4w9RMjlH8g

VinLieger

So it looks like simply changing your name removes the ticks handed out by elon, this back and forth is hilarious to watch.

Penn

Some legal commentators on Twitter making the point that with regards celebs being given blue ticks again, when you click on the blue tick it says the user has subscribed to Twitter Blue. As the celebs haven't, it could be seen as Twitter creating a false endorsement by the celebs of a product Twitter is selling. Could leave Twitter legally liable.

pjohnson

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120511510#Comment_120511510

He'll be removing them again tonight.

I posted months ago that it would eventually come down to his initial interaction with Stephen King and his bartering on the price. And lo and behold.

AndrewJRenko

Interesting GDPR issue, with Musk stating that people have subscribed when they haven’t. Twitter has a legal obligation to present accurate information.

I wonder if anyone will make a formal complaint ?

https://twitter.com/neilhimself/status/1650194655399628802?s=46&t=3l1OhjvjsuAh4w9RMjlH8g

Run Forest Run

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120509981#Comment_120509981

The lefties throwing a tantrum and leaving twitter, is a bit like taking your ball and going home... except you don't get to take the ball! 🤣

Twitter will continue to be an echo chamber to one degree or another. And it will still influence public discourse too heavily (unfortunately)... it will just have a few less loopy lefties and a few more from the other tribe. The vacuous vacuum will no doubt be filled one way or the other.

Christy42

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120513855#Comment_120513855

There is a reason that Truth Social failed and well 4chan is probably running but no one outside of it cares about it. People don't really care for what a right wing echo chamber will become. Twitter will have less and less of an influence on public discourse as time goes on. This is why Elon has backtracked heavily on forcing left wing celebs to buy twitter blue and why right wing celebs are annoyed others won't pay for it. It has made them realise that people who have been successful for decades before twitter came along don't actually need twitter for their lives and without someone outside the right echo chamber twitter will just be Truth Social.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120513941#Comment_120513941

Saw a great thread on Twitter yesterday talking about the blue tick. It was a guy talking about a parable of someone buying one of Jimi Hendrix's most famous guitars, one that was specialised and uniquely tailored to Jimi, had that unique Fender sound that Jimi would use etc. However, the guy who bought it couldn't play the guitar. He couldn't get it to reproduce that Hendrix/Fender sound. He had the tool, but couldn't use it.

The reason celebs et al were given the ticks to begin with was because it's not the guitar that people go to listen to, it's Hendrix. Celebs were given the tick because they were notable and famous outside of Twitter. People want to be able to follow their accounts and to know it's the real account not because it's an account with a blue tick, but the tick just helped confirm it was really them.

Whereas people buying the tick are all of a sudden realising, they still don't know how to play the guitar. People will still ignore their posts, people still won't care about their accounts, they still won't be seen as being important.

Jimi Hendrix with a different guitar is still Jimi Hendrix. Someone with a Jimi Hendrix guitar, still isn't Jimi Hendrix.

McFly85

It’s incredible how ridiculous the whole blue tick thing has become.

Musk misunderstood the blue tick from day 1(legitimately or otherwise). It’s not a status symbol, it’s a feature for regular users to help them know that tue information they’re viewing is legitimate.

And, in true Musk fashion, the implementation of his version of it is completely ham-fisted. So now there’s people who’ve paid for blue ticks who were angry at this status “being kept by elitists” while Elon is treating celebrities differently by giving them the service for free. And of course you can see how ill thought out it is because it’s misrepresenting users who have been given the service, making it look like they subscribed themselves.

Its a complete mess, I honestly don’t see how anyone can look at his management of Twitter and think this is the guy that will make it an amazing service.

Cordell

Someone with a Jimi Hendrix guitar, still isn't Jimi Hendrix

But they may be even better than Jimi Hendrix, and now they have a chance to reach the audience only Jimi Hendrix used to reach when that kind of gatekeeping was in place.

McFly85

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514194#Comment_120514194

If they’re more talented than Jimmy Hendrix they’re not going to need his guitar to show it.

And paying for a blue tick doesn’t mean anyone cares about your tweets any more than they currently do. People follow who they want to follow and previously would use the blue tick to identify the real account.

Now a blue tick only means I pay for Twitter - people aren’t going to suddenly take everything said by a blue tick as gospel.

Christy42

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514194#Comment_120514194

The guitar is not why Jimi Hendrix got famous and people aren't getting spotted because of the blue tick. Celebrity status is not always fair but people need to realise that celebrity status meant people got the blue tick not the other way around.

The other piece I left out of my post was that Musk is also giving out the blue ticks again because people are blocking blue ticks by default. It just immediately became a sign of people who think that a blue tick makes them relevant.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120513726#Comment_120513726

similar vein, and a good read:

https://www.thegist.ie/the-gist-my-superpower-is-not-knowing/?ref=the-gist-newsletter