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

Good job Twitter isn't about the money 😁

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-12-30/elon-musk-becomes-first-person-ever-to-lose-200-billion

The question marks about social media's ability to turn a profit didn't suddenly emerge last November. It's been known for years. I'm not in a position to evaluate Twitter's finances, but cutting costs and finding new revenue streams seems necessary. Musk is doing both, but as I noted if he had some imagination he ought to be perfectly willing to run it at a loss so he can influence public discourse instead.

Regards the CSAM - as I said, I cant independently verify it. But the claim was made an independent campaigner against this material who as far as I know has no reason to lie. Nuking the hastags (and the accounts - they were nuked too) might not be a permanent solution but that isn't an argument for doing nothing. It should still be done as soon as they are identified. What is damning of the "Trust and Safety" era is that even with all their resources and staff they did not take even that small action.

So it isn't just about resources - it is about will. T&S Twitter didn't have that will or direction [no wonder given who led them] whereas Musk's Twitter made it a #1 priority.

Yes, I've heard its a veritable 4th Reich on Twitter these days.

I think everyone should be more concerned about CSAM being curtailed than if Trump gets his account back.

Most people don’t fall for the “shout paedo and hope it distracts people” these days, given the extent to which it has been overplayed . You’ll need to come up with some new tricks.

Yeah, the old Trust and Safety team seemed to have the same priorities. Musk does think combatting CSAM takes priority, so I see that as a positive even if I'm otherwise underwhelmed.

The discourse on Twitter can only improve tbh. As far as I can see the issue appears to be some people are enraged that there might be any discourse they don't approve of on the platform and that they don't get a free pass on harassing or doxxing people anymore. I'm not sympathetic.

As for your anecdote, that sounds like a user side problem. They've updated what a blue check mark means, which is reflected in the Twitter rules. Even prior to Musk, people with blue check marks would say dishonest nonsense. It is still against the policies to run a misleading or deceptive account so report one if you see one. Or don't.

People are acting as if Musk arrived in and deleted the entire Twitter ruleset and it became some chaotic hellscape. The hysteria is unwarranted. He's done very little - bar the crackdown on CSAM, which is a low bar - and likely wont do anything particularly dramatic.

I don't "care" about them but they are a massive part of the discussion around both Musk and Twitter so they interest me and like others have pointed out until they are stable they will be the only thing that decides what direction Twitter goes

Don’t suppose there’s any actual evidence of this claimed crackdown on CSAM?

How’s the crackdown working out?

Do you ever feel like you’ve been suckered?

I often feel like people don't read my posts.

Who said all CSAM had been purged for evermore? See my post 5815 where I state myself that its not a permanent solution but Twitter still should have been nuking those hashtags/accounts ASAP. Now they are. That was what was noteworthy. As NBC admitted they gave the accounts/hashtag information to Twitter (apparently, Twitter had to ask...NBC didn't report or volunteer it for some reason) and the accounts were suspended/closed.

Musk has stated combatting CSAM on the platform is his #1 priority. It seems that the old T&S team had different priorities. Its a positive change, no matter how much you seethe about it.

I became aware of it, not through Musk, but the claim/observation of an anti-CSAM campaigner who noted that three well known, long running hashtags had been nuked quickly under the new Musk regime. Now, as I'll say again for the third time in the last 24 hours I cannot independently verify the claim but I don't see why this person would have any cause to lie about it. And it aligns with with Musk publicly claiming CSAM is his #1 priority, and with Twitter VP Ella Irwin saying in her response to NBC that they have been improving and are detecting more than Twitter has done for a long time. It also aligns with the departure of the old head of the T&S who wrote a PhD thesis that makes me think he's not the right person to be leading a fight against CSAM. These are all positive changes, in their own right and taken together.

I'll note though this idea of "followers" is a fairly sad indictment of how so many people have been conditioned to engage in debate by social media, particularly under the massive repression of free debate and ideas. It's all personality driven worship or hatred. It's the only way too many people can interpret events these days. People end up projecting this onto others, because that's how they think.

For the record, I'm not a follower of Musk - I think the guy is a dope. I think he's a dog that finally caught the car, and like all of his ilk when he finally gets some power he hasn't a clue how to exploit it. But I can still observe that the social media public square is and always has been privately owned, so Musk can do what he likes and its dumb to provoke him. And he has not made sweeping changes to the Twitter rules. And its good that he is prioritising the fight against CSAM on the platform.

Call it just a gut feeling that a guy calling for children to be on adult networking sites isn't necessarily going to be the right person to fight CSAM. Though its probably just a coincidence that the change in Twitter prioritisation regarding CSAM occurred after his departure.

Prioritisation has more to do with will and leadership. The team could have been cut in half and still have more people working on fighting CSAM than there was three months ago. As it stands, an upsurge in Twitter taking action against CSAM has been noticed by those who have no reason to lie about it.

He has made sweeping changes to the platform. He just had to reverse them because people provoked him. Provoking him isn't dumb, it shows off Musk's true character to the world and is the only reason a lot of the terrible changes to site got reversed.

You say you are not a fan but need to squeeze in the #1 priority everywhere. It isn't just I think this bit is a positive change, it is reinforcing this claim everywhere. Forgive for being skeptical, this thread has seen a lot of Musk's #1priorities for twitter from money, to truth/free/equal speech. Everyone has their own issue they want fixed and believe that Elon is 100% with them on it.

No, he took a stronger stance than "Oh well, its happening anyway so we might as well facilitate it". Which by itself would be dumb.

He said, and I quote "Rather than merely trying to absolve themselves *OR, WORSE, trying to drive out teenagers entirely*, service providers should instead focus on crafting safety strategies that can accommodate a wide variety of use cases for platforms like Grindr"

So he viewed efforts to prevent children accessing platforms like Grindr - a platform he himself just a few lines before described as being "lewd" and "hook-up-orientated" - as being negative. That was the stance he took - it was bad for adult platforms attempt to "drive out" children from their platforms.

Its the sort of argument that makes my skin crawl. Even if I grant that somehow its entirely well meaning, its a dumb idea. How exactly does identifying the children work so that they can have restricted access? You seem to dismiss the ability of service providers to identify children for the purposes of removing or preventing their access. If we grant that, then how do the same service providers identify the same children for the purposes of limiting their access to the kids club version of their platform? Even worse, how do they identify adults masquerading as children so they can access the kids club version and interact with those kids?

It is an awful idea. The best option - despite the difficulties - is to work to identify and prevent child access to adult sites. But its probably just a coincidence that when this guy left Twitter that fighting CSAM seemed to get a higher priority.

How do you prevent child access to adult sites on the internet?

You’re putting one particular interpretation on one statement out of what is presumably a 100,000 word or similar thesis to suit your own narrative.

The reason why most people focus on mitigation strategies over prevention strategies is that prevention strategies don’t work. There is no way to definitively identify the age of an internet user. Recognising this reality leads to a far safer online world than burying your head in the sand.

It’s difficult to see this narrow focus on one sentence from a very long thesis from many years ago as a good faith argument.

You're moving the goalposts. First its a challenge to quote where he said children should be on adult networking sites. When I provide the quote, now it needs to be more than a quote. You seem to be arguing from a conclusion, searching for evidence. And I was as generous as possible to him - that statement I quoted is completed by a view that Grindr (a "lewd" and "hook-up-orientated" platform) could play a role in connecting "young adults". The usage of "young adults" is bizarre in the context of arguing for underage access to adult networking platforms. Adults can freely access those platforms already. Children shouldn't. "Young adults" seems to be a deliberate effort to blur the lines between the two. But despite it making me roll my eyes, I left that bit out to be as generous as I could.

He didn't make a typo in an offhand text message. He's writing his dissertation for his PhD. It is a serious document into which he would have put considerable thought, care and effort. He made the statement I quoted. Indeed, he led into that statement by describing several cases linked to Grindr where underage children had been sexually assaulted including a 14 year old. He acknowledged that those cases were the tip of the iceberg and that many more cases could go unreported. He did the old sensible chuckle routine about the DA who prosecuted one case urging parents to protect their children. And then - with that context established - he argued that platforms like Grindr needed to facilitate the access of children to their platform, rather than prevent it.

And to follow on from that he further stated "It's not altogether clear *IF* or how Grindr should approach the task of credentialing its users".

IF. Not just how. But IF. So he argues that children should have access to adult networking sites, but its not a given that the users of those sites should even be credentialed at all. So his argument is to facilitate underage children accessing an adult "hook-up-orientated" platform with uncredentialled users and hope for the best!

So, maybe this guy is just a well meaning idiot. But on a gut-check, he is not the guy I want leading a team tasked with combatting CSAM given he is arguing for children's access to adult networking platform. But still, its probably just a coincidence that he leaves Twitter and then Twitter seems to take CSAM more seriously. Totally unconnected.