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

Timberrrrrrrr

Sweet Jesus 🙈

https://twitter.com/markmobility/status/1650095565743562757?t=X1NTfrsWJ__4LFCHe8pmOA&s=19

Penn

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

There are plenty of accounts on Twitter who made their fame through Twitter. They did it through insightful commentary or expert opinion on different topics, or being funny and gradually plugging away, building up their following over time. It is of course possible that there are accounts that have long gone unrecognised, still waiting for that one viral tweet to get them trending, get more followers etc.

But you're conflating "gatekeeping" with "recognition". The previous blue tick was only as worthy of recognition as each individual felt it was. Was an account worthy of following or paying attention to just because it had a blue tick? Of course not. Think about how many blue tick accounts there were on Twitter, then think about how many the average person would have followed.

Again, it's not the blue tick, it's the person. Some of my favourite accounts don't have and never had a blue tick. Some of the worst, most banal, boring accounts have blue ticks, because that's who the person is. And in some of the cases of accounts without a blue tick that I like, it was probably an account with a blue tick retweeting or mentioning them which brought them to my attention.

Now you have an actual literal gatekeeping system in place. If you don't pay for Twitter Blue, your tweets will be buried under everyone who did. That's literal gatekeeping.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514384#Comment_120514384

similar happened to shinzo abe's account.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514433#Comment_120514433

At least he wasn't murdered by the people that helped Musk buy Twitter in the 1st place....

MBS can't be happy with the this coming back up because Elon is completely inept.

Furze99

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

I agree but it's also obvious that you can't sustain free services - people have to be paid for development and maintenance work, server fees and the threat of litigation..

I can get a free service by going and chatting to family & neighbours but I think in future we'll see that social media services will need to be supported some way. And advertising isn't the full answer, it can help. Maybe it'll require state or taxpayer subsidies but that has it's own problems.

Cordell

If you don't pay for Twitter Blue, your tweets will be buried under everyone who did. That's literal gatekeeping.

No, that's not what gatekeeping means. You don't have any control over gatekeeping, but now you do have control over blue ticks. If you want your tweets promoted, you pay. The old way gave more reach to your tweets based on who you were, which is just as wrong and arbitrary as paying for, but at least now the decision is yours.

Furze99

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

Yes I agree and YouTube / Netflix are good examples. But how do we know which is the better performing model? I'd guess their financials are pretty complicated. One or other or both could collapse at some stage, Netflix had huge growth but now faces more competition for subs and eyeballs. Advertising has it's limits. I can see that readily on the likes of FB/Insta where an ad I place now is competing against more ads and has less bang for the buck than before. As a user, I mostly skip past the ads without noticing.

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514505#Comment_120514505

you dont sustain it by losing swathes of advertisers and trying to replace that with a subscription model that nobody wants.

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514565#Comment_120514565

Well what do you suggest? This discussion was typified for me by some gal on with Ballsy O'Connor on radio over the weekend. She gaily proclaimed that she used Twitter for promoting her business and for news information etc. She also proclaimed that no way would she pay for a service like Twitter and implied that anyone who does should be cancelled.

Who does she think she is? Nobody owes her a living. If she wants to use services like Twitter to run her influencer type entity, then she should fecking pay for it or piss off. The entitlement was dripping off her.

If I was Musk, I'd cancel her account and let her ponder on the value of things.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514530#Comment_120514530

The issue with subscription models is the value proposition for each and where the content comes from.

Netflix (and all the other music/video streaming services) either purchase or directly create the content on their platform and then charge you to consume that content. They are also starting to roll out a version where you pay less but see adverts to make up the difference.

YouTube displays content created by its users and generates revenue from the advertising it displays, which it then shares with the content creators. You can also pay a subscription to not see advertising. You can absolutely argue about the level of payments to content creators etc. but the payments exist.

Twitter however neither directly pays for the content on its platform nor does it share the advertising revenue with the content creators it hosts.

The current Twitter subscription model is flawed in that the only people making money from it are Twitter and the content creators are getting nothing in return, and if you don't pay for it your content will be pushed down in the rankings.

Twitter wants content creators to give them money so that Twitter can make money off their content - That's really not a good model for a sustainable flow of engaging content.

ohnonotgmail

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514597#Comment_120514597

what she is is a product. a product sold to advertisers.

pjohnson

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514597#Comment_120514597

Yeah your view is the nonsensical no mans land Musk is aiming for.

Christy42

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514597#Comment_120514597

Given he has been handing out twitter blue for free I strongly suspect he will not be cancelling her, I assume she is not big enough to get it for free but he still won't be cancelling people making content. Apparently Elon has pondered the value of twitter blue.

Twitter content is a two way street. It gives people a platform but content also keeps people coming back to twitter. Certainly how many people is relative to your follower base but a lower follower base also gives you a smaller platform so it scales. This is why blue ticks were pushed, because it brought users to log onto twitter more often.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514526#Comment_120514526

Now paying gets you blocked by a large proportion of those that do see your tweets. People just don't care what they have to say. Famous people will still have more reach. They will have more followers and more reshares. Meanwhile ordinary people will just have their accounts blocked by people who get annoyed at random people they don't care about all across their timelines. The value of the blue tick was not for those who had it. The real value was for those who didn't to know whose tweets they were seeing. As I said above the point of social media is to get people to log on to sell them advertising, most people don't care about their posts getting boosted but they do care about the content they see on twitter and if that goes down then twitter loses value as the quality of the platform goes down.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514526#Comment_120514526

Firstly, the old way didn't give more reach to your tweets based on who you were, people still had to choose to follow your account. Even in replies to people's tweets, blue tick accounts had the same access as everyone else, the only difference may occur when their tweets get liked or retweeted more, which may make their tweets appear first under replies. But again, that's nothing to do with the blue tick, but rather followers engaging with the tweets of someone famous. That would happen blue tick or no. Someone paying for Twitter Blue and for their tweets to be bumped up the queue still doesn't mean they're going to get any active engagement on their tweets.

Again, the blue tick was only a verification symbol. That's it, that's all it did. It didn't give your tweets more reach, their followers did that by liking/retweeting their tweets. Like I said, it's not gatekeeping, it's recognition.

As for "now the decision is yours", tell that to all the accounts who now have blue ticks against their will, whether Musk was doing it as a punishment, or just because they have 1m+ followers. Again, literal gatekeeping.

Quin_Dub

Musk has ruined the blue check mark for everybody now.

He could have left it as it was - Which was a way for users to identify "real" high profile accounts OR he could have removed it for everyone and had only those people that paid the subscription fee (which was always a bit pointless tbh).

Now though , he has just ruined it for everyone - Some people get it for free and some people have to pay for it and no one really has any immediately obvious way of telling the difference so the value of it is completely diluted.

It's all just a bit silly and even the fact that he decided to make the change on "4/20" is just further evidence that he really doesn't think about these decisions beyond their immediate "meme-lord" value to his ego..

PeadarCo

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514530#Comment_120514530

By asking who is better performing YouTube or Netflix you have completely missed the point and you don't understand the business of video streaming and social media in general. YouTube could not operate with Netflixs business model and vice versa.

YouTube is quantity over quality and Netflix are the opposite. They operate in different segments of the video streaming industry but both are highly successful in their respective niches.

For YouTube to generate the quantity required to compete with Netflix it needs a large number of users most of whom will produce stuff that very few people watch. YouTube does pays well enough so it's possible to make a career out of YouTube for even moderately successful creators.

Netflix rely on the vast majority of its content being watched. So it pays for content to be produced directly or buys content already produced. They could never produce YouTubes level of content nor would subscribers tolerate the reduction in quality this volume increase would cause.

Twitter is not Netflix it relies on its users to create content especially users that have big followings. As others have explained asking these people to pay is stupid putting things mildly. The guy has no understanding of social media.

What seems to have happened is that Musks solution to Twitters cash problem has been to look at the total users and say that if X% pay X price, Twitter would be profitable. If it was really that simple the previous owners of Twitter would have done that years ago. Again it shows the guy is clueless about the Twitter and the industry its in.

Sums it up.

silliussoddius

....

Timberrrrrrrr

Well that's not weird, that's not weird at all.

https://twitter.com/theserfstv/status/1650686921738444800?t=_dtq0uczcr_AiU6gN52cqQ&s=19

Timberrrrrrrr

More bad news for Musk

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/04/24/spacex-starship-explosion-spread-particulate-matter-for-miles.html

Run Forest Run

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120515565#Comment_120515565

So, you're saying there is ample fuel to keep a platform going then...?

This is exactly what I have been saying.

It doesn't really matter whether it's dominated by one tribe or the other. Once there is plenty of loonies making a fool of themselves, then twitter will be doing just fine. I think Musk understands this very well... he's been an intimate part of it for a while now. He gets the mass appeal, and it's mostly cringe media. He has just shook the place up a bit, and welcomed in more of the oddballs from the other tribe! 😂

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120517650#Comment_120517650

If true, the only strange thing is that he made it something so easily linked back to himself.

Then again, with his ego, probably not that strange....

VinLieger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120517792#Comment_120517792

Except hes still not making enough money to keep twitter in the black let alone service the debt hes loaded the company with

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120517792#Comment_120517792

No there isn't , not even remotely close to it.

That's why "Truth" Social , Parler , Gettr and all the other echo chamber social media environments are failing badly.

Advertisers won't touch any of the above with a barge pole and Musks Twitter is well its way to Advertising no-mans land as well.

People paying for blue ticks won't even cover keeping the lights on at Twitter, let alone help pay for the massive borrowing costs that Musk loaded up on to the books when he decided to grossly over pay for it at $54.20 per share because he needed to get 4-20 into the offer price "for the epic memes".

Twitter will survive for as long as Musk is willing to burn cash to keep it afloat , in its current form it will never get close to breaking even.

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120514890#Comment_120514890

Of course I understand the different models of YouTube and Netflix, not stupid! I would query which financially works better and I doubt if anyone knows the full story there.

What is apparent and what you and others seem to be wishing away, is just how you run a service like Twitter and make it pay? What's your idea?

It's quite understandable that media services like this start off as free as various portals vie for market share. But as things mature, the costs of running & developing them further escalate.

Advertising works to a certain extent, when it's new to a site and adverts are thinner, they have impact. But you start selling more & advertising and those purchasing same start to see diminishing returns. You can't flood a social media site with adverts.

So how do you finance the likes of Twitter or on a much lesser scale Boards here? Either a) a large benefactor, philanthropist b) the state i.e. taxpayer or c) subscriptions from those who use the service?

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518328#Comment_120518328

The whole problem is that the age of pure social media is over to a large extent.

As people have become more and more aware of privacy and the data that they share online, the models historically followed by Twitter & Facebook are increasingly weakened.

The value to advertisers was not so much showing the ad , it was showing the ad to a very specific person based on all the data that was being captured by Facebook and Twitter.

Their ability to do that is massively reduced today, both by legislation and by larger companies like Google & Apple making it much easier for end users to restrict access to that data.

Facebook are trying to diversify into the Metaverse (which is already a bust) but Twitter really doesn't have many options.

People are just not going to subscribe to Twitter in anything like the required volumes to meet the costs and advertisers are also running away because they don't want to have their brands appearing in toxic tweet threads and also because Twitter (and everybody else) are unable to offer them the level of targeting that makes sense for the brands.

So , the only route really is the "rich benefactor" path you mention above.

As I said in an earlier post , Twitter will last for as long as Musk (and his fellow investors) are prepared to burn money to keep it afloat.

It would have lasted much much longer had Musk not burdened it with billions and billions in additional debt mind you.

Penn

I'd also tack on to that that another money-generating feature that Musk has introduced is the ability to subscribe to some Twitter users, where those users would essentially put some of their content behind a paywall and you can only view it by subscribing to the individual user. However any users who want to generate more income from their content likely already have a Patreon, or Substack, or any of the various "tip"-type systems in place.

What bonus content are you going to get from, say Musk's subscription? Get to see recycled memes from Reddit and 4chan?

I don't know how profitable Twitter was before Musk took over, or indeed how much money it was losing which I believe was the case. But the best course of action would have been increase ads (slightly, not enough to annoy people, but enough to get a bit more revenue), increase the cost of ads, and reduce overheads of the company. Musk has shown there was clearly a bit of fat which could be cut off. I think he's likely gone too far with that in ways that will eventually become evident, and the site has definitely been more glitchy with more downtime than before he took over, but there was likely operational costs which could be cut regardless.

But as Quin_Dub said, Musk has burdened the site with billions in debt. You cannot take a free service which people have used for free for 10+ years and suddenly start locking all advantages of the site behind paywalls and subscriptions without causing an exodus of users who have numerous other sites to go to instead, thereby also affecting ad revenue in the meantime (even ignoring how he p*ssed off so much of the existing advertisers which was a huge portion of their income).

Run Forest Run

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518064#Comment_120518064

I guess we'll find out in due course.

There is no doubt that many people who hate Musk, want to see him fail spectacularly... but then we've seen the predictions about his other business endeavours that haven't come to fruition either. I have a feeling twitter will trundle along just fine for many years to come. Which will obviously annoy quite a lot of people... but hey ho, that's life!

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518560#Comment_120518560

Hey as much as I dislike Musk myself, I hope Twitter keeps going. For what I like about it, it still operates as I want to use it for (ie. never ever talking to anyone or discussing anything or posting anything myself, but just following accounts for general news, info, jokes etc) and is always one of my go-to sites throughout the day.

And it's one of the best places for people making fun of Musk, so win-win.

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518394#Comment_120518394

Yeah, I'd agree largely with that. There's only one way costs develop with services like these and that is upwards.

The problems with the benefactor or state subvention models are obvious.

These issues are not confined to Twitter of course, I'd be watching Google as time goes on. It provides a lot of 'free' services that are expensive to develop and maintain. OK commercial use is charged for some services. Whilst advertising and data mining is used to generate income from more general public users. But will it always be like this? I'm not so sure, there is a lot of value in Google services and many people leverage off them freely to generate income. When services become indispensable, then we may see subscription or pay by use charges coming in there too.

What I laugh at the protests from Twitter users who use the service professionally and yet who think they should not pay something towards it out of some sort of principle. Ask them to put their hands in their own pockets to fund some service freely and they'd run a mile.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518560#Comment_120518560

Like I said , Twitter will go on for as long as the people who funded the takeover are prepared to lose money, or at least not get their investment back.

That could be 6 months or that could be 20 years, but it's entirely up to them.

What is pretty clear though is that Twitter is extremely unlikely to ever generate sufficient revenue to cover its annual costs and debt obligations.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518613#Comment_120518613

There is probably a model there where people have to register as a "commercial entity" or whatever and pay for their accounts if the primary use is business promotion - But if I was a company paying for my account on Twitter I'd want guarantees that no adverts for my competitors are going to show up next to my tweets etc. so it wouldn't be a simple thing to implement.

But asking regular users - who are the ones that generate the interactions that make Twitter its ad revenue , to pay for the privilege of using the service isn't a pathway to growth and sustainable revenue.

Flaneur OBrien

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518613#Comment_120518613

What I laugh at the protests from Twitter users who use the service professionally and yet who think they should not pay something towards it out of some sort of principle. Ask them to put their hands in their own pockets to fund some service freely and they'd run a mile.

If you don't understand this, then you have no concept of the problem. It's like you turning up for work and paying your boss for the privilege of working there.

I did think of one way Twitter could have made more income, but the ship has already sailed as Musk has ruined everything😁

For want of a better phrase, a cross-contamination of media. You subscribe to a purse that you control, twitter takes x% of each deposit. Now, when the like of the Irish independent, Times etc. puts up an article behind a paywall, you can unlock just that article by going through twitter and clicking the link. Instead of paying for an annual or monthly sub, you get to choose what content to pay for. Papers make a little bit more money, but also can tailor their content to what makes money. Eventually people may realise a subscription works out cheaper, and subscribes.

Cordell

Yeah that won't work, the media behind the paywall doesn't want to sell you an article, they want your repeat business for a long time. Just like the streaming services who won't sell you just the film or series you're interested in, because they want you hooked for more.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518879#Comment_120518879

I'd tend to agree , but there's definitely scope for partnership type deals where there are shared benefits across subscriptions.

Like , if you subscribe to a newspapers premium offer you also get access to the Twitter subscription and vice versa - Something like that.

The value proposition of paying $8/month for just Twitter really isn't there for the vast vast majority of users.

97% of Twitters content comes from ~25% of the accounts and 82% of that is replies and retweets (which are 50% of the total).

So right out the gate , 75% of users have next to zero to gain from subscribing to Twitter as being able to edit etc. is of very limited value.

If they want people to subscribe to the service , they have to make it worthwhile and right now it just isn't.

Flaneur OBrien

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518879#Comment_120518879

Except I can already pay for single items from prime, apple+ etc.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518879#Comment_120518879

Part of the problem with so many different sites etc having a subscription model is that consumers then become a lot more picky about what services they subscribe to. Netflix had the streaming market sewn up, but because more and more companies started their own subscription streaming services, piracy has risen substantially because people don't want to or can't afford to have all the streaming services. Likewise with news websites or social media, people will use them all when they're free, but when they start paywalling behind subscriptions, people will pick one or two and not visit the rest.

When it comes to social media, subscription is an even harder sell, because the whole thing about social media is being able to connect with as many other accounts as you want, and people have accounts on different social media sites. Once they start going behind subscription services, the main benefit of social media is gone because everyone will disperse to different sites (if at all). And while you get news from news sites, films/tv from streaming sites etc, social media is going to be something a lot of people just don't pay for.

Run Forest Run

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518728#Comment_120518728

We'll see...

I don't think he bought it purely as a vehicle for making profits. But I think he'll find a way to make it a financially viable operation - by hook or by crook as they say.

VinLieger

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120519072#Comment_120519072

Its nothing to do with financial viability, the issue is the debt hes lumbered the company with. He likely could make it financially viable and at the very least break even but on top of that servicing 1 billion dollars of debt this year alone is a task he is nowhere close to reaching.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120519072#Comment_120519072

He didn't buy it because he wanted to , he bought it because he was forced to by the courts , let's be fair here.

I have no doubt that he'll try to find some way of making money from it , but none of his ideas thus far are going to do that.

His idea of a WeChat clone - this "Everything App" thing is a bust as well, it's just not viable.

WeChat exists only because the Chinese has banned or blocked every single potential competitor from the only market that WeChat operates in - Mainland China. It is non-existent anywhere it has any competition.

Who knows what idea he might or might not come up with in the future , but I wouldn't hold my breath.

Musks gift is in marketing and promotion , it's not in Product design.

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120519058#Comment_120519058

Grand, so how do social media / news sites pay their way?

As it stands, it appears that the likes of Twitter would collapse overnight if Musk just cut his losses and pulled out.

I'm not sure what the answer is but I do know that data and information has value and it's simply unsustainable for the public to expect long term to have free access to data and information at their fingertips. Was a time when you wanted to know something, that you found and asked someone knowledgeable or you bought or borrowed a book or watched & observed. All required effort and often some cost. The fundamentals of that have been pushed aside for a number of years but it can't last.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120519274#Comment_120519274

"Grand, so how do social media / news sites pay their way?"

Advertising and Data Licensing.

"As it stands, it appears that the likes of Twitter would collapse overnight if Musk just cut his losses and pulled out."

Well yeah, Twitter is now privately owned entirely by Musk. He's not an investor in it, if he pulls out the company closes unless he sells it off.

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120519416#Comment_120519416

Advertising - losing it's shine on social media as pointed out above. Between saturation, legislation and ad blockers and so on.

I can't recall purchasing any product or service this year based on a social media advert. I might click on the odd one that catches my eye but that's been it. How about yourself, do adverts work with you?

Obviously they work to some extent, if not purchases then building brand awareness. But all businesses use metrics to decide on how to spend marketing money. And when it pales, they pull.

Penn

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120519461#Comment_120519461

Who? Me?

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120519461#Comment_120519461

Agreed - It's a dying business which makes the amount Musk paid for Twitter all the crazier.

There is a possible narrow pathway via the influencers - If Kim Kardashian or whoever is getting $X from some brand or other to tweet that she loves the product , then Twitter should probably be getting a piece of that fee as it is in effect an advert they are displaying. But working out how that works would require very subtle and targeted pricing and attribution.

But asking people to subscribe to your service so you can monetise their activity just isn't going to fly.

Christy42

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120518963#Comment_120518963

I would add that twitter blue makes twitter actively worse for most of the 75% who don't really tweet. They go to twitter for the content they see there. If that content reduces in quality then it makes their experience worse. Hence the block the blue tick movement as it became a quick and easy way to filter out a lot of undesired content.

Christy42

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120519461#Comment_120519461

I am not sure I have ever done it and clicks in tend to be misclicks. Right now my boards ads are all the same idea based off of some searches yesterday. However I have already made up my mind on what I will buy so not sure they will get anything there. Maybe subliminal and I don't know it.

In any case that is the market Elon paid to get into. Maybe if they could get a cut like youtube memberships (I am not a member so not 100% on what they do), twitch, patreon subscriptions but tweets are less content to pay for than videos. Potentially you could make it much cheaper. In any case just because he bought into a questionable business model does not mean anything he subs in is a good idea and this was obviously a bad idea months ago. People got annoyed and insisted that big shots would go crawling back for a blue tick. Then it was a mess with no verification and had to be redone. The price was lowered and now the big shots get it for free and are still unhappy as twitter was saying they had paid for it (essentially trying to fake endorsements).

If your new source of income is just people emotionally invested in you succeeding as opposed to being able to provide a worthwhile product then you are onto a loser.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120516034#Comment_120516034

Yes, I wrote that. The last great Irish writer.

francois

I thought child protection was a priority

https://twitter.com/NBCNews/status/1650853683788148736?t=maeZLnlcQ50M5Ug1D4zgWA&s=19

AndrewJRenko

Surprise surprise

https://twitter.com/fuckyouiquit/status/1651281854430081024?s=46&t=3l1OhjvjsuAh4w9RMjlH8g