Dear Twitter Advertisers

October 27, 2022 9:19 AM

@elonmusk says he has "bought Twitter" in a message to advertisers and that he hopes the site doesn't "become a free-for-all-hellscape". However, according to the Guardian, "despite his use of the past tense, he did not legally own Twitter at the time of the post" although "the final paperwork is expected to be completed on Friday afternoon". It's also not certain if a specific former President's banned account will be allowed to return to the site, an event the WSJ calls "a red-line for some brands".
posted by autopilot (1538 comments total)

Nothing good will come of this.

However, in the extremely unlikely event that Musk kills the algorithmic timeline, I might be persuaded to consider it a wash.
posted by tclark at 9:22 AM on October 27, 2022 [8 favorites]

Reposting my comment from the last Twitter discussion. This may be obvious but:

The problem isn't that I will see Trump on Twitter. I've never been a member! I don't care about Twitter.

The problem is that the fucking media will report on every stupid thing he tweets, allowing him to shape the narrative of US politics.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 9:26 AM on October 27, 2022 [284 favorites]

1000% what Abehammerb Lincoln said.
posted by Bella Donna at 9:31 AM on October 27, 2022 [18 favorites]

The larger problem is that he isn't rotting in a prison cell. We have a legal system that seems to help bail him out whenever he gets in trouble. Elon Musk and Twitter (whoever owns it) are window dressing.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 9:36 AM on October 27, 2022 [45 favorites]

As a former Twitter insider nothing has made me sadder than watching this disastrous acquisition slowly unfold. I mean I enjoy seeing Musk forced to honor a bad deal as much as the next schadenfreund, but literally no one thinks this acquisition is good for Twitter or global discourse.

Dave Karpf has a reasonable read on what the likely outcome will be: a slow decline at first, then rapid. Honestly Twitter was already likely going to be doing worse over the next few years of declining revenue and user base. But Musk's malign influence isn't going to help.

I also appreciated this take on Elon's weird little missive to advertisers

“I did it to try to help humanity, whom I love” is some real Adrian Veidt dialogue

posted by Nelson at 9:40 AM on October 27, 2022 [73 favorites]

Utter contempt for content moderation, even moreso than Twitter has at the moment, an intent to fire or drive off more or less the entire staff, and an inability not to meddle all make me hopeful that the decline to being unusable will be quite quick.

For now anyone still on it really needs to get the app off their phone/other devices and start considering DMs completely insecure.
posted by Artw at 9:43 AM on October 27, 2022 [15 favorites]

Is it an appropriate metaphor to say that the iceberg just bought the Titanic?
posted by njohnson23 at 9:43 AM on October 27, 2022 [82 favorites]

i just hope that under musk's leadership, twitter becomes as stale and irrelevant as facebook
posted by entropone at 9:44 AM on October 27, 2022 [17 favorites]

Has trading stopped on Twitter stock? (Not that there’s be any sane reason to buy it now.)
posted by sjswitzer at 9:45 AM on October 27, 2022

Honestly Twitter was already likely going to be doing worse over the next few years of declining revenue and user base.

I was recently alarmed to find out that, due to a local history account I help run, I'm considered a "power user" by Twitter, by tweet volume.

Dealing with trolls, malicious quote tweets, etc. is already a steady pain in the ass - if Musk floods the platform with fascists, I'm very likely done.
posted by ryanshepard at 9:46 AM on October 27, 2022 [8 favorites]

The big thing is that it feels like Musk is the dog that caught the proverbial car. He takes control of a company whose staff he has managed to alienate through a number of actions, and whose user model is in serious trouble as the user tier that has historically driven the narrative has decamped for other, friendlier platforms. Beyond that, it's come out that Tesla has been the subject of a federal criminal probe (so if you're wondering why he was engaging in prop comedy that would make Carrot Top disgusted, there's your answer.)

In short, a number of butcher's bills are coming due for the man, striking at his personal image.
posted by NoxAeternum at 9:47 AM on October 27, 2022 [17 favorites]

How likely is it that the very act of publicly claiming the deal is already done (when it isn’t), is itself yet another violation of securities regulations?
posted by notoriety public at 10:00 AM on October 27, 2022 [29 favorites]

Time for another mass emigration event. Maybe it'll stick this time.
posted by seanmpuckett at 10:03 AM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

NoxAeternum: ...the user tier that has historically driven the narrative has decamped for other, friendlier platforms.

I have seen this elsewhere, too, and I am curious: where did they go? To individual newsletters, or columns at Medium & Substack? Those are all "one-way" communications. Or are there actual communities -- with two-way conversations -- where the interesting people have migrated to?
posted by wenestvedt at 10:11 AM on October 27, 2022 [12 favorites]

I mean I have my own platform for my own stuff. Twitter will just turn into another thing I repost links to my real stuff, just like Facebook. It's halfway there, already.
posted by alex_skazat at 10:15 AM on October 27, 2022 [5 favorites]

This comment from the other thread is worth repeating:

I never understand why companies think that their social media network is the one that will last. Remember MySpace? Remember Friendster? It all dies eventually. Facebook will not survive forever, neither will Twitter. Facebook was at least smart enough to buy Instagram, which will die eventually too, or be sued into oblivion as the new Big Tobacco.
posted by Melismata at 10:20 AM on October 27, 2022 [14 favorites]

Or are there actual communities -- with two-way conversations -- where the interesting people have migrated to?

Mastodon is not really the same thing and is hyper sedate by comparison, and long timers like it that way, but does seem to be picking up a bit as a place where conversations happen. Really the big winner here is Discord, though the downside is everything becomes super fragmented.

I have said “maybe I should start a blog” unironically recently.
posted by Artw at 10:25 AM on October 27, 2022 [24 favorites]

I am a huge twitter reader, just shamefully addicted. I do not contribute in anyway, but after ten years of carefully tweaking who I follow, it is absolutely my main source of news, commentary, laughs, art, etc. Hours a day on that cursed site. But I am absolutely quitting the instant the deal goes through, I took an afternoon to see about newsletters I could subscribe to and bookmarking any blogs or personal websites I could follow. But that will be it, I will manually unfollow everyone and fuck off.

I miss my old RSS feed, I am sure with a little research I could cobble something similar.
posted by Stonestock Relentless at 10:27 AM on October 27, 2022 [34 favorites]

The reason I acquired Twitter is because it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner...

Our platform must be warm and welcoming to all, where you can choose your own experience according to your preferences....

So it's crucial to have a place where everyone comes together.. as long as you can choose to see only the content that you agree with. Got it. Great.
posted by martin q blank at 10:28 AM on October 27, 2022 [7 favorites]

or be sued into oblivion as the new Big Tobacco

(small derail)
Just FYI lots of those assholes moved into Big Food with tobacco lessons learned, a promise not to let what happened to their precious tobacco companies happen to them again, and have contributed to some of the completely f*cked and grotesque giant food conglomerates and their proud lack of ethical consideration for people, animals or the environment.
posted by Glinn at 10:30 AM on October 27, 2022 [21 favorites]

I miss my old RSS feed, I am sure with a little research I could cobble something similar.

I recommend Feedly as a Google Reader clone.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:33 AM on October 27, 2022 [25 favorites]

Good.

I think Twitter has been very bad for the world, and I also enjoy seeing billionaires forced to accept consequences for their actions. Seems like a win-win to me!
posted by rhymedirective at 10:33 AM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

I have seen this elsewhere, too, and I am curious: where did they go? To individual newsletters, or columns at Medium & Substack? Those are all "one-way" communications.

One, Twitter has historically been driven by parasocial relationships, which are primarily one-way.

Two, it depends on the creator and their needs - many have moved to TikTok, others to Substack/Medium, others to Instagram.
posted by NoxAeternum at 10:39 AM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

Remember when the K Foundation set a million quid on fire? Looks like Elon is going to put them to shame.
posted by sjswitzer at 10:40 AM on October 27, 2022 [17 favorites]

sjswitzer, Elon Musk taking orders from the Justified Ancients of Mu Mu sounds like a conspiracy theory I can get behind.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:44 AM on October 27, 2022 [26 favorites]

I miss my old RSS feed, I am sure with a little research I could cobble something similar.

Newsblur is an excellent feed reader, and RSS.app will generate a feed for damn near anything that doesn't have one of its own.

I may be a dead-ender, but I still consider the web essentially unusable without RSS.
posted by ryanshepard at 10:49 AM on October 27, 2022 [56 favorites]

It's definitely not meant to become The Next Twitter (which is probably a good thing), and I still haven't gotten the hang of public social-media where I add content (vs. listening to & boosting others almost entirely), but cohost has been pretty neat. Design-wise it feels like something in the Tumblr-to-LiveJournal range.
posted by CrystalDave at 10:50 AM on October 27, 2022 [8 favorites]

I recommend Feedly as a Google Reader clone.

Inoreader, for me. Dave Winer is working on something in the RSS space right now, but I haven't played with it yet.

Oh. Just saw Dave's thing uses twitter for user authentication.

I'm not believing Musk until an official press release from Twitter comes out.
posted by a non mouse, a cow herd at 10:55 AM on October 27, 2022 [6 favorites]

“I did it to try to help humanity, whom I love.”

"NO! STOP! It's a cook book!"
posted by Splunge at 10:58 AM on October 27, 2022 [77 favorites]

Substack allows comments if you have paid to subscribe to the newsletter, and many creators have specific newsletter posts for their paid subscribers to comment on if they have free and paid subs.

I use Inoreader + Newsblur + Feedly (different feeds in each) since they have different features I like. Inoreader will let you send your newsletters to a specific address ties to your account that turns the newsletter into an RSS feed. It'll also let you see your YouTube subs and keep updated on new videos. Newsblur does similar, but not YouTube. It's great for twitter subs. Feedly has a lot of the big websites already and has a clean interface. Super limited for the free tier but great for WordPress follows (WordPress/Automatic has a Reader function where you can follow any WP blog, and you can keep up with those blogs. But the Reader is very bare bones.)
posted by tlwright at 10:58 AM on October 27, 2022 [6 favorites]

Twitter is a method of annoying the maximum number of people in an efficient and humorous way.

Any other uses for it are unintended side effects and should be considered transitory.

Like dril, I will never log off.
posted by delfin at 10:58 AM on October 27, 2022 [10 favorites]

On a lighter note, Ben Collins has put out a call for the best tweets ever, and people are obliging.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 11:01 AM on October 27, 2022 [16 favorites]

Best tweet
posted by sjswitzer at 11:08 AM on October 27, 2022 [8 favorites]

> [Musk] hopes the site doesn't "become a free-for-all-hellscape".

Isn't that what he's been calling for this whole time, though?
posted by asnider at 11:11 AM on October 27, 2022 [9 favorites]

If we're all dropping Google Reader alternatives in here, lemme give a shout-out to the one I use: BazQux. It costs $30 a year (or $249 for lifetime support) and I'm glad to pay it just for the slightly lower chance of it disappearing suddenly like Google Reader did. I like it because I was able to make the UI look and feel very, very similar to my old Google Reader.
posted by mhum at 11:14 AM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

I suspect that Musk's ability to create a global town square where a wide range of opinions can be discussed civilly is approximately in line with his ability to create a working hyperloop.
posted by clawsoon at 11:17 AM on October 27, 2022 [30 favorites]

Refuting Betteridge's Law...
posted by a non mouse, a cow herd at 11:19 AM on October 27, 2022

Also much like Hyperloop was just a scam to sabotage California High Speed Rail, this "global town square" claim from Musk is cover for his particular brand of sophomoric politics and sense of humor.
posted by Nelson at 11:19 AM on October 27, 2022 [22 favorites]

"cohost has been pretty neat."

Says I need an invite to post there.

I don't have one -- any help?
posted by MrJM at 11:19 AM on October 27, 2022

“I did it to try to help humanity, whom I love.”

Dante: But you hate people!
Randal: Yes, but I love gatherings. Isn't it ironic?
posted by credulous at 11:24 AM on October 27, 2022 [15 favorites]

I bought the dip when Ol' Muskypants pulled the rope-a-dope, and I just sold all my holdings for just under $1 per share on the asking price. I didn't wait for the deal to close because I don't trust Elon enough to try and slip out of his commitment at the 11th hour.

I feel like I sold him a boat anchor and I'm watching as he carries it off the end of a pier smiling.

I have always hated Twitter and I'm glad to watch it become irrelevant. I know some here have used it as a utility of some importance in their lives, and to them I apologize. I support Mastodon and its development, but I understand it might not serve as a replacement for some people.

The firehose of half though effluvia from Twitter impacted my life way too much for someone who had never had an account. I've seen it impact the mental health of family and friends, and had it give me anxiety due to the fact that our previous president would announce policy decisions/insurrections over it while pressing out an insufficiently digested big mac on the white house commode.

Twitter was the Eternal September, may God have mercy on its soul...
posted by The Power Nap at 11:26 AM on October 27, 2022 [22 favorites]

Says I need an invite to post there.

I don't have one -- any help?

Turns out one is automatically generated after ~24 hours. D'oh.
posted by MrJM at 11:27 AM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

Floating across my RSS feeds this morning (theoldreader.com, btw): John Gruber firmly planting his flag on the wrong side of the fence:

I’m more optimistic about Twitter’s future than I have been in years. Don’t get me wrong, I think there’s a very real chance that under Musk’s leadership, Twitter might break apart and fade into irrelevance. But Musk himself notes the same thing! Keeping Twitter open to a wide range of content, but making it easy to control what content you see, as user, is a worthy ideal. Pulling it off, that’s the trick. But as a privately-held company Musk is free to make changes that move Twitter away from being optimized for engagement and towards being optimized for enjoyment.

Whose enjoyment, exactly?
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:30 AM on October 27, 2022 [14 favorites]

become a free-for-all-hellscape

LITERALLY IT WILL BE BY WEDNESDAY NEXT WEEK.
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:31 AM on October 27, 2022 [17 favorites]

I am rarely on Twitter, but it appears that it has been a free-for-all-hellscape for a pretty long time already.
posted by Bella Donna at 11:34 AM on October 27, 2022 [9 favorites]

Deactivated my Twitter account today.

F that guy.
posted by 1adam12 at 11:39 AM on October 27, 2022 [11 favorites]

John Gruber firmly planting his flag on the wrong side of the fence:

Why am I not surprised that the anthromorphic incarnation of the overly credible tech press is getting suckered by nice words?
posted by NoxAeternum at 11:40 AM on October 27, 2022 [17 favorites]

The only plus side of this whole situation is the dark belly laughs I'm getting from the cracks my smart friends have made about Musk.

It's you, by the way. You're my smart friends.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:44 AM on October 27, 2022 [54 favorites]

Does he actually think healthy debate is possible on Twitter? It's like the worst possible format for a healthy debate.
posted by wondermouse at 12:02 PM on October 27, 2022 [3 favorites]

For RSS console dwellers I can recommend newsboat...
posted by jim in austin at 12:04 PM on October 27, 2022 [3 favorites]

I should add that it seems a lot of people are incapable of healthy debate anywhere these days, let alone Twitter of all places.
posted by wondermouse at 12:05 PM on October 27, 2022 [5 favorites]

However, in the extremely unlikely event that Musk kills the algorithmic timeline, I might be persuaded to consider it a wash.

I don't think he's paying $44B to kill the algorithmic timeline. I'm thinking he's paying $44B to have personal ownership of it.

When billionaires buy floundering media companies, it generally isn't as a financial investment. Rather, it's to buy influence over public discourse.
posted by swr at 12:07 PM on October 27, 2022 [36 favorites]

When billionaires buy floundering media companies, it generally isn't as a financial investment. Rather, it's to buy influence over public discourse.

One suspects that Musk's version of "healthy debate" is "doesn't make me feel bad."

We can only hope he doesn't have the talent of Rupert Murdoch.
posted by clawsoon at 12:10 PM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

Sigh.
I swear, I still believe he's doing it for two reasons:
1) To influence prices of companies more effectively, and
2) To influence the narrative on behalf of that ex-gf of his.

He's only one step (if that) away from the supposed Twitter bot expert (that in truth appears to be a new type of scammy paid PR guy) who claims anyone with vocal opposition to his viewpoint is a bot.

It's gonna be a mess. I USE Twitter, but I've never been a huge fan of it. So I'm mostly wondering where the author/writing-related community will land during what I expect will be a long, drawn-out mass exodus. (First, there will be a huge number fleeing, accompanied by tweets from those who believe it won't be that bad and intend to stay. The drawn-out part will be the rest of the somewhat sane ones as they hit max frustration and/or disgust.)
posted by stormyteal at 12:11 PM on October 27, 2022 [8 favorites]

The answer to my question of whether Twitter stock is still publicly traded appears to be yes. That means that Musk still doesn’t own Twitter and a lot can happen in a day, especially when it concerns Musk.

The market price is within 5 cents of 5-blunt, so the market seems to believe it’s going to happen. And banks have moved billions of dollars (some from shady sources). Still, if there’s anything we know about the elongated muskrat it’s that last-minute shenanigans are to be expected. This could still fall through. Not likely, but it could still happen.
posted by sjswitzer at 12:14 PM on October 27, 2022

One thing that became clear in the Mudge thread is that Twitter has egregiously bad internal data controls and logging. Musk & friends will be digging around in his enemy's DMs (past and present). It probably turns into a secret group of Twitter employees who forward him stuff.

I don't know that he'd even try to pretend about it. He might just pick an unpopular target and release their private messages as a show of power / feeling out what he can get away with. He will be so tempted to wink about it.
posted by ryanrs at 12:15 PM on October 27, 2022 [9 favorites]

Somebody tell me where @darth will be after the impending hibernation. That’s all I need to know.
posted by m@f at 12:17 PM on October 27, 2022 [7 favorites]

Ryanrs, I've worked a bit with Missy Cummings, the automated vehicle expert from Duke who was given an appointment with NHTSA and then got chased off Twitter by Musk's fans because she has criticized Tesla's crappy AV claims and safety record. I can absolutely see a vindictive person like Musk using her data maliciously.
posted by TheKaijuCommuter at 12:21 PM on October 27, 2022 [15 favorites]

I signed up for cohost but didn't see any way to do discovery on who else was there
posted by jazon at 12:26 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

Although it seems unlikely that you could keep a special channel into DMs concealed and nobody would detect that in an organization of this size, there are probably already law enforcement portals into DMs and various administrative ways in, so it’s not at all improbable that a few well-placed people could feed that information anywhere with nobody noticing.
posted by sjswitzer at 12:33 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

there isn't any way to do discovery on cohost, cause there is no algorithm, which is a really lovely change. You've got to search some tags you are interested in and follow people by hand.
posted by velebita at 12:35 PM on October 27, 2022 [5 favorites]

so far i've searched my home state, capitol city, a couple bands i like, and Metafilter, and every time I get No Pages, No Tags
posted by jazon at 12:43 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

Although it seems unlikely that you could keep a special channel into DMs concealed and nobody would detect that in an organization of this size

It's the new moderator task force everyone was clamoring for (snicker). They are just rooting out bots and toxicity.
posted by ryanrs at 12:43 PM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

This is going to go so horribly sideways for everybody involved. It’s going to be the cautionary tale for leveraged venture capital buyouts for years. Musk is over-extended financially and in his promises to users, and the company has been slowly tanking for years.
posted by The River Ivel at 12:45 PM on October 27, 2022 [8 favorites]

Charlie Warzel: How Elon Musk Could Actually Kill Twitter. (Risks of cutting trust & safety team. Also the risks of losing technical talent that keeps the site working.)
posted by Nelson at 12:47 PM on October 27, 2022 [6 favorites]

What will the nation do with millions of hours suddenly free? After the break.
posted by gottabefunky at 1:16 PM on October 27, 2022 [6 favorites]

Here's my recommendation on how to slowly decouple from Twitter (only if you are more interested in following certain people than tweeting yourself):

• create a Twitter list with all the people you follow, get the URL of that list
• access that list via nitter.net
• log out of your Twitter account, delete its cookies, and let it collect dust

This has helped me a lot on scaling back my engagement with the platform (without outright deleting the account) and I still get to read what my favorite people are tweeting (chronologically) without all the weirdness the algorithm throws into the mix.

(If someone has a more elegant solution, however, I'm all ears!)
posted by bigendian at 1:19 PM on October 27, 2022 [35 favorites]

I started Twitter with just immediate friends then added some comedians that could exploit 140 chars for good one-liners (like Patton). Then dril. Then gradually added some lefty blogger people’s feeds since their blogs were dwindling off (Atrios, looking at you) or their home pages were useless (TPM). Then added good things that came along with that, which turned out to be mostly BIPOC people and their perspectives, and I’ve learned a lot from that. Then I blocked several of the lefty bloggers who got too much up their own asses (not gonna name names here, but Vox founders among them).

And I have to say my Twitter experience has been mostly… fine. But when I drill deep enough into the replies I find a very different Twitter that basically only wants a race war. So, I guess it all balances out? Both sides!
posted by sjswitzer at 1:38 PM on October 27, 2022 [7 favorites]

...create a Twitter list with all the people you follow, get the URL of that list...access that list via nitter.net

Does that work if your account is private?
posted by mookoz at 1:46 PM on October 27, 2022

US might bail Musk out by blocking Twitter deal over national security
posted by meowzilla at 1:47 PM on October 27, 2022 [10 favorites]

Deactivated my Twitter account today.

The problem is that reporters won’t delete their Twitter accounts. It will still drive the press agenda, and to the extent it becomes more of a cesspool, the whole news media landscape will be more of a cesspool.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 1:49 PM on October 27, 2022 [21 favorites]

I’d still bet low three figures this deal ultimately doesn’t go through. Elon’s s a slippery eel and there’s no reason to think he isn’t up to shenanigans. Again.
posted by sjswitzer at 1:59 PM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

If your message to Twitter is too long to post to Twitter as plain text, maybe use a link to a website instead

I mean the platform was expressly designed NOT to be used for long-form text

I'm watching the acquisition. If Musk lets TFG back onto the platform, a whole lot of people are going to quit. Me, I won't delete my account... I'll just never use it again, like I did with Facebook. It will sit there, abandoned.
posted by caution live frogs at 1:59 PM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

Yeah I am not getting that feeling that I get when something feels likely to happen. This just doesn't feel real. Could be wrong obviously.
posted by bleep at 2:00 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

I'm no fan of Musk, but if the White House thinks the quantity of data that Twitter collects on Americans is a national security threat, it's not enough to stop Musk from buying Twitter. It is an open admission that twitter (and Facebook, et al) should not be allowed to collect that information in the first place.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 2:05 PM on October 27, 2022 [22 favorites]

BTW, Semiphemeral can be used to wholly/selectively delete your old tweets.
posted by credulous at 2:05 PM on October 27, 2022 [5 favorites]

If your message to Twitter is too long to post to Twitter as plain text, maybe use a link to a website instead

Ironically, this is basically RSS with more clicks.
posted by sjswitzer at 2:07 PM on October 27, 2022 [3 favorites]

>> ...create a Twitter list with all the people you follow, get the URL of that list...access that list via nitter.net

> Does that work if your account is private?

It won't work if your account is locked, if you've made the list private, or (to a lesser degree) you follow locked accounts.
posted by Pronoiac at 2:10 PM on October 27, 2022

I'm seeing a steady trickle of new Mastodon accounts from librarians following me today. Gives me hope that this community, at least, can dissolve and re-form.
posted by humbug at 2:11 PM on October 27, 2022 [8 favorites]

It was such a clever invention: text-based, scrollable, allowing blocking and muting and threading. I'll miss it a lot; it keeps me company as I translate (it scrolls along on the left edge of my left screen, next to the reference material, with the work front-and-center on the right one.)

It's been a great place to converse (debate is not a good use for my time). It has yielded clever words and for me, good friendships, a "place" where I could talk about things I was reading and hear from others who were cared about whatever it was (for me it was often words for late bronze age textile processing in Semitic languages. Maybe a tad niche, but Twitter was a good place to find others with intersecting interests.) I gave a final degree presentation on twitter, and my acknowledgements page had only four people without an accounts. Two of them were my kids, two my academic advisors. The other hundred or so were twitter handles.

In my fifties and techy from the get-go, this is far from the first die-off I experience. It is already in progress, because of the dratted algorithmic view, which brings gratuitous nastiness by showing my tweets to people who are there to hate on me. It's been years since I felt free there.

I think about how telephone conversations have died off. So many random sales pitches and polls that the medium has become unusable. The process of discovering the new places is always exciting; the process of losing them, always sad. One of its stages is captured perfectly in Robert Frost's Reluctance..

I wonder what will come next.
posted by Shunra at 2:16 PM on October 27, 2022 [28 favorites]

If your message to Twitter is too long to post to Twitter as plain text, maybe use a link to a website instead

I mean the platform was expressly designed NOT to be used for long-form text

If there is one post that ought to get Twitter sued for ADA-compliance due to not providing alt texts for the images of walls of text its design encourages, it's surely a forward-looking statement from its new owner to a bunch of companies.

Not holding my breath.
posted by joeyh at 2:39 PM on October 27, 2022 [7 favorites]

Maybe we'll get lucky and he just bought Twister.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 2:40 PM on October 27, 2022 [7 favorites]

It's not the data collection that's the problem. It's control over the flow of information.

For "free speech" reasons if Twitter just lets all those Russian trolls and bots back online, and turns off the miniscule fact-checking, comment-hiding, and labeling they have now, we've let foreign countries dictate what people see on Twitter. And even though Twitter's numbers are low, the media elite still use it.

What if Musk decides that a certain topic from China simply cannot be discussed, because he wants Tesla to break into that economy? We know he has a rather simplistic view of world.
posted by meowzilla at 3:11 PM on October 27, 2022 [12 favorites]

This is going to be as important as News Corps’ acquisition of MySpace.
posted by interogative mood at 3:25 PM on October 27, 2022 [7 favorites]

to the extent it becomes more of a cesspool, the whole news media landscape will be more of a cesspool.

A press pool cesspool, if you will.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 3:41 PM on October 27, 2022 [28 favorites]

John Gruber's "cautiously optimistic" take on this news, when plugged into my patented Gruber Decoder, is actually more along the lines of: "I thought that Twitter was 100% fucked, whereas now I think it's only 99% fucked. Maybe the mild good he could do will outweigh the fact that he's Elon fucking Musk."

(My only takeaway from all of this is that we should try petitioning Musk into bringing back Vine. It's the sort of dumb meme shit he might actually do, and it would be a genuinely net good for the world. The cultural and political implications of all this are turtles dumbass all the way down, and that's a fractal I refuse to spiral down into.)
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 4:28 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

I actually think Twitter's fundamentally broken even without an algorithmic timeline. One of the reasons it's so unpleasant to use is because the user graph is such that conversations spread virally, and you only see what your friends are talking about, so you will see your friends talking about something and either you don't get to be part of the conversation, or you have to look up today's Main Character that everyone is coming up with their best dunks for. There's also when your friends tweets about horrible things they've heard about to 'spread awareness', which I have heard described as taking a prey animal like a deer and extending its senses so that it knows about every single threat in the forest. America is so dominant on the internet, and so dysfunctional, that I know way more about the details of America's dysfunctional systems than anyone really should who will never have to interact with them.

They could fix this, with an algorithmic timeline that works out the vague allusions are all associated with a specific Main Character and filter that out of your timeline unless you specifically seek it out, but at this point everyone is sick of algorithms and just wants a chronological list of their friends' tweets, even though that's demonstrably bad.
posted by Merus at 4:43 PM on October 27, 2022 [10 favorites]

Outrage is the maxima that all these algorithms converge to.

Twitter, Facebook, Youtube; all want you engaged;
want you comming back.

There is no fixing it. Raze it to the ground.
posted by The Power Nap at 5:03 PM on October 27, 2022 [13 favorites]

I’d still bet low three figures this deal ultimately doesn’t go through. Elon’s s a slippery eel and there’s no reason to think he isn’t up to shenanigans.

It’s definitely going through.

I’ve been saying this for months but—I’m from Delaware. The Court of Chancery does not Fuck Around.
posted by rhymedirective at 5:14 PM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

As I've said previously, I like twitter. A lot. I enjoy Twitter and use it as a news aggregator. But I do not tweet, I do not comment, I rarely read comments and I detest Elon Musk. Having said that, I will delete my account when he starts firing people because there are good people at twitter.
posted by bluesky43 at 5:29 PM on October 27, 2022 [3 favorites]

Go ahead and delete, blusky43:
Musk fires top Twitter execs
posted by kittensofthenight at 5:49 PM on October 27, 2022 [8 favorites]

For those without Post access:

As one of his first moves, he fired several top Twitter executives, according to three people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters. One of those confirmed the deal had closed.


CEO Parag Agrawal, chief financial officer Ned Segal, and Vijaya Gadde, head of legal policy, trust, and safety, were all fired, according to the people. Sean Edgett , the company’s general counsel, was also pushed out, one of the people said.

Getting rid of the head of trust and safety in the first cut is certainly a signal.
posted by fedward at 6:03 PM on October 27, 2022 [31 favorites]

But in recent days, Musk appeared resigned, and even enthusiastic, about his impending ownership. He showed up at the company’s offices unexpectedly on Wednesday, carrying a sink to suggest that the message that he would become owner needed to “sink in,” according to a photo he posted to his more than 100 million Twitter followers.

Sink. JFC. Second prize is probably a set of steak knives, for the love of Christ.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 6:07 PM on October 27, 2022 [11 favorites]

I can understand the sink, if he brought a urinal, people might think he’s going to piss away the company.
posted by njohnson23 at 6:13 PM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

Now he's going to be on the inside, pissing in.
posted by ryanrs at 6:19 PM on October 27, 2022 [12 favorites]

The execs he fired today are thanking their lucky stars. They just got a huge payday with the sale of the company for way more than the market valued the company at. They best part is they don't have to stick around and deal with all of Elon Musk's insanity. The people who are screwed are anyone who have to stay.
posted by interogative mood at 6:21 PM on October 27, 2022 [50 favorites]

This is orthogonal to the Elon Musk news, which is bad, but people who are bothered by twitter's algorithm... are you aware that you can choose between viewing an algorithmically populated timeline ("Home") vs. a chronological timeline ("Latest")? I'm not asking in a snarky way, just trying to spread the gospel, since I always see so many people complaining about it that I assume a lot of people don't know.
posted by dusty potato at 6:26 PM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

He showed up at the company’s offices unexpectedly on Wednesday, carrying a sink to suggest that

...they're sunk.
posted by Greg_Ace at 6:32 PM on October 27, 2022 [40 favorites]

The firing of Agrawal isn't unexpected, given how poorly Musk and Agrawal seemed to get along in the Musk phone messages that got leaked.
posted by clawsoon at 6:36 PM on October 27, 2022

So just to help me understand, the deal is Musk owns the thing, and it's getting delisted and going private, and is accountable to no one but him?
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:37 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

Not quite. It’s a privately owned company. Musk is a major shareholder, but there are other shareholders as well, and he’ll be at least somewhat accountable to them.
posted by chrchr at 6:40 PM on October 27, 2022

The firing of Agrawal isn't unexpected, given how poorly Musk and Agrawal seemed to get along in the Musk phone messages that got leaked.

None of the firings are unexpected - they were the execs who a) didn't bow to him and b) called him out on his bot bullshit. They knew that they were getting walking papers.
posted by NoxAeternum at 6:42 PM on October 27, 2022 [3 favorites]

He showed up at the company’s offices unexpectedly on Wednesday, carrying a sink to

...distract everyone from the reveal of the criminal probe of Tesla. This is a pattern of behavior - Musk pulls stunts when le merde hits la ventilateur.
posted by NoxAeternum at 6:45 PM on October 27, 2022 [13 favorites]

Twitter is not a web site for me. Twitter is the third-party app Twitteriffic (macOS and iOS) which doesn't show promoted tweets and doesn't have any other way of sorting the timeline except chronologically.
posted by emelenjr at 6:54 PM on October 27, 2022 [5 favorites]

Tesla Engineers Visit Twitter Office to Review Code for Musk

Elon Musk asked engineers from Tesla Inc., the electric-car maker he runs, to meet with product leaders at Twitter Inc., moving swiftly to make a mark on the company he’s about to take private, according to people familiar with the matter.

Earlier Thursday in Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters, product leaders showed Tesla engineers the company’s code, so they could assess and explain to Musk what the company needs, according to one of the people.

In one way this seems perfectly reasonable, but in another way that I can't quite put my finger on...
posted by clawsoon at 6:55 PM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

Showed the code? A big stack of paper? A huge bunch of PowerPoint slides? A hard drive? Can’t quite grasp what happened today down on Market Street in regards to what code got showed.
posted by njohnson23 at 7:02 PM on October 27, 2022 [10 favorites]

Tesla engineers? These Tesla engineers?
posted by Artw at 7:06 PM on October 27, 2022 [14 favorites]

I have to confess that I spend way too much time on Twitter. I've got most of the morons locked out of my timeline, and they're never looking for me, anyway. This privilege lets me keep up on where the storm chasers are, on where the wildfires are, on what Star Trek makers and fans are doing. I also get to see a lot of wonderful dogs and cats and fennecs and wolves and red pandas and chinchillas and bunnies. It dishes up a lot of terrible puns and people being genuinely nice to each other.

I won't touch Facebook and have felt somewhat hypocritical for that given what Twitter is. I am concerned about how much worse it may become under Musk. I'll have to keep track of where the storm chasers go so I can follow them there.
posted by bryon at 7:09 PM on October 27, 2022 [17 favorites]

Just deleted my account. It was a hellhole at the best of times, but yoking my attention to the whims of that alt right megalomaniac just feels grosser than doing the same for a gaggle of target-date funds. Also proudly telling everyone I know, as a commitment device to keep me from ever going back.
posted by rishabguha at 7:13 PM on October 27, 2022 [13 favorites]

In one way this seems perfectly reasonable, but in another way that I can't quite put my finger on...

I've seen a bunch of tweets demanding that Musk "release the algorithm!", whatever that means. I think they suspect there's a piece of code somewhere deep in the system that can magically suppress right-wing tweets or whatever.
posted by JoeZydeco at 7:15 PM on October 27, 2022 [6 favorites]

Looking at architecture maybe makes more sense? Tesla presumably are doing some big-data stuff with user data at scale -- telemetry etc -- although that doesn't necessarily overlap much with Twitter's architecture which is all about how to choose what tweets to show people.

But yeah, "go over there and make them show you the algorithm" does sound very Musky.

More interesting in that Bloomberg article (archive link) is that Twitter's in a code freeze as of noon, presumably to stop disgruntled employees sabotaging it on their way out.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 7:17 PM on October 27, 2022 [10 favorites]

if I'm a twitter developer, and I see the Tesla guys come in? I'm applying for a new job as soon as possible. And I bet the Tesla folks are excited to be pulled off their work and go look at _checks notes_ code for a damn website.
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 7:18 PM on October 27, 2022 [19 favorites]

If a lot of important developers are going to leave, they might be trying to learn the code as quickly as possible so they can try to transfer knowledge.
posted by Golden Eternity at 7:24 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

That place is going to be a living hell very shortly so you have to assume that’s everyone for themselves trying to get hired out of there. Best and brightest are going to go first. It isn’t the best tech employment environment right now, but anything has got to be better than staying.
posted by Artw at 7:28 PM on October 27, 2022 [3 favorites]

_checks notes_ code for a damn website.

Heh. See post above re what their code is like. I don’t imagine it’s gotten better. They are undoubtedly all libertarian weirdos with massive ego problems but that doesn’t mean they’re going to be good at much.
posted by Artw at 7:29 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

And TFG has been officially reinstated.

I guess the Dear Twitter Advertisers tweet was yet more bullshit.
posted by NoxAeternum at 7:39 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

that doesn’t mean they’re going to be good at much.

They're good at helping their boss carry a kitchen sink around some random unrelated office building. Sounds like they're very busy over at Tesla.
posted by UN at 7:41 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

Remember Sleeping Giants? They used pressuring advertisers to help defund and harry mostly right wing jerks in media. Does anyone think their new organization called https://checkmyads.org/ can help to fight these people as they come back on Twitter? Are they useful? I hope media companies and advertisers along with professional organizations can help out too. I just wonder what all those scientists and researchers that use Twitter will do when it starts to become a fascist hell hole.
posted by RuvaBlue at 7:41 PM on October 27, 2022 [7 favorites]

And TFG has been officially reinstated.

Source please? I'm not seeing that reported anywhere, and the @realdonaldtrump account is still showing as suspended.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 7:45 PM on October 27, 2022 [6 favorites]

(not that I don't believe it will happen; neither of them would be able to resist it)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 7:47 PM on October 27, 2022

I hadn't been keeping up with all the details, so I didn't notice this along the way:

Twitter lawsuit halted so Elon Musk can close deal by Oct. 28

"Oct 6 (Reuters) - A Delaware judge on Thursday ordered a halt to Twitter Inc's (TWTR.N) lawsuit against Elon Musk on the eve of trial... The judge's order said if Musk, the world's richest person, failed to close by her Oct. 28 5 p.m. EDT deadline, she would schedule a trial for November."

I guess he really didn't want to get caught up in that trial?
posted by clawsoon at 7:51 PM on October 27, 2022 [5 favorites]

There was a fake TFG statement making the rounds.

"Happy to be able to engage with an African-American owned business!" should've given it away, though Poe's Law is always in operation.
posted by clawsoon at 7:57 PM on October 27, 2022

I guess he really didn't want to get caught up in that trial?

More that he announced his renewed bid a couple of days before he was scheduled to be deposed for the trial, and after discovery of his private messages wound up outing not only his behavior, but the behavior of all the other billionaires he consorts with.
posted by NoxAeternum at 7:57 PM on October 27, 2022 [3 favorites]

I'm imagining Musk being led into a hidden sub-basement and finding a chained door like DON'T OPEN DEAD INSIDE from the Walking Dead, except this one has RACIAL SLURS AND IVERMECTIN painted on it.
posted by delfin at 8:15 PM on October 27, 2022 [8 favorites]

Just deleted all my tweets and mothballed my account. It was fun until it wasn't.
posted by RakDaddy at 8:18 PM on October 27, 2022 [9 favorites]

Rak - Masto is pretty hopping tonight if you want to stick your head in, just saying.
posted by Artw at 8:40 PM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

As far as I can tell, Musk is putting up about half the money. $13 billion is coming from banks, which apparently could cost Twitter about $1 billion a year in interest payments.

That interest bit is such a classic '90s private-equity-takeover move, forcing a company to suck itself dry. I wonder if that part of it was intentional, or if it's just become the routine way of doing this kind of business.
posted by clawsoon at 8:42 PM on October 27, 2022 [15 favorites]

"Frederick Gray! What a surprise. And in distinguished company, all wearing gas masks. You must excuse me, gentlemen, not being English, I sometimes find your sense of humor rather difficult to follow!"

-#Hugo Drax
posted by clavdivs at 8:46 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

I hope all the people that I'm following will post where they're going.
posted by meowzilla at 8:49 PM on October 27, 2022 [5 favorites]

Delete. Delete. Delete.
posted by Toddles at 8:51 PM on October 27, 2022

The Twitter deal closing and the FANG companies (but not Apple!) running out of Wall Street magic on the same day really feels like the end of something.
posted by chrchr at 8:51 PM on October 27, 2022 [5 favorites]

I’m going to miss the community I’ve got. I’ve built a huge mute list in Tweetbot to insulate me from the most egregious bullshit, but I can’t hang for this. I’m moving a little slow- gotta do the download archive thing, then will probably change my pinned tweet & profile to link to my other stuff for a few weeks before I pull the plug entirely.

What a waste.
posted by Devils Rancher at 8:56 PM on October 27, 2022 [6 favorites]

Well, I just nuked my personal twitter, and set up a sockpuppet so I could still stay somewhat plugged in and watch the fireworks. I will miss the good bits of the hell site.
posted by mrjohnmuller at 9:30 PM on October 27, 2022 [2 favorites]

I've always been into sports, and Twitter is the perfect place for that. The game watching chatter is fantastic and hilarious. Highlights show up quickly. When I'm at the stadium I can check my feed to see what happened in situations where you'd get an immediate explanation on TV but have to wait until someone announces something. (For example, waiting to see the outcome of an replay review, because a lot of these guys will be seeing a live feed in the press box or on TV and can tell you what they think the result is.) Finding a community to replace that kind of thing will be tough.
posted by azpenguin at 9:36 PM on October 27, 2022 [4 favorites]

Twitter's in a code freeze as of noon

Well, that nice. It gives everyone ample time to start brushing up their resumes and resetting their LinkedIn passwords.

Because that's what I'd be doing.
posted by Kadin2048 at 9:44 PM on October 27, 2022 [9 favorites]

As mentioned above, no social media company lives forever. Musk purging so much of the company's talent could easily end up seeding other social media companies that will drive Twitter to the ground.
posted by azpenguin at 9:49 PM on October 27, 2022 [11 favorites]

Twitter is apparently written in Scala, so, uh, good luck finding a bunch of people that know that.

Maybe they could try rewriting it all in another language. That always goes well.
posted by Artw at 9:54 PM on October 27, 2022 [7 favorites]

no social media company lives forever.

Are you telling me that sociable youths are no longer signing up to their local Kee-wanis Club?
posted by clawsoon at 10:00 PM on October 27, 2022 [5 favorites]

The people who are screwed are anyone who have to stay.

Apparently that won't be too many people who have to stay--either they quit or get fired.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:01 PM on October 27, 2022 [1 favorite]

Hopefully the most of the staff had some equity and got paid something on this acquisitions.
posted by interogative mood at 10:23 PM on October 27, 2022 [3 favorites]

Like many I have little desire to remain active on Twitter, especially now. But also like many I also value some people on Twitter. So my solution was as follows:

1) Deactivate/delete my Twitter account
2) Extract those I follow. This involved quite a number of screenshots.
3) Convert those feeds I wish to keep seeing into a Nitter RSS feed.
4) Add those to my existing RSS feeds/program
5) Moved to our local Mastodon community

This enables me to follow those I want to on Twitter, but effectively in 'read-only' mode. Nitter doesn't allow you to 'like' or 'reply' to tweets. You can engage with other Twitter users only by reading their tweets. This means I am not tracked by Twitter nor am I subject to The Algorithm. My RSS program (Reeder on MacOS) effectively controls how I see the tweets via Nitter.

Of course this method is not 'social' at all, and to be honest I miss that. But, also like so many, I found engaging on Twitter bad for my mental health. And outrage is really tiring after a while, no matter how assiduously you manage your feed.

It's far from a perfect solution but it is what I came up with.
posted by vac2003 at 11:14 PM on October 27, 2022 [13 favorites]

Does this change in ownership trigger immediate vesting for all Twitter employees? I've seen contracts with a clause like that, but I don't know how common it is.
posted by ryanrs at 11:19 PM on October 27, 2022

I'm going to wait until the actual announcement that TFG will be reinstated before I delete my account. They have to connect the stimulus directly with the response or they will never learn.
posted by Soliloquy at 1:37 AM on October 28, 2022 [7 favorites]

Just about now Donald Trump is realising he's forgotten his twitter password, because he had people for that, and he can't remember which email account he used.

Meanwhile [e-mail] is very carefully NOT clicking on those links ...
posted by mbo at 2:55 AM on October 28, 2022 [16 favorites]

I expect scala devs remain moderately numerous, but yeah it's trickier than hiring java devs, so it'll suck for functional programming if "twitter died because they could not hire replacement scala devs" becomes a thing.
posted by jeffburdges at 2:59 AM on October 28, 2022

Musk says Twitter will not be a "free-for-all hellscape".

My reading of that is they will start charging for it, perhaps you will get 50 tweets per month free and then you will need to pay for Twitter Blue?
posted by Lanark at 3:08 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

I haven't really ever had a twitter, but I'm a member of CounterSocial and it's been a busy couple days.

As far as I'm concerned it's always been kind of a garbage pile. Honestly I hope it gets bad enough that it finally draws into sharp focus how ridiculous it is for the media to report on tweets as if they're news. It's always struck me as something more popular with the media than with actual people; most of the folks I know in real life don't have an account or abandoned theirs long ago.
posted by one of these days at 3:11 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

Supposedly 1 in 5 Americans has an account, but how many people actually use their accounts is a different story.
posted by subdee at 3:38 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

While following both Gruber and Kara Swisher during this purchasing drama, I get the sense that they enjoy sitting at back of room giggling at prankster* of the class antics as long as it gives them news to write no matter who the tech-bro-wanna-be hurts.


* swap this word for bully if he reactivates Drumpf
posted by filtergik at 4:23 AM on October 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

I can promise you that if twitter "cannot" hire scala devs it will be for one reason only: they don't want to work at elon's twitter and/or were all fired (or left)

also, an experienced programmer (or any programmer, but certainly a willing experienced one) can certainly pick up scala, especially if a large tech company is paying them 200-500k a year to do so

I promise you that the incoming implosion of twitter's service will entirely be due to a hubristic self-own by elon "I did hardcore programming for 20 years!!! let me talk to the engineers, parag!!!" musk. twitter's stack is quite sophisticated at this point and yes much of it is in scala (but certainly not all) but it's no weirder than any gigantic tech property, all of whom have to have large, idiosyncratic stacks to support their uniquely gargantuan technical problems

the likeliest scenario is everyone who knows anyone leaves, the service starts falling over, musk can't do anything, and he blames it on the code being bad or whatever

context: I wrote scala at twitter
posted by wooh at 5:16 AM on October 28, 2022 [66 favorites]

Musk fires Twitter executives. Of all the responses about the deal I've seen in the last day, the outpouring of support for Vijaya Gadde has been the most heartwarming. Many folks who worked with her saying very nice things about her work leading Twitter's trust and safety policies. She really stepped up once the company realized being a home to hate speech was a bad thing. Twitter's a lot better now about hate speech than it was a few years ago and a lot of that is due to Gadde's leadership.

I fear all that work is about to be undone by a man who read some Ayn Rand in high school and thinks he's an expert in all things.
posted by Nelson at 5:42 AM on October 28, 2022 [13 favorites]

So Musk was originally inspired to buy Twitter after Babylon Bee was suspended for misgendering? I wonder if this prediction will come true.
posted by clawsoon at 5:43 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

How to download your data :

https://twitter.com/settings/download_your_data
posted by lalochezia at 5:48 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

I am not going anywhere just yet. My account is private, carefully curated, it's where my longest online friends live--I dumped my FB account after the 2016 election--and it's where I find out relevant news about my city as events happen. It's where I have found amazing activists doing the hard work despite the hate, and where I have discovered many cool artists. If a lot of my friends start dumping their accounts and posting where they will go en masse, I will reconsider, but I am sorry. I do not have inclination, the skill, the time, to create an alternate feed. And I am someone with the privilege to at least try.

I have no love for Musk, but I'll see what happens. I mean, honestly, the locked account is preferable than an public one. I am noticing a lot more folks locking their accounts this morning, which is fine because we follow each other anyway.
posted by Kitteh at 5:52 AM on October 28, 2022 [8 favorites]

So Musk was originally inspired to buy Twitter after Babylon Bee was suspended for misgendering? I wonder if this prediction will come true.

I would wager that it will.

I have seen anecdotes of idiots leaping back onto Twitter and happily spamming "Elon is in charge, I can say n----- again, n----- n----- n------." They're likely in for a rude awakening, because even Musk is aware that if Twitter transforms into Stormfront overnight, his new purchase's value will plummet so fast that it'll make Tumblr seem like a sound investment.

He didn't really want it, but he has it now. Dog, meet overturned car. What does he do with it?

So, content moderation will continue for the lowest of low-hanging fruit. "Don't say n-----, n-----, n----- in a hateful way," Musk will scoff. "Don't send death threats. That kind of thing." But more indirect invective and discrimination -- including misgendering, including TFG, including less-directly-in-your-face racism and sexism and such -- will be presented as a compromise position. Opinions Vary as to whether it's truly hateful or whether there is room for Civilized People to discuss their differences, right?

Meanwhile, the search begins for someone dumber than him to buy the site from him. It may be a long search.
posted by delfin at 6:06 AM on October 28, 2022 [7 favorites]

For the last year or so, I have periodically deleted all my Tweets, replies, and likes after a few days, so deactivating the account was a matter of a moment. I need to cut down on social media anyway because the relentless bombardment of negativity didn't make up for the whimsy and the illusion of keeping up with things.
posted by Peach at 6:06 AM on October 28, 2022 [6 favorites]

I'm saddened by the number of people who feel they should stay. This is a golden opportunity to throw Elon's money into the toilet, prevent Trump from reconsolidating media influence, and keep a Putin ally from gaining control over an American social media network.

If you have a bunch of activists you're following, coordinate a new platform. Organize. Assume every word that you send in a DM on Twitter is compromised.

If you're worried about following Ukraine journalists, remember that keeping Twitter alive is important for the forces attacking them now.

It's one of those situations, frankly, where I really wonder if pro-democratic people can prevail - if we can't even get everyone off a silly social media platform that's literally being taken over by fascists, how are we going to stop anything more serious in the future?

If you're planning on staying, please reconsider.
posted by condour75 at 6:12 AM on October 28, 2022 [18 favorites]

Quitting Facebook but staying on Twitter is a mindfuck for me. Don't get it.
posted by tiny frying pan at 6:17 AM on October 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

I'm saddened by the number of people who feel they should stay.

Same here. "Stay and fight" (to me) can make sense for countries, not companies.
posted by hijinx at 6:19 AM on October 28, 2022 [8 favorites]

Facebook has its own special brand of toxicity. I rejoined after quitting, with a different email and no friends, so that I could use the functional bits but avoid the drama.
posted by Peach at 6:19 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

Waffling between deleting my account and simply continuing not to post there, as I have since 2013 or so.
posted by aspersioncast at 6:35 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

I was working on my (almost entirely inactive) blog's annual Halloween lit post when I saw the news, and said to myself, "well, perhaps it's a good thing I decided to keep this blog around, even in only semi-alive form..." Given how many people have started up Substacks, I wouldn't be surprised if blogging returns in some form or another; we'll see.
posted by thomas j wise at 6:54 AM on October 28, 2022

how are we going to stop anything more serious in the future?

You can't. Or, more accurately, won't.

I mean, nothing personal -- that's just one of the key reasons fascism works; it tends to co-opt everyone, even some of the people it's chosen for eventual scapegoating. It's "better" to go along to get along, take your personal advantage/convenience where you can, and then oops what happened to me?

It's why Republicans never think the leopard is going to eat their face, and why people will stay on Twitter.

It's simply easier and, by the time it isn't, it's too late.
posted by aramaic at 6:56 AM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

"Stay and fight" (to me) can make sense for countries, not companies.

They're not fighting for the company, they're fighting for the communities they built, communities that, contrary to techie popular belief, cannot just be uprooted and transplanted to another platform. And like Facebook, the feeling I get is that the people who are saying that people should leave are the folks who can, because they have the privilege and ability to do so.
posted by NoxAeternum at 7:00 AM on October 28, 2022 [37 favorites]

^ This ^

As I said in another recent thread about this, it's really easy to leave and re-create what you love if you have the ability to do so. I am Internet savvy at a very basic level--I still have trouble with a lot of stuff that is very very easy for the majority of MeFites--and I have privilege to probably figure it out in my spare time if I weren't tired from being at my healthcare job. And people who work harder jobs than I do? Who are way more marginalized than me? Who is going to help them find/rebuild the communities they've invested time in, even with the extant racist Twitter vitriol?

I don't have those answers. I would like people to realize it's not a simple matter for a lot of people.
posted by Kitteh at 7:11 AM on October 28, 2022 [10 favorites]

There's still a pandemic on, honestly, I hate that guy and everything he stands for, and I'll keep my interactions to a minimum, but I can't just instantly throw away the actual social connections I have with old friends on that network right now, my mental health is fragile enough. I keep telling/asking people to get over to Mastodon and it's slowly happening, but everyone has their own pace.
posted by seanmpuckett at 7:13 AM on October 28, 2022 [9 favorites]

everyone I follow on twitter is trying to figure out what to use next, and there's no clear answer. so...we want to leave, but it will take time

some people are interested in cohort.org, will see if anything comes of that. it has seemed dead up to now, especially with restricted invites, but everything going on with twitter should be a boost to it and mastodon

as far as mastodon, it seems to have some very serious security issues regarding pms etc, so...that's sort of a non-starter for me, at least for now
posted by wooh at 7:17 AM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

In other news Jack Dorsey's Bluesky Social app: What we know so far
Twitter founder Jack Dorsey's new Bluesky Social app is now accepting users for beta testing, and is set to launch "soon". The highly anticipated social media project has been described as a rival to Twitter (TWTR) and is set to challenge existing social media platforms like Facebook (META), Instagram and Snapchat (SNAP). On Tuesday, Bluesky announced the roadmap of its decentralised social network protocol, which will be the underlying code behind the app. Importantly, it says user data will be free from governmental influence and controlled by users rather than commercialised by a corporation, a move which could revolutionise the personal data economy.

/no relation haha
posted by bluesky43 at 7:22 AM on October 28, 2022 [11 favorites]

Gonna echo bigendian above...

Here's my recommendation on how to slowly decouple from Twitter (only if you are more interested in following certain people than tweeting yourself):
create a Twitter list with all the people you follow, get the URL of that list
access that list via nitter.net
log out of your Twitter account, delete its cookies, and let it collect dust

I would also recommend, if you have a close-knit circle of friends on twitter, creating a discord server and inviting in all the refugees. You just want a way to keep track of where everyone goes so you can follow them again once the dust settles.

Because livejournal experience is that it's a question of when, not if, the userbase drifts away. It took a long time but I was eventually able to find most of my old LJ friends again on tumblr, twitter, dreamwidth and discord. And twitter users will probably become similarly scattered.
posted by subdee at 7:24 AM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

Musk says Twitter will not be a "free-for-all hellscape".

My reading of that is they will start charging for it

So a hellscape, but only the suffering is free - you have to pay to inflict it?
posted by nubs at 7:28 AM on October 28, 2022

I am not signing up to anything Jack Dorsey has involvement with.
posted by seanmpuckett at 7:41 AM on October 28, 2022 [13 favorites]

For your reference, if you need it: A Brief Mastodon Guide for Social Media Worriers

And it looks like Kanye is back. I'd expect TFG before the weekend is over.
posted by JoeZydeco at 7:44 AM on October 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

The only person I'd trust less with creating a social media platform than Jack Dorsey is Yishan Wong, and that's a neck and neck race there.

Also, in regards to leaving Twitter, I also have to agree with this statement:

Everyone realizes the GOP *wants* you to leave Twitter, right? It’s one of our most effective messaging platforms.

posted by NoxAeternum at 7:47 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Everyone realizes the GOP *wants* you to leave Twitter, right? It’s one of our most effective messaging platforms.

This imagines something akin to singing La Marseillaise to drown out the Nazis, when in fact Strasser has bought Rick’s and is putting a Marshall stack behind the German table.
posted by condour75 at 7:56 AM on October 28, 2022 [20 favorites]

I don't get how my staying weakens the GOP messaging ecosystem. Even Mary Trump is tweeting to stop ceding ground.

They can have the ground, we'll just salt the earth. Make it unhospitable for advertisers and others that want your attention. Just like Check My Ads is doing with Fox News on a long-term plan. Make that debt servicing *painful*.

I still plan to leave.
posted by JoeZydeco at 7:56 AM on October 28, 2022 [7 favorites]

This imagines something akin to singing La Marseillaise to drown out the Nazis, when in fact Strasser has bought Rick’s and is putting a Marshall stack behind the German table.

Nah, it's about not cutting off your nose to spite your face. The reality is that social media is a huge megaphone (hence why the Democrats just did a big influencer meet and greet), and the other side would just love for us to chuck it away.
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:04 AM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

Meh. There will be VoA type accounts run by people who have the stomach for such. Performative stuff. You don't argue with a fascist to convert the fascist, but to connect with the weak-minded bystanders. Twitter will be a fine place to reach bystanders but I am not going to have my personal social life in the middle of a permanent protest march.
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:14 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

Leaning towards deleting my account but trying to think this thru. If everyone who isn’t a fan of Musk/Drumpf leaves, doesn’t Twitter become Tr&th S0cial and therefore completely (ok, mostly) ignored?

I’m all for standing up and fighting, but let’s pick our battles. Is my presence on the site adding credence to its existence? Note I have like 78 followers and I’m sure 1/3rd are bots.

I’ve logged out of my account but haven’t deleted it yet. Would like to migrate to something similar but frankly I’m not going to put much effort into it just yet. Left FB and missed it for about 43 seconds, let’s see how my twitter addiction plays out.
posted by Farce_First at 8:22 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

The reality is that social media is a huge megaphone (hence why the Democrats just did a big influencer meet and greet), and the other side would just love for us to chuck it away.

Twitter is a valuable political asset because everyone is on it. If we actually managed to "chuck it away" it would become worthless to them, too. Just another truth or parler. Our resources go into the platforms that pick up the slack.
posted by condour75 at 8:23 AM on October 28, 2022 [7 favorites]

The reality is that social media is a huge megaphone (hence why the Democrats just did a big influencer meet and greet), and the other side would just love for us to chuck it away.

Also, like, the absolute damage that marginalized people will suffer on it as the hate ramps up is not nothing, you know? it's actually pretty fucking bleak.
posted by corb at 8:32 AM on October 28, 2022 [19 favorites]

Took my account private, not ready to leave just yet. My corner of Twitter is largely used to keep in touch with friends in addition to gaming stuff and cute/funny cats and dogs. I have had to take breaks from Twitter before and found that cutting out the depressing stuff via unfollowing and muting has worked wonders.

If a certain pair of holdouts in my internet-now-real-life friend circle finally sign up for Discord, that may convince me to leave for good.
posted by May Kasahara at 8:39 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

I quit Twitter the moment the company agreed to let him buy it. Even if the deal hadn't gone through that showed me that the company was bad enough to think the idea was ok. I still haven't found a replacement. I miss a lot of the comedy accounts and breaking news. But it just doesn't matter that much. I've gotten a lot of time with my Switch in instead.
posted by downtohisturtles at 8:44 AM on October 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

The point is to demonetize Twitter so it HURTS when they lift the ban from someone who used it to actively organize attacks on democracy. Literal physical attacks on national institutions. People died.

But feel free to keep their active users numbers up so they can keep getting ad funding!
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 8:45 AM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

Dear advertisers:

The reason I committed some SEC violations in silently acquiring a bunch of stock in Twitter, then joined the board, then immediately quit the board, then committed to a poorly structured and way-too-high bid to buy the company, then immediately began backpedaling and trying to scuttle my own terrible deal, and trashed the company and its execs for months, and got sued by Twitter to force me to buy it after all, and tried to get out of that some more, and then got queued up for a jurisprudential trouncing by the Delaware Chancery court, and then folded and went ahead and bought Twitter after all, is because, uh...*checks note written on hand* it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square.
posted by cortex at 8:45 AM on October 28, 2022 [75 favorites]

Like, it's one thing to try and handwave away other people's shitty behavior when you're making a hollow pitch, but when you're like FAMOUSLY exactly the sort of intemperate and chaotic asshole the companies you're transparently snowing wouldn't want to risk associating with their brands it's beyond PR into pure cardboard cosplay.
posted by cortex at 8:48 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

I stayed on tumblr to not cede ground to the trolls & harassers over there and now I'm glad I did, but it was also draining. And it effects your mental to be in the middle of a hate match, in an insidious way you start to think like your opponents if only so you can counter them. It affects your worldview and drains your optimism and energy. Keeping your mental is worth a lot and not everyone can stay without letting the negativity get to them.

Not to mention, in a real-world analogy the thing that's most improved my working conditions at my actual job is when the rest of the department quit and admin were forced to make concessions to keep those of us who remained.
posted by subdee at 8:49 AM on October 28, 2022 [9 favorites]

WaPo links below:
How to lock down your Twitter data, or leave, as Musk takes over
Racist tweets quickly surfaced after Musk closed Twitter deal
Alexandra Petri: It is another glorious day on Mr. Musk’s wonderful internet

Mr. Musk said in an ingenious, perfectly worded note to advertisers that he did not want Twitter to become a “free-for-all hellscape.” That’s always reassuring to hear! And it certainly won’t! There aren’t any signs of that happening! The people excited that he is taking over Twitter so that they can finally be unleashed are all people who have been waiting all this time to do good things!
Twitter used to be gross and bad and there used to be many people there who felt comfortable openly saying negative things about fascists! Rude! Everyone knows that the only way to combat fascism is to let them be heard and let them silence — through threats of violence — anyone who disagrees with them. The only thing that stops fascists is listening to them really, really carefully. That was what happened in the 1940s, I believe.

posted by jenfullmoon at 9:00 AM on October 28, 2022 [21 favorites]

To tweet, or to toot, that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous Twitter,
Or to take Mastodon against a Sea of trolls,
And by switching end them: to toot, to tweet,
To tweet, perchance to go viral; aye, there's the rub...
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:19 AM on October 28, 2022 [6 favorites]

Does this change in ownership trigger immediate vesting for all Twitter employees?

Nope. The merger agreement spells this out:

Treatment of Twitter Equity-based Awards

• At the effective time of the merger, each vested Twitter equity-based award (other than a vested Twitter option) outstanding as of immediately prior to the effective time of the merger will be canceled and converted into the right to receive an amount in cash, without interest and less any required withholding taxes, equal to the product of (1) the per share price and (2) the total number of shares of our common stock subject to such vested Twitter equity-based award (and with respect to any vested equity-based awards subject to performance vesting conditions, calculated based on the achievement of the applicable performance metrics at the level of performance at which such equity-based award vested in accordance with its terms).
• At the effective time of the merger, each unvested Twitter equity-based award (other than an unvested Twitter option) outstanding as of immediately prior to the effective time of the merger will be canceled and converted into the right to receive an amount in cash, without interest and less any required withholding taxes, equal to the product of (1) the per share price and (2) the total number of shares of our common stock subject to such unvested Twitter equity-based award (and with respect to any unvested equity-based awards subject to performance vesting conditions, calculated based on the achievement of the applicable performance metrics at the target level of performance), which amount will, subject to the holder’s continued service with Parent and its affiliates (including the surviving corporation and its subsidiaries) through the applicable vesting dates, vest and be payable at the same time as the unvested Twitter equity-based award for which such cash amount was exchanged would have vested pursuant to its terms and will otherwise remain subject to the same terms and conditions as were applicable to the unvested Twitter equity-based award immediately prior to the effective time of the merger (other than performance-based vesting conditions, which will not apply following the effective time of the merger).

(and similar terms for Twitter options, but most employees will have equity awards, not options)

So: no. Stock employees have already received ("vested") converts to cash -- because it has to, because there isn't Twitter stock any more. Stock employees have been granted to receive in the future ("unvested") converts to a right to receive cash on the same vesting schedule.

No immediate vesting; no accelerated vesting.

I've seen contracts with a clause like that, but I don't know how common it is.

My understanding was: somewhat common to sweeten the deal for employees, not least so that they stick around until the deal closes? When a previous employer got acquired we got 2 years immediate + 2 years accelerated. (And a layoff six months later, but oh well.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 9:22 AM on October 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

I have seen anecdotes of idiots leaping back onto Twitter and happily spamming "Elon is in charge, I can say n----- again, n----- n----- n------."

When I first saw that image, I thought the scrubbed-out part said "Nazi", and I thought, "well, that'll be good, if you can at least call a Nazi a Nazi on Twitter."

I was wrong.
posted by clawsoon at 9:22 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

This is likely an unpopular opinion, but was @jack really much better? Those of us who used Twitter in the past did so despite his horrible politics, and did so while Trump et al were allowed pretty free reign.

For me, Twitter is a read-only medium. I don't use their homepage at all. I just open a set of tabs to the twenty or so voices I want to hear and curate that list over time. I don't intend to stop doing that in protest myself, but if the voices I'm interested in move on, I'll follow them elsewhere.

That said, the calculation for anyone using Twitter more actively, i.e. creating content there, is going to be different than mine.
posted by bcd at 9:22 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

Twitter isn't even that good as a read-only platform. multi-tweet blog posts are a blight.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 9:25 AM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

For now anyone still on it really needs to get the app off their phone/other devices and start considering DMs completely insecure.

Isn’t this a bit alarmist, particularly for iPhones? I mean I have Wechat and a variety of other Chinese apps on my phone, how much worse could Twitter be?
posted by viborg at 9:27 AM on October 28, 2022

It takes a little while to download your data, and it takes 30 days of nonuse for your account to totally delete after activation. So if you're going to do so take that into account.

My problem is that I kind of don't want to leave a link to where I'm going on my old account. Which is probably overly paranoid, I'm not a big enough deal to be a huge target.
posted by emjaybee at 9:30 AM on October 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

From The Verge: Welcome to Hell, Elon:

You fucked up real good, kiddo.

Twitter is a disaster clown car company that is successful despite itself, and there is no possible way to grow users and revenue without making a series of enormous compromises that will ultimately destroy your reputation and possibly cause grievous damage to your other companies.

I say this with utter confidence because the problems with Twitter are not engineering problems. They are political problems. Twitter, the company, makes very little interesting technology; the tech stack is not the valuable asset. The asset is the user base: hopelessly addicted politicians, reporters, celebrities, and other people who should know better but keep posting anyway. You! You, Elon Musk, are addicted to Twitter. You’re the asset. You just bought yourself for $44 billion dollars.

The problem when the asset is people is that people are intensely complicated, and trying to regulate how people behave is historically a miserable experience, especially when that authority is vested in a single powerful individual.

What I mean is that you are now the King of Twitter, and people think that you, personally, are responsible for everything that happens on Twitter now. It also turns out that absolute monarchs usually get murdered when shit goes sideways.

posted by NoxAeternum at 9:34 AM on October 28, 2022 [30 favorites]

I say this with utter confidence because the problems with Twitter are not engineering problems. They are political problems.

I'm waiting for 10 years of bold bullshit about how fully operational AI civility moderators are just around the corner.
posted by clawsoon at 9:40 AM on October 28, 2022 [8 favorites]

Twitter is a valuable political asset because everyone is on it.

Not sure if you're being exclusionary ("If you're not on Twitter you're nobody") or just wrong.
posted by achrise at 9:46 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

AI civility bots are possible right now if you're willing to accept the level of nuance and accuracy we see from the already deployed AI copyright cops.
posted by Pyry at 9:48 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

"Uh, Elon, hate to mention this, but remember when Telsas were speeding up and crashing into emergency vehicles? Yeah, so, uh, our AI civility bots have gone rogue and started posting hate speech."
posted by clawsoon at 9:53 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

REALLY wish some of y'all would put your Twitter links in your bios here. I want to expand my network as much as possible right now, it seems like the best way to build community resilience at this point.

I'm not leaving yet, I use it mostly for music and politics and the next best alternative now is Instagram which as a shit-muncher is effectively unusable. So glad no one has mentioned r3ddit as an alternative yet, truly the worst -- 4chan with a suit on.

*Just realized I had removed my Twitter link from my bio in a bout of paranoia but it's back there now.
posted by viborg at 9:57 AM on October 28, 2022 [6 favorites]

The thing about relying on the lack of advertising revenue to save Twitter is who advertises on Twitter anyway? As a Power User (tm) I only ever see ads from two categories: strange little direct marketing Chinese novelty manufacturers and Big Pharma. As interesting as I find videos for the latest in EZ sink trap cleaning out technology or magical ponytail holders, I can't imagine they're paying enough in advertising to make a dent in the Twitter budget. I'm unclear on the budget for drug marketing, but I'm still doubtful it's up there with big brands going directly to consumers. I've never been sure how exactly Twitter keeps the lights on.
posted by mygothlaundry at 10:00 AM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

Not sure if you're being exclusionary ("If you're not on Twitter you're nobody") or just wrong.

I'm not the person whose comment you truncated, but I didn't read it as exclusionary or wrong. I'm going to annotate the original comment the way I interpreted it:

Twitter is a valuable political asset [that is, valuable to politicians and the press, and thus to advertisers attracted by the traffic generated by their original content and responses to it] because everyone [well, a lot of people, anyway. Enough people to make an advertising market as long as those people are engaged] is on it. If we actually managed to "chuck it away" it would become worthless to them, too. [If the broader Twitter audience were to stop participating, leaving only the worst people, advertisers would leave both because they don't want to be seen supporting that content and because the economic return on advertising on the platform is no longer worthwhile because of the reduced audience. Without advertising revenue, Twitter itself will cease to be a viable platform for lack of ongoing investment.]
posted by fedward at 10:00 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

I see ads from a lot of big firms. I've reported so many ExxonMobil ads I can't count. Get a lot of ads for the local power company, car manufacturers etc.
posted by viborg at 10:01 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Huh. See, again, being in a completely useless - poor and old, what are they good for? - demographic pays off. The algorithm works! You probably don't get bombarded by ads for socks that look like chicken legs and I never see car ads.
posted by mygothlaundry at 10:08 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

I started getting shitpost promotions about gambling. I swear one tweet was something like, “for those who want to take a chance on making it in life - gambling”

Just mountains of trash headed now by the kingpin of trash, mr trust fund extraordinaire, Elon musk
posted by glaucon at 10:09 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

Do I enjoy shitposting on twitter? Yes.
Am I able to use my privilege as a weapon? Yes.

Did I come up from the usenet? That weird and malevolent birthplace of "being online"?

As I drifted along with my bodiless invisibility, I felt myself more and more becoming an empty, floating shape, seeing without being seen and walking without interference from these grosser creatures who shared my world. It was not an experience completely without interest and even enjoyment.*

Was I on IRC? So much I used Pidgen just to manage Yahoo, MSN, AIM in one place. I archived those threads and never looked back.

Did I bury myspace and LJ and nuke all the jerks in my Facebook until that too was empty?

So twitter is dying. What is it about the experience of participating in a global discussion, in the world beyond my community, beyond my small context, beyond the human. Is it the liberation? Being equal to all other voices, being weightless and infinite? Was it being checked and limited only by attention and time?

Certainly all my amusement at the clever wit made it a pleasant way to pass my time, but the pace of it all was difficult, always too much, all at once. So it goes.




*“The Last Feast of Harlequin" by Thomas Ligotti
posted by zenon at 10:25 AM on October 28, 2022 [10 favorites]

Looking forward to Musk posting this in a year:

“Generalized self-driving Running a successful social media company is a hard problem, as it requires solving a large part of real-world AI dealing with real-world people. Didn’t expect it to be so hard, but the difficulty is obvious in retrospect.”

( from Elon Musk Admits That Full-Self Driving Is a Hard Problem To Solve)
posted by meowzilla at 10:27 AM on October 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

Via Twitter. The Lincoln Project: When he returns, we'll be waiting.
posted by bluesky43 at 10:35 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

"I have seen this elsewhere, too, and I am curious: where did they go? To individual newsletters, or columns at Medium & Substack? Those are all "one-way" communications. Or are there actual communities -- with two-way conversations -- where the interesting people have migrated to?"

It's possible to have a substack with a large conversational community-- that's how it is at astralcodexten, and if the owner chooses, commenting can be free. What I've seen of substacks generally is that seems to have few comments, though.
posted by Nancy Lebovitz at 10:35 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Actually shitpost was the wrong word - it was a gambling ad for a guy who runs a service that gives advice on how to bet on NFL games. Total bottom feeding trash man.
posted by glaucon at 10:42 AM on October 28, 2022

The Babylon Bee twitter account has been reinstated, so step one has been completed.
posted by meowzilla at 10:53 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

People, let's not lose focus of the big goals:
1. Twitter goes into a death spiral, takes Musk with it.
2. Separate useful Tesla stuff by forcing Musk to sell lots of stock.
3. Separate useful Space X stuff by way of/because of National Security.

Re. 1, Yay people leaving Twitter to new communities! That helps a lot! As to the death spiral, I feel like Musk will probably end up helping a lot, too.

During the death spiral, are there circumstances where Musk could be forced to shovel more cash into Twitter? Is he personally on hook for that $1b/yr interest? (Prob not, but would he put in his own to prevent default?)

Re. 2, He already sold a pile of Tesla stock to finance the buyout. How much does % of Tesla does Musk still own? Tesla has made very important advances in both engineering, infrastructure, and public attitudes re. electric vehicles, so that is a useful thing that should not be destroyed. It would be bad if Tesla could be raided to pay for problems at Twitter.

Re. 3, I've heard that yanking Musk's security clearance will straight up kill Space X. Which I imagine means it would in practice force an immediate sale (and so much lawsuit, lol). I'd love to understand more about the legal aspects of this.
posted by ryanrs at 11:09 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

Does anyone honestly believe large companies will blacklist Twitter over Trump? Also, does Mastodon have an established black community?
posted by Selena777 at 11:18 AM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

Adidas dumped Kanye.
posted by ryanrs at 11:19 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Re. 3, I've heard that yanking Musk's security clearance will straight up kill Space X.

Perhaps SpaceX but the essential change in rocket reuseability is now apparent to the entire world. The new super sized rocket just needs to prove one landing(catching) and the entire economics of outer space will be transformed.
posted by sammyo at 11:20 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

P.S. Yanking Musk's security clearance is probably as simple as showing he lied about smoking weed on his SF-86.
posted by ryanrs at 11:23 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

The new super sized rocket just needs to prove one landing(catching) and the entire economics of outer space will be transformed.

Why? Why do people think this? The massive, massive, massive amount of detailed, highly skilled, grueling labor required to check and refurbish a relaunch vehicle doesn’t scale. And worse, is always, always going to be pressured to approve and deliver on time, whether that’s justified or not.

We saw all this with the Space Shuttle. Which, of course, sucked in countless ways and could have been improved. But the parts that will always suck, and which won’t be improved, are the massive manual labor and corner cutting.

It doesn’t magically get easier because of “free market is better lol”. Sigh.
posted by notoriety public at 11:29 AM on October 28, 2022 [8 favorites]

Elon Musk
@elonmusk 10m
Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints.

No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.
posted by sammyo at 11:30 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Moderation council = N of one.
posted by bluesky43 at 11:33 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

diverse.... i do not think he is using that word the way i would use that word.
posted by seanmpuckett at 11:36 AM on October 28, 2022 [12 favorites]

"Diverse" means people from engineering and marketing.
posted by RakDaddy at 11:43 AM on October 28, 2022 [14 favorites]

"Diverse" means people from engineering and marketing.

I don't know if I accept diversity that much.
posted by Melismata at 11:45 AM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

Well, logged out, then deleted the app from my phone. Apparently I had been on Twitter for 10 years.

Suppose it's been a good run.
posted by caution live frogs at 11:47 AM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

Who will buy the corpse of twitter in a few months time? In the old days, one could find at least one of the ancient media conglomerates — or an even larger failing tech company — to do so. But these days they're wiser than that.

Is this why Musk was so kind to Putin recently? Does one of the last remaining potential buyers also happen to run a troll factory in St. Petersburg?
posted by UN at 11:50 AM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

It's entirely possible that Agrawal's theft of AI IP leads to Twitter being owned by Yahoo. Not even kidding.
posted by ryanrs at 11:56 AM on October 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

Thierry Breton, European Commissioner:

👋 @elonmusk

In Europe, the bird will fly by our 🇪🇺 rules.

#DSA
posted by roolya_boolya at 11:56 AM on October 28, 2022 [7 favorites]

He's referencing the Digital Services Act (Wikipedia) if you're wondering which acronym they're referring to.
posted by thebotanyofsouls at 12:06 PM on October 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

Jaron Lanier:

If you’re privileged enough to have the option of walking away from social media, and yet you don’t, you’re failing to use your privilege to defeat a system that traps other people who are less fortunate than you...

If you are actually in a position to quit and you don’t, you’re making yourself part of the problem. You’re not doing anything to free those who are more trapped. You’re only enslaving them more by entrenching the system. As an affluent or valuable person to the system, you’re the one that the whole system is being funded by.

posted by TheophileEscargot at 12:09 PM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

How do you know if you're privileged enough to have the option of walking away from social media?
posted by Selena777 at 12:13 PM on October 28, 2022 [14 favorites]

How do you know if you're privileged enough to have the option of walking away from social media?

There's a certificate involved. If you haven't received it already, you're not on the 'privileged' list.
posted by Greg_Ace at 12:17 PM on October 28, 2022 [11 favorites]

Adidas dumped Kanye.

Adidas has good reasons to be adamantly opposed to antisemitism now. They were founded by a Nazi.
posted by viborg at 12:18 PM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

Big picture though, this could signal the senescence of text-based media in general.

Newspapers are dying. People read less books now. Content that’s easiest to judge, easiest to scroll through without really engaging, gets the most traction.
posted by viborg at 12:22 PM on October 28, 2022

I'm not going to preemptively dump Twitter, because all of the connections I have on there would be lost. That said, if things really do start to turn to Parler II: Parler with a Better Codebase, I certainly will leave.

But I don't think there's any shame in hanging out a bit to see where the accounts you follow end up migrating to before you bail.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 12:25 PM on October 28, 2022 [8 favorites]

> bcd: "This is likely an unpopular opinion, but was @jack really much better?"

Probably the greatest advantage of Jack over Elon is that Jack seemed to barely care about Twitter. The problem with Elon is that he very clearly cares a lot about Twitter. And not in a good way. In a bad way.
posted by mhum at 12:27 PM on October 28, 2022 [10 favorites]

Elon Musk Pledges to Spend First Day as Twitter Boss Helping User Named Catturd

Imagine paying more than retail for one of the world's leading social media outlets and immediately finding yourself at the beck and call of someone calling themselves "Catturd."
posted by DirtyOldTown at 12:27 PM on October 28, 2022 [13 favorites]

Selena777: Also, does Mastodon have an established black community?

My cautious and extremely non-expert, non-embedded sense of this (as a white person who doesn't recklessly stomp into BIPOC spaces, so only sees tiny pieces of this kind of conversation in the fediverse) is "yes, but it's small and it's not finding the fediverse as welcoming as hoped." FWIW... and yes, I too have been wondering how Black Twitter will navigate this. Feeling sick at heart that they have to.
posted by humbug at 12:29 PM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

It's like Twitter is suddenly Real Science and Elon Musk is Chet, the asshole brother bearing down like a freight train on his way to fuck up this party for everyone.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 12:33 PM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

I wonder if Kanye is still buying Parler.
posted by meowzilla at 12:35 PM on October 28, 2022

Newspapers are dying. People read less books now. Content that’s easiest to judge, easiest to scroll through without really engaging, gets the most traction

"Tasty morsels, from groovy hubs."
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:40 PM on October 28, 2022

How do you know if you're privileged enough to have the option of walking away from social media?

When you don't rely on it for your job or business is a good metric. When you have the time to invest in setting yourself up in the ways folks have suggested above. When you have the know-how to create those options.

Again, I am seeing a lot of Black activists refuse to cede ground because they built their communities on that platform, for good or ill, and they are raising hell.
posted by Kitteh at 12:40 PM on October 28, 2022 [11 favorites]

Joining and participating in social media is a privilege to begin with, requiring access to technology and connectivity, and a dedication of one's free time, that is not equitably distributed. Before pundits talk about it being a "privilege" to disconnect, we'd probably need to acknowledge the kind of lifestyle required to connect and participate in the first place.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:48 PM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

How do you know if you're privileged enough to have the option of walking away from social media?

How about looking at the people with similar situation as you, a similar level of privilege as you, who aren't on twitter? How do they do it? Don't act like they don't exist.
posted by Wood at 12:49 PM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

Joining and participating in social media is a privilege to begin with, requiring access to technology and connectivity, and a dedication of one's free time, that is not equitably distributed. Before pundits talk about it being a "privilege" to disconnect, we'd probably need to acknowledge the kind of lifestyle required to connect and participate in the first place.

Absolutely! And I don't think this is being addressed at all. I like social media okay but I don't depend on it for my livelihood or organize or inform others. I've dropped Twitter before, dumped FB, and have really stopped using IG for no reason. But I can. I don't need it. But others do, and it feels really weird to assume we all have the same options if we leave Twitter.
posted by Kitteh at 12:59 PM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

Nobody needs Twitter.
posted by wondermouse at 1:27 PM on October 28, 2022 [12 favorites]

Fox Business: "Former President Donald Trump wished Elon Musk the best with Twitter but stressed he will stay on his own Truth Social, a social media platform he touts as "better," "safe" and that feels "like home."
posted by JoeZydeco at 1:28 PM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

You know, I'm not trying to be mean, but I know the old guard warned of this.

You never owned twitter. It was always up for sale. All the work you up into it was for someone else's benifit. I understand you want the fruits of your labor, but it changes none of these facts. The scions of web 1.0 said this would happen.

You wanna stay and stir the pot? Party on Garth! Hell, I've entertained hooking up an NLP model to thousands of Parler bots to blast it with graphic erotic stories.

Building sites/communities is hard work, but its time to start building your own houses now.
posted by The Power Nap at 1:29 PM on October 28, 2022 [10 favorites]

OT, sorry not sorry.

It's like Twitter is suddenly Real Science and Elon Musk is Chet, the asshole brother bearing down like a freight train on his way to fuck up this party for everyone.

I... you're mixing up Real Genius and Weird Science and now I have SO MANY QUESTIONS about how the offspring of that union would work. Okay, Musk is playing Chet, but who is Chet in this? That sounds more like Prof Hathaway but Chet is such a hapless schmuck he deserves to be folded into Kent IMHO. THIS IS JESUS, CHET. What role does Lazlo Hollyfeld play in the Weird Science parts of the story? Ooooh, does he replace Kelly LeBrock?

And what's the difference between Real Science and Weird Genius?

(You are doing the Lord's work over on fanfare and don't think it hasn't been noticed)
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 1:32 PM on October 28, 2022 [18 favorites]

I mean look if you been training all your life for your current job and you need twitter to do it, it seems reasonable to me that you'd probably need to stick around. It's not like anyone's offering skills upgrading or re-training packages just because Elon's in charge now.
posted by some loser at 1:35 PM on October 28, 2022

My thinking is that anyone who's got the skills necessary to grow and maintain a very successful Twitter presence has the skills to continue that line of work if Twitter goes away or otherwise becomes something different.
posted by wondermouse at 1:48 PM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Welp - Elon Musk says he doesn't want Twitter to turn into "a no-holds barred hellscape".

I just checked to see what people are saying about the top trending topic - the attack on Nancy Pelosi's husband Paul - and it's about a 50/50 split between people saying what a tragedy it is, and people saying that it was "faked" or that the attack was a lovers' spat between Mr. Pelosi and a male prostitute.

....If this is Elon Musk's vision of what Twitter is supposed to look like, a pox on the whole thing.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 1:53 PM on October 28, 2022 [11 favorites]

People can leave Twitter if they wish (and personally I think they should, I left years ago and my life is better, not worse) but this is just going to repeat itself in 10-15 years if people migrate to yet another social network owned and operated by for-profit corporations who are monetizing/abusing your human desire for connection by selling you to advertisers.
posted by rhymedirective at 2:14 PM on October 28, 2022 [6 favorites]

they're not fighting for the company, they're fighting for the communities they built, communities that, contrary to techie popular belief, cannot just be uprooted and transplanted to another platform.

Quoted for truth. I understand why so many commenters here are dropping Twitter. That said, there's no need to being indignant about folks who have become part of a strong community on Twitter and who plan to stay as a result.

Community is a big deal. I don't have nearly enough of it. If I had it on Twitter, I would be deeply reluctant to lose something that is vital to one's health. Like, I don't confuse the American residents with the US government, and I don't confuse Twitter users with Musk (or Dorsey before that). To those who have left or plan to leave: awesome. To those who plan to stay: I get it.
posted by Bella Donna at 2:20 PM on October 28, 2022 [30 favorites]

Building sites/communities is hard work, but its time to start building your own houses now.

This is why it’s been such a relief for MeFi to finally transition to a community led site.
posted by rikschell at 2:41 PM on October 28, 2022 [13 favorites]

This is the only time I’ve rooted for Elon Musk to ruin something. Set it on fire, sir, like those cars of yours.
Lyz Lenz in the latest Men Yell at Me.
posted by Bella Donna at 2:47 PM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Well, I de-activated my acct. Please refrain from calling me a hero.

My wife reports that she “will try to take him [Musk] down from the inside.” Godspeed, my dear.
posted by Don.Kinsayder at 3:20 PM on October 28, 2022 [12 favorites]

communities that, contrary to techie popular belief, cannot just be uprooted and transplanted to another platform

But, in tech mediums, that is over and over the only possibility you get. Platforms get taken over and shut down. It’s a lot easier to move if you do it while you can still announce the new destination on the old site.

They’ve always changed, IME, but some of them survive.
posted by clew at 4:19 PM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Communities can't just be uprooted but you also don't have a choice after everyone else leaves.
posted by subdee at 4:52 PM on October 28, 2022

From Casey Newton on Twitter:

I have come into possession of Twitter information so silly that I have no choice but to write a bonus Friday newsletter

Here it is: Twitter engineers were told today to *print out* their last 30 to 60 days of code, so they could show it to Elon Musk himself.

Then they were told wait, no, actually, please shred all that code you just printed out.

In the second tweet is a screenshot of a block of text from Newton's newsletter:

According to four current employees, engineers spent Friday afternoon at Twitter dutifully printing out their code in anticipation of meetings with Musk and some of his senior engineers from Tesla. Other engineers were told to prepare for “code pairing” with Musk, in which they would sit with him and review code together.

Just after noon, an executive assistant asked engineers to begin preparing code to show to Musk. “Please print out 50 pages of code you’ve done in the last 30 days (if you haven’t submitted code in the past 30 days, then you can go back up to 60 days),” the assistant wrote in a Slack message obtained by Platformer. “Please be ready to show on your computer as well.”

Nothing says "Boy, I sure do know how to run Twitter" than asking for printouts of "50 pages of code".
posted by mhum at 6:07 PM on October 28, 2022 [39 favorites]

Mike Masnick of Techdirt on fired legal/policy exec Vijaya Gadde: Elon Musk’s First Move Is To Fire The Person Most Responsible For Twitter’s Strong Free Speech Stance.
posted by mbrubeck at 6:11 PM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

I think Tesla is so, so, so fucked. China can cut off Tesla's access to their markets or factories if Twitter won't bow to the Party's will. If Elon thinks all those autocrats he cozies up to won't apply massive pressure to him now that he owns the world's largest political megaphone, he's a lunatic. And Tesla, because it makes physical products in a highly-regulated industry, is by far the easiest part of the Elon empire for corrupt state actors to fuck with.

Threats against Tesla will start almost immediately, all future Tesla negotiations to enter new markets will involve demands for Twitter concessions, and there are going to be shareholder lawsuits about it ... like, maybe even before 2024 starts. Hostile autocrats are going to suddenly start having big, expensive investigations into Tesla safety. There's enough safety concern with Tesla to make the investigations plausible, and they'll just keep ratcheting them up until Elon tells Twitter to hand over all regime protestors' information, or shut down all critical accounts, or amplify state propaganda.

Twitter is pretty fucked, and we all on the internet are kinda fucked, but Tesla is EXTREMELY fucked.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 6:13 PM on October 28, 2022 [29 favorites]

Amusingly, by firing those three execs within twelve months of a "change of ownership" Musk/Twitter is on the hook for $187 million in payments.

Man, that's one hell of a severance package.
posted by aramaic at 6:27 PM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

Leah Culver is the hero we need when it comes to code printing.
posted by Nelson at 6:30 PM on October 28, 2022 [6 favorites]

mhum: Nothing says "Boy, I sure do know how to run Twitter" than asking for printouts of "50 pages of code".

Oh God. This is giving me flashbacks to the psychopath of a boss I once had who at one point demanded printouts of which tapes all the files were backed up on. Millions of files, of course, spread across hundreds of tapes.

The printouts never happened, thankfully. But that boss didn't get any better.

I'm reminded incidentally of Epstein, who apparently liked to surround himself with smart people into order to feel smart by interjecting into their conversations with college sophomore wisdom while they smiled and nodded because of course he was paying for the party.
posted by clawsoon at 6:39 PM on October 28, 2022 [8 favorites]

In the worst timeline China is now less of a problem for Tesla because Musk now has a bribe.
posted by clew at 6:46 PM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

aramaic: Amusingly, by firing those three execs within twelve months of a "change of ownership" Musk/Twitter is on the hook for $187 million in payments.

I guess we know why they were pushing so hard for Musk to take over.
posted by clawsoon at 7:57 PM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

My tiny pushback has started by muting every advertiser who comes across my feed
posted by mbo at 8:01 PM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Muting? I've been blocking every advertiser for months.
posted by nubs at 8:14 PM on October 28, 2022 [7 favorites]

CNBC: General Motors temporarily suspends advertising on Twitter.

Ooops. Seems like a pretty simple decision to, oh gee, not fund your competition?
posted by JoeZydeco at 8:18 PM on October 28, 2022 [15 favorites]

Musk saying he'll let people out of "Twitter jail" sure sounds like TFG could be back. Maybe just a teaser for clicks, who knows. Hate all of it.
posted by tiny frying pan at 8:21 PM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

I don't know how The Verge is regarded around these parts, and I am always wary of men with reckons (including myself), but Nilay Patel has a good article on Musk's takeover of Twitter, Welcome to hell, Elon. One of his key points is, "The essential truth of every social network is that the product is content moderation, and everyone hates the people who decide how content moderation works." Made me think of Metafilter :-)
posted by vac2003 at 8:26 PM on October 28, 2022 [9 favorites]

I block every advertiser as well

I will say, the printing debacle is a super important data point for me. I knew elon was stupid, but I didn't realize quite how stupid. a lot of speculation online (including in this thread) is based on somewhat logical models of action..."even elon will realize." the printer debacle goes to show that you simply cannot assume anything logical about elon's thought process, period. he will sink to lows lower than it might seem reasonable to imagine

the very real constraints, then, are financial. twitter has very large loan payments coming up. I predict a forced sale to google or somesuch
posted by wooh at 8:46 PM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

Muting? I've been blocking every advertiser for months.

Block early, block often.

It's a petty and, at an individual level, toothless sort of protest, but I have spent years doing quiet recreational blocking of almost every sponsored tweet I see as a kind of evening decompression thing. Bad mood? Bad day? Busy stupid brain? Block some sponsored post accounts on twitter. It's low-effort, it falls into the natural rhythm of my doom-scrolling, and even if it's pennies at most it is disrupting the unambiguously shitty advertising model of the site.

One of the weird upsides of it is that you also, when you do still get ads, tend to get the weirder ones. Very specific medical professional ads for niche prescribable meds and journals, narrowcasted defense contractor come-ons, etc. Algo has no idea what to do once you strip out the like thousand most prominent advertisers. Though periodically there's another tranche of shitty nothing clickbait sites with the worst ads you've ever seen; that'll never be a one-and-done job, they multiply like rabbits.

I don't really have any solid proposal for how you actively, collectively scuttle a product like Twitter from the inside with protest—I really think nothing can be more effective there than genuine top-down executive incompetence—but if there's anything that could work at a collective scale I think it'd be mass adoption of a dynamic blocklist tool that blocks a regularly updated list of all advertising accounts on the site. How to get EVERYBODY to use that is a real problem because most folks aren't going to be plugged-in enough to even know or care, but making some real noise among Very Online people for a push-button Block All The Fuckers solution might be something that'd be at least felt and worried about.
posted by cortex at 8:50 PM on October 28, 2022 [15 favorites]

I suspect that if everyone (or a large chunk of everyone) started blocking/muting ads they'd have to take notice
posted by mbo at 9:05 PM on October 28, 2022

You're going to change Musk's behavior by clicking the "don't show me this ad again" button?
posted by ryanrs at 9:19 PM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

I guess we know why they were pushing so hard for Musk to take over.

Yep.

...I bet the CEO spent like fifteen minutes swearing and cursing when Elon made his first move (the Board), and then some legal stooge guy whispered in his ear, and he was like "wait, really? Oooooohhh. I forgot about that! Oooookaaayyy then, let's ride this train my babies! Choo choo m'fker!"
posted by aramaic at 9:19 PM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

"Glorious are the Ori, who didst lead us to salvation, who did fight the evil that would doom us to mortal sin. Did they defeat the old spirits and cast them out? And now, with the strength of our will, they do call upon us to prevail against the corruption of all unbelievers."

-Book of Origin. 'SG1'
posted by clavdivs at 10:56 PM on October 28, 2022 [2 favorites]

Musk says he's convening a "moderation council" that will represent everyone .... I look forwards to the elections ....
posted by mbo at 11:04 PM on October 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

>> For now anyone still on it really needs to get the app off their phone/other devices and start considering DMs completely insecure.

> Isn’t this a bit alarmist, particularly for iPhones? I mean I have Wechat and a variety of other Chinese apps on my phone, how much worse could Twitter be?

Re: Twitter DMs, they aren't end-to-end encrypted. The connection to Twitter is protected by TLS, but Twitter employees and intruders can read and share them.

Re: app security, have you given the apps permission to access your photos & contacts? If so, without needing to escape their sandbox, they could make connections to hosts other than the service's and exfiltrate your data to them. Remember, JBIG2 is Turing complete. What other unsanitized data can subvert the original intentions of the code?
posted by ASCII Costanza head at 11:09 PM on October 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

Someone on Tumblr suggested mass DMing Musk to go fuck himself, putting him in a tailspin because he can't toss you out if he's pro free speech! He'll be revealed as a hypocrite, etc.

Given the ample evidence we get everyday that conservative assholes are immune to shame I found that sweetly naive.

But hey, if you want to, yeah go tell Musk to fuck himself.
posted by emjaybee at 11:12 PM on October 28, 2022 [5 favorites]

I've only ever used Twitter for looking at art and I stopped checking my account after a couple of days. When you have an RSS feed, having an account becomes redundant...

Currently I use Misskey as my main social media. It's like Mastodon, but allows for longer text posts, custom emotes, etc. But I'm still kind of dissatisfied with it. It's hard to find things you're interested in over there, because there isn't a central mechanism showing you cool posts that you wouldn't have been shown by your community's reposts otherwise.

I hope Dorsey's Bluesky social media takes off. It would be awesome to see a decentralised network with the same kind of backing as Metabook and Twitter.
posted by wandering zinnia at 2:12 AM on October 29, 2022

Although considering the track record big tech companies have if making algorithmic content pure ragebait, maybe I shouldn't be so optimistic about Bluesky.
posted by wandering zinnia at 2:16 AM on October 29, 2022

You're going to change Musk's behavior by clicking the "don't show me this ad again" button?

No, but I'm hoping there's at least one developer at Twitter who is smart and strange enough to snowcrash ol' Muskrat with a printout of some cleverly presented code about Cantor sets or a nice, fat Minkowski sausage or some other topological nonsense to trigger him into an unrecoverable fugue state.

Granted, it's Twitter so I don't have a lot of hope in this one but it's worth a shot.
posted by loquacious at 2:38 AM on October 29, 2022 [13 favorites]

Much earlier in this thread I said I was going to nuke my account. I swear it was like I was on a twitter bender yesterday. But early this morning, using a handy Chrome extension, I ended my twitter time for good. It's a sunny morning here in Baja, I am going take my coffee to the porch, stare at the ocean, and marvel at the emptiness and possibilities of this new day, lol.
posted by Stonestock Relentless at 7:01 AM on October 29, 2022 [7 favorites]

@RobynElyse: I try to be an optimist so I will say now that I am very much looking forward to all of the people whining about how they were "shadowbanned" to find out they were just really unpopular all along.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:17 AM on October 29, 2022 [10 favorites]

I know that lots of people browse twitter without an ad blocker, but I had no idea so many mefites did!
posted by rum-soaked space hobo at 8:13 AM on October 29, 2022 [2 favorites]

Fortunately, Elon Musk will never buy Metafilter.
posted by larrybob at 8:18 AM on October 29, 2022 [4 favorites]

"1,434,964,899,882,498" transcribed from D67245750 profile* started in Sept. 2021

1434964899882498

That makes 1.4 quintillion (1.4 x 10^15) IDs or 200 Earth populations.

Everyone on Twitter? No, but 199 alternate dimensions worth.

Sure, they deleted many over the years leaving empty places. But, still.

--
* random "new" user I found dutifully ranting against Leah Culver printout post
posted by filtergik at 8:27 AM on October 29, 2022

Twitter IDs haven't been sequential in 10+ years. Their Snowflake ID system is basically timestamps and they increase very rapidly.
posted by Nelson at 8:43 AM on October 29, 2022 [7 favorites]

Re: app security, have you given the apps permission to access your photos & contacts? If so, without needing to escape their sandbox, they could make connections to hosts other than the service's and exfiltrate your data to them. Remember, JBIG2 is Turing complete. What other unsanitized data can subvert the original intentions of the code?
posted by ASCII Costanza head at 11:09 PM on 10/28

Really appreciate the specifics! I’m very careful with permissions generally and never give apps access to contacts. And I’m not having any sensitive discussions in Twitter DMs either. These all seem like pretty basic general security measures.
posted by viborg at 9:02 AM on October 29, 2022

That "mask of civility" link is probably a fake. It purports to be a screenshot of a tweet Musk made joking about attacking people with hammers (see: Paul Pelosi). But it appears to be fabricated.
posted by Nelson at 9:07 AM on October 29, 2022 [3 favorites]

Jinx
posted by viborg at 9:07 AM on October 29, 2022

@TVietor08: "The second largest investor in Twitter is...Saudi Arabia. The bone saw-loving kingdom that just sentenced a 72-year-old American man to 16 years in jail for his tweets." [image of the press release in the tweet].

It says they rolled the shares over into shares in the new private company, so presumably, they were already a large shareholder.
posted by Buntix at 9:16 AM on October 29, 2022 [5 favorites]

I read a funny WaPo article this morning about replacements for Twitter, which included “maybe you should try library ebooks.” Why DON’T I do that? I was inspired to add some friction to logging in. I’m gonna sign myself up for my own private No Tweet November.
posted by eirias at 9:36 AM on October 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

Twitter engineers were told today to *print out* their last 30 to 60 days of code, so they could show it to Elon Musk himself.

I hope someone had the guts to print out the compiled JavaScript, if any, plus any other machine generated code too... stick the paper bill to Musk
posted by JoeXIII007 at 9:55 AM on October 29, 2022 [2 favorites]

I hope someone had the guts to print out the compiled JavaScript, if any, plus any other machine generated code too... stick the paper bill to Musk

I think I changed my mind. Now I really want to watch someone present several hundred pages of obfuscated Perl indistinguishable from line noise. Bonus points if they mix in some Lisp, Brainfuck and a couple of Nethack maps.
posted by loquacious at 10:52 AM on October 29, 2022 [5 favorites]

Over at The Intercept, Jon Schwartz has a piece titled By Buying Twitter, Elon Musk Has Created His Own Hilarious Nightmare:

Twitter currently makes 90 percent of its revenue from advertising. (The rest is largely from data licensing.) This means that you, the Twitter user, are not Twitter’s customers. You are its product. Its customers are corporate advertisers and, as every businessperson knows, the customer is always right. Grocery stores care about the people shopping for Cheetos, not about the feelings of the Cheetos themselves.
…
Twitter is also, speaking just in financial terms, a crummy business. It’s only been profitable for two years of its existence, 2018 and 2019. In 2020 it lost over $1 billion, rebounding to lose a mere $222 million in 2021.

To make matters worse, Musk’s deal to buy Twitter involved taking out $12.5 billion in loans. This means that Twitter will have to come up with an additional $1 billion a year to service this debt.

If you liked Nilay Patel's piece for the Verge (linked a couple times above) you'll also like this one.
posted by fedward at 12:16 PM on October 29, 2022 [10 favorites]

Is there any reason to think "Elon has officially removed the Covid news from the search section" is true? I don't think @sammy4723 is a reliable source. I don't even know what "Covid news from the search section" would mean.
posted by Nelson at 12:27 PM on October 29, 2022 [2 favorites]

"I printed out this code from before the 60 day window, Mr. Musk. I know you only wanted recent code, but I'm really proud of this contribution. It's the code that makes bullshit spread as fast as possible."
posted by clawsoon at 1:06 PM on October 29, 2022 [4 favorites]

It's the code that makes bullshit spread as fast as possible.

*Presents mirrored mylar foil coated paper, then Musk's head starts to vibrate, wobble and then explode wetly like a scene out of Scanners.*
posted by loquacious at 1:20 PM on October 29, 2022 [2 favorites]

All the chucklefucks have reappeared on my timeline. I feel like this purchase is the equivalent to when the ghosts escape in ghostbusters 2, except, ya know, it’s a bunch of racist idiots on a social network
posted by glaucon at 1:41 PM on October 29, 2022 [7 favorites]

And why did I follow chucklefucks at one point? Well, naive me in 2014-2016 thought I could respond to them and change some minds. I would follow and engage. At some point I stopped trying and I’m guessing a bunch got off when they felt the app was “bad” for banning Drumpf. And now here we are.
posted by glaucon at 1:45 PM on October 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

Topics come and go from Twitter Explore all the time. Covid is not gone from there now. And the false viral tweet claimed "Elon has officially removed...". It's not removed, Elon wouldn't have been the one to remove it Friday if it had been removed, and there's nothing "official" about it.

Sorry to be so detailed on this. But there's so much misinformation going on right now that it's distracting and I'd rather not see Metafilter amplify it. There's a lot of real, dumb things happening already at Twitter thanks to the new chaos owner, things like the "print your code out! wait, don't!". And some terrible changes are very likely coming soon, particularly reinstating white supremacists and insurrectionists.
posted by Nelson at 1:59 PM on October 29, 2022 [12 favorites]

Oh I see what you mean; you're talking about the topics on this Explore page, currently what I see is "For you, Trending, US elections, News, Sports, Entertainment". Maybe that changed recently, perhaps to add US elections? The Covid explore page still exists but is not linked as a tab on that page for me today. Whatever change there may have been is very unlikely to have anything to do with Elon Musk.
posted by Nelson at 2:14 PM on October 29, 2022

NYTimes: Elon Musk Is Said to Have Ordered Job Cuts Across Twitter.

Elon Musk planned to begin laying off workers at Twitter as soon as Saturday, four people with knowledge of the matter said, with some managers being asked to draw up lists of employees to cut. ... The scale of the layoffs could not be determined. ...

The layoffs at Twitter would take place before a Nov. 1 date when employees were scheduled to receive stock grants as part of their compensation. Such grants typically represent a significant portion of employees’ pay. By laying off workers before that date, Mr. Musk may avoid paying the grants.

(This article is brand new reporting, independent of the WaPo's reporting a few days ago that there was a plan to cut 75% of Twitter staff.)
posted by Nelson at 2:23 PM on October 29, 2022 [4 favorites]

Having a centralized platform designed to maximize advertising revenue as a major form of communication and community creation was always poison, and I am glad to see its impending implosion. That twitter centered around short messages, exploded any and all context, and facilitated viral misinformation are integral to its setup and not curable side effects. I'm sorry for all the people who use it for something important to them, but better alternatives will have the opportunity to achieve the critical mass needed.
posted by a robot made out of meat at 2:45 PM on October 29, 2022 [3 favorites]

Pranksters, including one "Rahul Ligma" pretending to be laid off Twitter employees for media.
posted by emjaybee at 3:44 PM on October 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

By laying off workers before that date, Mr. Musk may avoid paying the grants.

The writing is on the wall. He's paid too much and has too much interest payments due to keep a viable workforce around. He probably has a plan to have Tesla folks work 6 months at Twitter.
posted by 922257033c4a0f3cecdbd819a46d626999d1af4a at 3:46 PM on October 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

The layoffs at Twitter would take place before a Nov. 1 date when employees were scheduled to receive stock grants as part of their compensation. Such grants typically represent a significant portion of employees’ pay. By laying off workers before that date, Mr. Musk may avoid paying the grants.

Are there really no legal protections against losing scheduled compensation when laid off not for fault? (I know, it's the US, but at least in California?)
posted by trig at 4:01 PM on October 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

There's various restrictions on mass layoffs like the WARN act and a stricter California-specific one. I have no idea if they'd apply to Twitter layoffs right after an acquisition. It seems certain that there'd be a lawsuit.

(My guess is Musk wouldn't do something so bold that would screw employee compensation. Twitter, Tesla, and SpaceX all depend on being able to hire engineering talent. I suspect he'd be worried about the reputational risk. OTOH he's also completely unpredictable and often cruel, so who knows.)
posted by Nelson at 4:04 PM on October 29, 2022 [4 favorites]

The layoffs at Twitter would take place before a Nov. 1 date

Scariest Hallowe'en ever for Twitter employees. Anybody know if Twitter has any kind of Hallowe'en costume tradition?

when employees were scheduled to receive stock grants as part of their compensation. Such grants typically represent a significant portion of employees’ pay.

Let's see... $200 million in severance to a few executives could've alternately been a $20,000 bonus for each Twitter employee. Amazing how fucked the priorities of capitalism are.
posted by clawsoon at 4:05 PM on October 29, 2022 [6 favorites]

Also from the NYT article:

The National Basketball Association star LeBron James pointed to a report by the Network Contagion Research Institute, a private group that studies the spread of ideological content online, which said that the use of a racial slur on Twitter had increased by nearly 500 percent in the 12 hours after Mr. Musk’s deal was finalized.
“I don’t know Elon Musk and, tbh, I could care less who owns twitter,” Mr. James tweeted. “But I will say that if this is true, I hope he and his people take this very seriously because this is scary.”
On Saturday, Mr. Musk took to Twitter to discuss food. “Fresh baked bread & pastries are some of the great joys of life,” he tweeted.

I see what you did there.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:21 PM on October 29, 2022 [3 favorites]

In Europe, the bird will fly by our 🇪🇺 rules.

A reminder that Twitter and other social media entities are still staring at thorny legal battles regarding content moderation and jurisdictions in general. Thanks to the 5th Circuit upholding Texas's nonsensical social media law, there are still questions as to whether there are Tweets that are legally required to be viewable in Texas, legally prohibited from being viewable in EU nations, and with no mechanism in place that can satisfy both requirements.

Elon Musk will certainly be the steady hand at Twitter's helm, guiding it through that dangerous legal sea and ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha hahahahahahahahahaha I can't finish that thought, sorry.
posted by delfin at 4:30 PM on October 29, 2022 [20 favorites]

“But I will say that if this is true, I hope he and his people take this very seriously because this is scary.”

Makes Elon feel bad.

On Saturday, Mr. Musk took to Twitter to discuss food. “Fresh baked bread & pastries are some of the great joys of life,” he tweeted.

Makes Elon feel good.

Elon likes to feel good.
posted by clawsoon at 4:38 PM on October 29, 2022 [4 favorites]

if musk is really trying to lay people off before their equity vests he should be [redacted] and i hope they band together to sue him. shameless!
making people work over the weekend to fire staff is also just incredible cruel. morale is going to be incredible at twitter.
posted by dis_integration at 5:44 PM on October 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

Holy crap. We're now stuck in "It's a Good Life."
posted by RakDaddy at 5:50 PM on October 29, 2022 [6 favorites]

Let them eat fresh baked bread and pastries cake?
posted by Soliloquy at 5:51 PM on October 29, 2022 [3 favorites]

Elon doesn't seem to have any qualms about violating the WARN Act: Lawsuit: Tesla broke US law by not providing 60-day notice before mass layoff

This is in Texas, though. I can see the Tesla layoffs on the CA Warn Act site just fine.
posted by meowzilla at 6:12 PM on October 29, 2022 [7 favorites]

Apparently, Musk's answer to all these issues with firing people is to claim that the firings are "for cause".

This is...insanity.
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:57 PM on October 29, 2022 [6 favorites]

And yes, the lawyers are starting to circle:

Hey, if any of my followers have a connection and want to suggest these folks use us for the litigation, we'd be ecstatic to do it on a contingency.

(Or, in other words: Elon Musk apparently has a fetish for "litigation he's guaranteed to lose")

posted by NoxAeternum at 9:01 PM on October 29, 2022 [5 favorites]

But the "for cause" thing only applies to the top executives so far, to avoid paying their severance?
posted by clawsoon at 4:20 AM on October 30, 2022

He's either bullshitting or setting himself up to lose some more lawsuits (maybe both).
posted by ryanrs at 5:38 AM on October 30, 2022

The executives have arbitration clauses that will likely prevent this from going to court, and their compensation agreements apparently (according to legal commentators on Twitter) say that they have to pay legal fees in a dispute even if they win, so I'm not as convinced that we're going to get to see another Musk lawsuit play out here. And even if the fired execs eventually prevail, he will have succeeded in putting them through months or years of pain and probably millions of dollars in legal fees, which hurt them much more than they hurt the richest man in the world. I don't think he cares that much if he wins or loses as long as he makes them suffer. He is a simple bully.
posted by primethyme at 7:29 AM on October 30, 2022 [4 favorites]

This morning Musk tweeted hateful political propaganda, a lunatic theory that Paul Pelosi was attacked as a consequence of a secret homosexual life. His source Musk chose to amplify is the Santa Monica Observer, a fake newspaper that in the past reported that Hillary Clinton was dead and replaced with a double for a 2016 debate (for example).

He's owned Twitter less than two days.
posted by Nelson at 7:34 AM on October 30, 2022 [40 favorites]

It's of course bad news that many talented and well-meaning people are losing their jobs at twitter. But: the ones who remain are now working at Truth Social with a different name. Is it a good thing to have competent people working at a company promoting sick ideologies across the world? Surely not — unless they're using their knowledge to actively sabotage Musk's efforts.

Incremental 'improve it from the inside' isn't going to help. A quick collapse would be preferable.
posted by UN at 7:59 AM on October 30, 2022 [5 favorites]

Musk's $44billion acquisition of Twitter reveals the vanity and dangers of tech. [Mastodon thread]
posted by Artw at 8:02 AM on October 30, 2022 [2 favorites]

Only Musk could convince metafilter that 8 figure golden parachutes for C-suite residents represent economic justice.
posted by Wood at 8:28 AM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

So the more just outcome is for the world's richest man to renege on legally-made agreements?
posted by primethyme at 8:35 AM on October 30, 2022 [16 favorites]

I'm out. I posted above that I'd try to hang on but it's going to hell faster than I could have imagined and I won't contribute my art or words to that shitheel any more. tumblr and mastodon are all i've got now.
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:35 AM on October 30, 2022 [16 favorites]

Let them fight.

I’d be more concerned for the regular employees, hope they have a recourse to a class action or somesuch.
posted by Artw at 8:54 AM on October 30, 2022

They’ll find out in court or arbitration what they’re legally entitled to. What information do you have about twitter’s lead attorney or for that matter the CEO? I’m inclined as a baseline to assume 7-8 figure payouts to executives who leave their jobs are fucking bullshit buddy buddy shit.

Regular employees have other legal protections and good for them.
posted by Wood at 8:57 AM on October 30, 2022

They’ll find out in court or arbitration what they’re legally entitled to. What information do you have about twitter’s lead attorney or for that matter the CEO? I’m inclined as a baseline to assume 7-8 figure payouts to executives who leave their jobs are fucking bullshit buddy buddy shit.

This is cheering on the tyrant because he's hurting people you think should be hurt. There are a lot of problems with golden parachutes, to be sure - but one of their purposes is to make just ripping out the leadership of a company painful, to discourage the sort of bullshit that Musk is pulling. In addition, if he's allowed to break these contracts for cause, the line workers lose their legal protection as well.

And since you brought up the execs, it's worth pointing out that one of those execs he fired - Vijaya Gaddez, the former policy chief - was the architect of Twitter's moderation policy, which as flawed as it was did a lot to push back on hate and disinformation. In fact, we've seen since the culling a marked increase in hate on Twitter, which is going to hurt people.

So in short, your argument here is cutting your nose off to spite your face, and letting Musk break contracts at will is something that will hurt us all.
posted by NoxAeternum at 10:17 AM on October 30, 2022 [19 favorites]

Marked increase probably understating it; use of racial slurs up as much as 500% under Musk's freedom of speech stance in just 12 hours.
posted by Mitheral at 10:40 AM on October 30, 2022 [2 favorites]

Maintaining my longstanding disbelief in executive golden parachutes is not "cheering on tyrants". Nor is it a matter of wanting to see anybody in particular hurt, nor is it an understanding that not getting a multimillion dollar payout is "being hurt" in the first place.

That being said, I do not share your belief that twitter's pre-Musk moderation policy as architected by Gaddez was a good thing. I believe Twitter's moderation pre-Musk was bad, or as you put it: flawed. It will undoubtedly be worse under Musk, but it was terrible before. I do not believe that there is anything that can be done to Twitter to make it a good thing.
posted by Wood at 11:01 AM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

Jack Dorsey was always softly in favour of filling the site with Nazis, then we had a brief period of them acting like a normal company and actually trying to tidy things up, now they have Musk who is not-even-slightly-in-disguise in favor of filling the site with Nazis.
posted by Artw at 11:09 AM on October 30, 2022 [12 favorites]

I was inspired by Metafilter's own mathowie to swear not to be counted as a Daily Active User on any platform run by Elon. I downloaded my Twitter archive, then used Tweetdeleter (paid for 1 month) to delete them all. I still have the account but I've logged out and deleted the app everywhere. I just used the nitter.net trick mentioned above to subscribe to a couple of my old lists in my RSS reader, so at least I can see what my friends are saying.
posted by web-goddess at 11:16 AM on October 30, 2022 [4 favorites]

Musk has now tweeted conspiracy theories about the attack on Pelosi's husband. His source was a site that published other fake stories including that former Secretary Clinton died in the September 11, 2001 attacks and had been using a body double since then, and that Ye, the rapper formerly known as Kanye West, was appointed to a non-existent position in the Department of the Interior under former President Donald Trump.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 11:29 AM on October 30, 2022 [5 favorites]

Maintaining my longstanding disbelief in executive golden parachutes is not "cheering on tyrants". Nor is it a matter of wanting to see anybody in particular hurt, nor is it an understanding that not getting a multimillion dollar payout is "being hurt" in the first place.

Arguing that it's a good thing that contract law is getting defenestrated because it means a bunch of golden parachutes won't get paid out is cheering on the tyrant, however. As was pointed out earlier, it's possible to view golden parachutes as bad and billionaires running roughshod over contract law as much worse.

That being said, I do not share your belief that twitter's pre-Musk moderation policy as architected by Gaddez was a good thing. I believe Twitter's moderation pre-Musk was bad, or as you put it: flawed. It will undoubtedly be worse under Musk, but it was terrible before. I do not believe that there is anything that can be done to Twitter to make it a good thing.

It was flawed, yes - but it was trending towards improvement under Gaddez, especially after Dorsey was kicked to the curb and actual moderation policy could be implemented. There's also the fact that a lot of the issues with online moderation tend towards the cultural, in particular the influence of the libertarian California Ideology on Silicon Valley - something that doesn't get talked about because it brings up a lot of uncomfortable questions.
posted by NoxAeternum at 12:00 PM on October 30, 2022 [6 favorites]

I give you Jeff Tiedrich.
posted by viborg at 12:07 PM on October 30, 2022 [2 favorites]

holy fxcking shite, twitter is crashing and burning faster than a tesla

Sorry I could have just posted the text.
posted by viborg at 12:12 PM on October 30, 2022 [3 favorites]

Arguing that it's a good thing that contract law is getting defenestrated

Assumes facts not in evidence. Assumes that in a battle between Musk and a whole gang of multimillionaires Musk will be able to destroy contract law. Assumes that it's contract law that explains why companies make these payouts.

in particular the influence of the libertarian California Ideology on Silicon Valley

Last time I tried to bring up California in a Twitter thread on metafilter it went over very poorly. I am admittedly a flawed messenger though. :)
posted by Wood at 12:25 PM on October 30, 2022

Musk has, without comment, deleted his tweet about Paul Pelosi.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 12:26 PM on October 30, 2022 [6 favorites]

That Pelosi tweet was beyond the pale. Jesus fucking Christ.
posted by gwint at 12:30 PM on October 30, 2022 [4 favorites]

This dude needs Michael Jordan to tell him that Democrats tweet, too.
posted by clawsoon at 12:33 PM on October 30, 2022

I don't think he cares that much if he wins or loses as long as he makes them suffer.

I get the theory, but this is a dumb example. None of these executives are waiting on that money to buy groceries for the kids. They've got time, it's a nearly open-and-shut contract case, a big bonus minus legal fees is more than zero dollars, why *wouldn't* they sue. And then with the certainty of winning, why would they settle? That "it's not about the money, it's about the principle" thing works both ways.
posted by ctmf at 12:47 PM on October 30, 2022 [2 favorites]

This dude needs Michael Jordan to tell him that Democrats tweet, too.

maybe they should stop
posted by ryanrs at 12:47 PM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

I hope that Paul Pelosi sues him and twitter for defamation. Section 230 doesn’t protect twitter when its owner and chief executive posts this garbage. Paul Pelosi is not a public figure like his wife and should get more protection from an obviously false, malicious rumor.
posted by interogative mood at 12:56 PM on October 30, 2022 [10 favorites]

How to Leave Dying Social Media Platforms (without ditching your friends)
posted by Artw at 1:11 PM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

Section 230 doesn’t protect twitter when its owner and chief executive posts this garbage.

Musk will just note he's repeating messages from other users - and the courts have held that is covered under Section 230.
posted by NoxAeternum at 1:18 PM on October 30, 2022

I get the theory [that Elon fired the executives just 'to make them suffer'], but this is a dumb example.

Elon taking an impulsive action to punish his 'enemies' but which ends up hurting himself more is entirely in character (see: this whole episode).
posted by Pyry at 1:25 PM on October 30, 2022 [4 favorites]

I mean, obviously that's his motivation. My point is more that this isn't going to punish his enemies (specifically those few executives) at all. He's going to make them yawn, call their lawyers, then put seven figures on their "receivables" line instead of their "cash" line. Several years later, after maybe showing up to a few meetings when their lawyers tell them to, they get the money. Meanwhile, Musk has still lost the money plus run his own company down with hopeless legal fees. Plus run the risk of his company catching the attention of employment regulators. Plus driven away every employee good enough to be employable elsewhere. It's less "punish his enemies" and more "self immolation while his enemies munch popcorn".
posted by ctmf at 1:42 PM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

Is there a good single site that offers brief, no-nonsense updates about what's going on with Twitter?

I'm slightly interested in new like Coca-Cola suspending its Twitter advertising until they see what's going to happen, but only slightly. A single site with brief updates would be helpful.
posted by kristi at 1:44 PM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

The firing of the Twitter executives was purely PR theater. When a company is acquired there is always some agreement about who if anyone from senior management is staying on. Any key executives you plan to keep are offered some retention bonus agreement; consulting agreement, etc otherwise it is assumed you no longer work there when the deal closes.
posted by interogative mood at 2:37 PM on October 30, 2022 [3 favorites]

→ How to Leave Dying Social Media Platforms (without ditching your friends)

Leaves aside the small matter of finding your friends in the fediverse, which is not even remotely a small matter
posted by scruss at 2:48 PM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

Any key executives you plan to keep are offered some retention bonus agreement; consulting agreement, etc otherwise it is assumed you no longer work there when the deal closes.

I could see this for the CEO and CFO but the head of trust and safety too?
posted by subdee at 3:11 PM on October 30, 2022

No, Elon and Jack are not “competitors.” They’re collaborating.
posted by Artw at 3:13 PM on October 30, 2022 [4 favorites]

How to Leave Dying Social Media Platforms (without ditching your friends)

Does not include steps on where to advertise locally now that newspapers are dead.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 4:16 PM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

The firing of the Twitter executives was purely PR theater. When a company is acquired there is always some agreement about who if anyone from senior management is staying on. Any key executives you plan to keep are offered some retention bonus agreement; consulting agreement, etc otherwise it is assumed you no longer work there when the deal closes.

We'll find out for sure when and if lawsuits are filed. No chance top execs let a bogus "for cause" firing take away their golden parachutes without a fight.
posted by srboisvert at 4:27 PM on October 30, 2022

How to Leave Dying Social Media Platforms (without ditching your friends)

There's a lot to unpack here (suffice it to say, it's another example of Doctrow almost getting it before his lifelong infatuation with the frontier myth kicks in and the point flies over his head to horizons unknown), but I will say this: one day, he's going to wind up in a situation where he can't just walk away, and it's going to blow his mind.

No, Elon and Jack are not “competitors.” They’re collaborating.

While I agree that Musk and Dorsey are on the same side (and thus Bluesky is not the answer), the reality was that Musk wanted out, and it was only when it was pointed out that his options were a) buy Twitter or b) buy Twitter after having his dirty underwear aired in public that he finally conceded the point.
posted by NoxAeternum at 4:41 PM on October 30, 2022 [3 favorites]

Elon Musk, new owner of Twitter, tweets unfounded anti-LGBTQ conspiracy theory about Paul Pelosi attack
posted by tiny frying pan at 5:17 PM on October 30, 2022 [3 favorites]

Seems like the main Nitter server has run afoul of daylight-savings time.
posted by urbanwhaleshark at 5:56 PM on October 30, 2022

The firings have nothing to do with their golden parachutes. That was all written into the merger agreement.
posted by interogative mood at 6:05 PM on October 30, 2022

Any claims he’s making that he fired the executives for cause and won’t owe them the compensation in the agreement will go over with the court the same as his attempts to wiggle out of buying twitter.
posted by interogative mood at 6:11 PM on October 30, 2022 [2 favorites]

Twitter is planning to start charging $20 per month for verification. And if the employees building it don’t meet their deadline, they’ll be fired by Elon Musk.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 7:18 PM on October 30, 2022 [4 favorites]

Agree with sentiment expressed upthread that so long as profit drives the shape and experience of these platforms, the shitshow that all social media platforms evolve into seem inevitable, given human nature.

Given the expectation of free-to-use, users have no leverage but their presence, nor much recourse to push back at increasingly toxic and psychologically hostile experiences because legal systems are more concerned with regulating transactions (and there is none) than with protecting individuals.

I have multiple Twitter accounts, the side effect of being an unhappy closeted trans woman. I'd already started backing away because I can't deny the fact that Twitter is bad for my particular brain. But social media since usenet has been bad for my brain in similar ways. I know not everyone has the same struggle as I. But without such, I have little to no contact with anyone as myself, especially in covid times. And that's incredibly hard as well. I wish there were better options for people like myself.

Fundamentally, most alternatives I've seen struggle with the same problem hindering adoption:

Discoverability in the big tent space of the internet.

Like it or not, the world increasingly lives online. And the feedback loop drives it ever more so. Twitter is one of the big tents in that space. If I switch over somewhere else, it will take a lot of work to find people. I'll probably never find many I care about because they won't have switched the same direction as myself.

If we want freedom and a healthier online existence, we need indexing and routability to not be owned by private interests. F*** if I have any good ideas on that. I'd love to see e.g., the library of Congress in the US do some of it. But the political football on that would be insane.

And still, yet, when i look at what most people do in terms of social connection, email, messaging, hosting pics and writing, and searches online, I can't help but wonder how much it would really cost to solve that collectively via public money, once the costs of ads, tracking, marketing, etc were subtracted. Bet it's less than the postal service, though that's a painful comparison in this year of our f****** politicians 2022.
posted by allium cepa at 7:24 PM on October 30, 2022 [8 favorites]

I don’t think this charging for verification is a terrible idea actually, other than the threat to fire people. There are probably many companies and brands who will want to get that blue checkmark just to say they are “verified” in terms of their main marketing and support channels on twitter. There are only about 300,000 verified accounts today; if there is some big pent up demand for verification and you could ten million accounts on that program then you’ve got $200 million a month for that service. I’m skeptical that it would be that high, and I suspect people will be especially unwilling to get verified based on the garbage we’ve seen today; but its worth a punt.
posted by interogative mood at 7:33 PM on October 30, 2022

I don’t think this charging for verification is a terrible idea actually

Not sure that charging content creators and making the verification mark a status symbol will have a good effect, honestly, but I could be wrong.
posted by nubs at 7:41 PM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

General sentiment from blue-checks on my timeline seems to be "yeah, no" so ... good luck with that.

The "do it or you're fired" thing feels like half "hey, big tough guy in charge now" bluster and half "resignations are cheaper than layoffs".

(And also: tests like this are selecting for True Musk Believers in the Twitter workforce.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 7:44 PM on October 30, 2022 [6 favorites]

Paying for verification? Anyone want to take bets on how long before the fabled blue check mark is essentially meaningless? Twitter just gave itself a ton of incentive to loosen their standards and verify anyone who's willing to pay.

Of course it's obviously greedy and short-sighted so... yeah. That's what'll happen.
posted by MrVisible at 7:45 PM on October 30, 2022 [7 favorites]

the week long deadline is just trying to create a culture of urgency and fear. features like that are not that hard to implement, the reason they don't exist is because twitter believed they were bad features. this is true of 80% of the features people wish twitter had (including myself).

regardless, seems like a great way to destroy the value of verification...I certainly won't lament it, though it won't be great to see the only remaining verified accounts be spammers and misinformation accounts
posted by wooh at 7:56 PM on October 30, 2022

It couldn’t possibly be worse than treating verified identity like a boon that twitter doles out based on their estimate of a persons “notability” and quality of character. Arguably it should be free or cheap but making “I am who I say I am” a status symbol was one of the things I loathed about the ancien regime at Twitter.
posted by Wood at 8:12 PM on October 30, 2022 [2 favorites]

That NYT article quoted above also noted that

Mr. Musk may also be testing Twitter’s engineers. He and his team have assigned some of them projects to complete, three people with knowledge of the matter said. One project involved changes to Twitter’s login screen, they said. Some engineers worked late into the night on Friday to complete the assignments, they said.

Nothing like the world's richest man making people work in crunch mode on stuff that isn't urgent because he feels like it.
posted by trig at 8:13 PM on October 30, 2022 [29 favorites]

Straight from the horse’s mouth. There exist accounts that can post on as unverified plebs, but are too vile by Twitter’s judgment to be verified.
posted by Wood at 8:37 PM on October 30, 2022

I’m sure there are a lot of politicians, news professionals, corporate brand & support accounts and others who will pay for the blue check.I also suspect they will give the blue check away for free to those creators and influencers some algorithm deems essential.
posted by interogative mood at 8:37 PM on October 30, 2022 [1 favorite]

Thinking about how, if Tim Tesla there were deliberately trying his hardest to destroy Twitter, in what concrete ways might he act in a way different from what he’s been doing so far

I genuinely cannot distinguish between his actual actions to date and what one might do to intentionally sabotage the company’s future
posted by DoctorFedora at 8:39 PM on October 30, 2022 [2 favorites]

Let me see if I've got this right. A billionaire heir to Apartheid money who has ties to despotic dictators and who parrots the rhetoric of a movement that is in the process of dismantling American democracy, has, with the backing of Saudi billionaires, bought the largest propaganda outlet in the world.

I find this vaguely unsettling.
posted by MrVisible at 8:43 PM on October 30, 2022 [56 favorites]

I mean, when you put it like that...
posted by RakDaddy at 9:19 PM on October 30, 2022 [22 favorites]

@oliverjones:

So it turns out the big Twitter business plan was, “that’s an awfully nice check you got there, would be a shame if something happened to it.”

posted by gwint at 10:39 PM on October 30, 2022 [7 favorites]

The "do it or you're fired" thing feels like half "hey, big tough guy in charge now" bluster and half "resignations are cheaper than layoffs". (And also: tests like this are selecting for True Musk Believers in the Twitter workforce.)

Yeah, and I'm thinking if I'm one of those engineers, I'm thinking even if I can meet this arbitrary deadline, do I want to work in a place like this? The answer is no.
posted by ctmf at 12:56 AM on October 31, 2022 [11 favorites]

I mostly have Musk blocked on twitter, but morbid curiosity overtook me earlier and I had a brief scroll through.
Someone asked him what the biggest problems at Twitter were, to which he replied something like:

"10 Managers for every coder"

I found that interesting, because surely twitter doesn't actually need all that much coding work done on it.
This notion that they need halls of coders and that they all need to print their work out for him to check it seems to betray a fundamental misunderstanding of what twitter needs to actually do.
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 6:18 AM on October 31, 2022 [12 favorites]

nubs, that ship appears to have sailed re: verification as status symbol
posted by Selena777 at 6:35 AM on October 31, 2022 [2 favorites]

Just deleted my account. It was a mostly pointless and aggravating time-sink anyway. My life will be better without Twitters.
posted by octothorpe at 7:21 AM on October 31, 2022 [5 favorites]

It wouldn't surprise me if Musk divides up all of twitter into two camps - programmers and everyone else. And because the only everyone else he sees are managers it's really programmers and managers. It would go aways to explaining his foot bullet plan to lay off 75% of the staff.
posted by Mitheral at 7:57 AM on October 31, 2022 [3 favorites]

Yes to the programmer and manager thing. For instance:

Longtime Musk associates David Sacks and Jason Calacanis appeared in a company directory over the weekend ... their titles were staff software engineer.

If you don't know who these two guys are I'm not sure how to convey how hilarious it is they were given an "engineer" title. Let's just say I doubt they were printing out 50 pages of code written in the last 30 days.

As a friend said: ✨ meritocracy ✨
posted by Nelson at 8:09 AM on October 31, 2022 [8 favorites]

Can Elon Musk Make the Math Work on Owning Twitter? It’s Dicey. (NYT gift link)

The $44 billion acquisition was the largest leveraged buyout of a technology company in history. To do the deal, Mr. Musk, the world’s richest man, loaded about $13 billion in debt on the company, which had not turned a profit for eight of the past 10 years. The deal was inked before the global economy looked to be headed toward a recession as interest rates surged higher. And digital advertising, which makes up 90 percent of Twitter’s revenue, has been falling at social media companies.
…
Last year, Twitter’s interest expense was about $50 million. With the new debt taken on in the deal, that will now balloon to about $1 billion a year. Yet the company’s operations last year generated about $630 million in cash flow to meet its financial obligations.

That means that Twitter is generating less money per year than what it owes its lenders. The company also does not appear to have a lot of extra cash on hand. While it had about $6 billion in cash before Mr. Musk’s buyout, a large portion of that probably went into the cost of closing the acquisition.

I'm just going to leave this article about leveraged buyouts here. No reason.
posted by fedward at 8:09 AM on October 31, 2022 [8 favorites]

Toys R Us vibes.

Then again, a zombie Toys R Us is back - brands never die!
posted by Artw at 9:21 AM on October 31, 2022

@TheDailyShow
Let’s get to know Twitter’s new C-E-Overlord, Elon Musk.

/Bonus: Narrated by William Shatner.
posted by bluesky43 at 9:30 AM on October 31, 2022 [3 favorites]

I think it's worth taking a moment to remind ourselves of how Twitter came to be what it is. It's not that Twitter offered some new service that was totally revolutionary: blogging existed on the free and open Internet, and microblogging was just a matter of brevity. Rather, hundreds of thousands, then millions, of people made a decision to abandon the free and open Internet in favor of a capitalist-controlled walled garden, largely from a desire to chase a trend. Twitter wasn't better, it was just cool. And predictably, that walled garden eventually turned into a prison. I hope that people will learn the lesson not to repeat it, but I fear we're doomed to keep watching it happen again and again.
posted by biogeo at 9:49 AM on October 31, 2022 [9 favorites]

Ehh it’s always been as much a universal asynchronous chat app as a microblog. That’s why it’s got crazy ass network effects.
posted by Artw at 9:54 AM on October 31, 2022 [5 favorites]

Twitter wasn't better, it was just cool.

and primarily because it had all the cool kids on it. it had lots of real celebs on it just posting whatever dumb shit came into their head with no pr person in front of them. The thing that really clicked it for me was shaq's "dats me yellin". When I saw that tweet I was (i thought) twitter for life. As soon as twitter becomes so toxic and associated with fascism (instead of it being just something incidental that is there and annoying as hell but not the core of the site) the cool kids are going to leave and then there won't be any point to the site at all, and it will die. Here's hoping, anyway.
posted by dis_integration at 10:19 AM on October 31, 2022 [7 favorites]

Journalists fucking love it and amplify it like crazy, and they also love their blue ticks, so maybe fucking with that will help its decline.
posted by Artw at 10:59 AM on October 31, 2022 [5 favorites]

blogging existed on the free and open Internet, and microblogging was just a matter of brevity.

Well, plus RSS. And maybe that's the way back out of this. Personal blogs, under your personal control, in a standard format and an RSS reader app so you can "follow" people you're interested in and they can follow you. Still needs a "like" feature.
posted by ctmf at 11:02 AM on October 31, 2022 [4 favorites]

I hope that people will learn the lesson not to repeat it, but I fear we're doomed to keep watching it happen again and again.

We've had this exact same discussion at least a half dozen times in the Twitter threads this month. Is this one going to bring anything new or shall we just have another round of complaining that if people don't have the time and tech skills to set up something as trivial as a blogging platform and then figure out how to find all the content they want on random blogs and then figure out an RSS reader with good flow and still not have the level of interactivity that Twitter et al provides than they deserve the fascism that corporate owned networks will surely bring?

Until you understand why the average person uses social media, your suggested replacements will never work.
posted by Candleman at 11:17 AM on October 31, 2022 [26 favorites]

I'm no fan of Twitter, but let's give credit where it's due: early Twitter provided a very nice way around international SMS charges. They have since retired this feature in most markets (I've been told it's still alive in places where there's low smartphone penetration, developing countries mostly), but it was really a killer feature particularly in Europe / Middle East / Asia... honestly pretty much everywhere but the US.

In the US, the billing model for cellular services in the early 2000s made voice calls cheap but SMSs expensive (generally you had to buy a "package" of 100/200/500 messages per month at a flat rate, but got charged anywhere from a few to 50 cents if you went beyond that). But in Europe, voice calls were generally expensive (and paid by the callee, not the caller), but SMS was relatively cheap as long as they were going to a domestic number. If you were in Germany and sending a SMS to a German number, easy day. If you were in Germany and sending a SMS to a number in Turkey, it could be relatively costly.

Twitter solved this issue by offering "short codes" in many countries, which you could send SMSs to from your feature phone, and by starting the message with someone else's Twitter handle, it would be sent via Twitter to the recipient's phone, and appear to come from the local access number in their locality. So both ends of the message only paid local rates.

This was super neat and I, along with a lot of other folks, made use of it heavily during Twitter's early years. It's what made getting people to sign up for Twitter an easy sell: even if they didn't care to microblog what they were eating for breakfast, "free international SMS" was a phrase that got people's attention. The 'microblogging' features—if you approached Twitter from this angle—were really a way of doing a sort of one-to-many, opt-in messaging feed. So you could send messages to specific people, or you could just send updates to your feed and people could subscribe to it or not, as they pleased.

Like Facebook's now-almost-forgotten Ivy League-centered rollout, it was this initial value proposition that got them their first batch of users, many of whom were exactly the sort of well-connected people that you'd absolutely kill for if you were rolling out a new service. It's why Twitter took off despite not really having much compelling about it technically (remember the Failwhale? It was a running joke on Slashdot for years that Twitter was the sort of thing any reasonable OLTP development shop could set up the backend for in an afternoon). After that, it was network effects and first-mover advantage.

By the time journalists showed up, and interest/affinity groups like Black Twitter became a thing, Twitter had a pretty good competitive moat, and they've been riding that wave ever since.

It's not like they've really added any exceptional features since then, either. Most of their development has been, frankly, user-hostile (the algorithmic feed nobody asked for, ads and sponsored posts nobody wanted, etc.), or folding-in services that started as third-party add-ons (link shortening, image hosting, threaded display).

They're a perfect example of a service that should have been copied a dozen times by now, but haven't because of non-technical reasons. And it doesn't surprise me that one of Musk's ideas is probably to axe about 80% of the technical staff, because honestly Twitter seems to have a suspicious number of employees for a service that doesn't really do very much, at least from the perspective of a user. I've long suspected that the majority of Twitter's engineers probably are working on stuff that's more of interest to their actual customers (advertisers, big data consumers), rather than users proper.
posted by Kadin2048 at 11:54 AM on October 31, 2022 [32 favorites]

Kadin2048: And it doesn't surprise me that one of Musk's ideas is probably to axe about 80% of the technical staff, because honestly Twitter seems to have a suspicious number of employees for a service that doesn't really do very much, at least from the perspective of a user.

As somebody pointed out, Twitter's product is content moderation (i.e. create a place with content that people want to read and advertisers want to put their messages beside). I'm not sure what sort of staffing requirement that has, though I'm guessing it changes depending on whether you're going for a large army of low-wage moderators or an AI moderation moonshot.
posted by clawsoon at 12:36 PM on October 31, 2022 [3 favorites]

I'd also be curious to know what portion of the technical staff are DevOps, SRE, etc. rather than developers coding new features.
posted by Candleman at 1:02 PM on October 31, 2022

an AI moderation moonshot

You wouldn't need a moonshot, i don't think. It doesn't need to be perfect to lower staffing. Train the AI based on past moderation history. Have it assign confidence levels. If c > .75, go with the AI, otherwise pass it to a human. You've immediately cut the workload and you've got a feedback cycle that will improve the AI. Even if the confidence is high only 20% of the time, you're still saving human moderator time.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 1:52 PM on October 31, 2022

Or (and more likely) it would be garbage that favors Nazis and punishes minority groups Nazis attack and new ownership would be perfectly happy with it.
posted by Artw at 1:56 PM on October 31, 2022 [12 favorites]

I'm guessing it changes depending on whether you're going for a large army of low-wage moderators or an AI moderation moonshot.

On that point, this Verge article about Twitter's decision not to go into competition with OnlyFans is worth a read -- the upshot is they decided not to monetize adult content because they lack the ability to police illegal content. You need both human and AI moderation at this scale, and Twitter is out of date compared to larger tech platforms on the AI side, such that it is likely missing most child sexual abuse material on the site. The article includes the fascinating tidbit that "In 2019, Mark Zuckerberg boasted that the amount Facebook spends on safety features exceeds Twitter’s entire annual revenue."
posted by john hadron collider at 2:01 PM on October 31, 2022 [5 favorites]

You wouldn't need a moonshot, i don't think. It doesn't need to be perfect to lower staffing. Train the AI based on past moderation history. Have it assign confidence levels. If c > .75, go with the AI, otherwise pass it to a human. You've immediately cut the workload and you've got a feedback cycle that will improve the AI. Even if the confidence is high only 20% of the time, you're still saving human moderator time.

pretty sure that's how it's operating now, which is how bad actors game the mass reporting system to target the marginalized people the moderation system is supposed to help protect.
posted by i used to be someone else at 2:03 PM on October 31, 2022 [6 favorites]

I've seen many people point out highly suspicious accounts on many social media sites. Essentially, people show legal pictures of their own children, but they have a Patreon account. It's assumed that the Patreon account is how they deliver the illegal content. It's sickening but I don't know how legal sites can fight against this if the content is not illegal on their sites, and then if the Patreon content is delivered outside of Patreon's systems. Ugh.
posted by chaz at 2:15 PM on October 31, 2022

Yeah I uh I'm just some guy but I'm gonna put it out there that if there were a workable, effective automated moderation solution that both catches enough bad actors to be meaningfully useful and also doesn't produce so many false positives as to make it a trivial vector of abuse, we'd all know all about it in detail because everybody, everybody, would be using it.

No fucking confidence interval on the planet is going to comprehend the breadth of normal human interaction or be able to account for necessary context. No system that automates any kind of credulity can survive motivated negative attention. You need humans, or you need to lock the door entirely, or a mix of both. A moonshot is underestimating the problem: we got to the moon in less time than the internet's been around and moderation is still a huge unsolved problem.
posted by cortex at 2:44 PM on October 31, 2022 [41 favorites]

Says one of the people who helped create this very nice moderated corner of the Internet.

I agree with cortex - this is a political/social nightmare that Elon clearly thinks he can engineer his way out of, and as one person pointed out above he'll either be sued by the State of Texas if he complies with the EU, or the EU if he continues on the trend he's on. Either way, I'm cheering for a dumpster fire and for more people to move to the fediverse
posted by thebotanyofsouls at 3:01 PM on October 31, 2022 [5 favorites]

ahahaha, so this will be his second failed AI moonshot?
posted by ryanrs at 4:08 PM on October 31, 2022 [2 favorites]

Still needs a "like" feature.

And a one-click re-blog (with back-link for credit) feature. That is, I think, the key to modern social media. The chance for your post to virally explode far past your follower count in a very short time. It would also need a way to count likes and reblogs, for metrics. Now we're inventing Twitter again, without even a way to moderate content.
posted by ctmf at 4:18 PM on October 31, 2022 [3 favorites]

One project involved changes to Twitter’s login screen, they said.

“Code Monkey think maybe manager wanna write goddamn login page himself
Code Monkey not say it out loud”
posted by nickmark at 4:20 PM on October 31, 2022 [23 favorites]

If I'm honest, part of my love-hate relationship with platforms like Twitter is how they forcibly preserve my exposure to the bad.

I can follow specific people, I can mute terms and block awful accounts, but Twitter has a vested interest in continuing to expose me to a wide variety of stuff that doesn't fit because that approach makes them money.

So the tools I use to protect my own mental health are crippled by design.

All of this is ignoring the fundamental problems with endless scroll interfaces and metricised=gamified social interactions and algorithms that magnify outrage because it stimulates interaction and interaction has a strong correlation with revenue opportunities.

The only option I know is to switch to something like nitter, or set up RSS feeds for accounts which post interesting stuff, but that's a usage without any friends, and I have enough anonymous read-only interest-pursuit in my life already.
posted by allium cepa at 4:38 PM on October 31, 2022 [5 favorites]

> And a one-click re-blog (with back-link for credit) feature. That is, I think, the key to modern social media. The chance for your post to virally explode far past your follower count in a very short time.

You're right that it's key, but I think there's a reasonable argument to be made that it isn't a good thing, in the end. Then again, it's not fundamentally different than blogging classic, which allowed for the exact same dynamics but just a little extra friction in the system. So maybe it's a wash.
posted by vibratory manner of working at 7:04 PM on October 31, 2022

GM pulls all paid advertising from twitter.
posted by Mitheral at 8:29 PM on October 31, 2022 [4 favorites]

it's a good thing musk took twitter private because the shareholders would surely have already fired him
posted by dis_integration at 8:34 PM on October 31, 2022 [1 favorite]

I'm wondering what the negotiations with the banks must have looked like. What happens to the loans if Twitter runs out of money?
posted by clawsoon at 8:57 PM on October 31, 2022 [1 favorite]

If Twitter can’t make its debt payments then it could try to restructure the debt, take on more debt, or Elon could himself try to buy the debt from the lenders. As discussed in the NYT article I linked above, restructuring the debt or finding more lenders may be tricky simply due to the amount of debt already involved. Elon’s wealth is tied up in ownership stakes of his other companies, and he may want to avoid liquidating too much and diluting his voting power or tanking the stocks. Tesla trades way above auto company fundamentals, so he’s also at risk of having a lot of his wealth disappear if the stock drops.

But probably he’d just take dirty oil money from a sovereign fund. It worked for WeWork!
posted by fedward at 9:21 PM on October 31, 2022 [5 favorites]

Fortune has an article Advertisers are closely watching Elon Musk’s Twitter. They can’t like what they see so far. It links to this advertising industry newsletter which says:

Twitter is an anomaly among the big social media companies. At one time there was a contingent of marketers who believed they "had to be" on Facebook. The same is true of Instagram. The same is now true of TikTok. But no marketer has ever believed they "had to be" on Twitter. This is Twitter's vulnerability. When over 90% of your income comes from advertisers, and no advertiser believes they "have to be" there, you have a problem...

He says he's creating a "moderation council" to create standards. If he thinks he has time for "moderation councils" and other corporate horseshit he's crazy. By the time he gets his "council" together Twitter will have drowned in sludge.

Musk needs to say loudly, clearly and quickly that he is at least sticking with Twitter's moderation policies. Over 90% of Twitter's revenue comes from advertisers, and advertisers are very easily frightened.

posted by TheophileEscargot at 10:10 PM on October 31, 2022 [6 favorites]

People are assuming the investors want their money back, top priority. Most probably do. Some might be fine considering it a payment for leverage over Twitter management when they want something.
posted by ctmf at 12:15 AM on November 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

Musk needs to say loudly, clearly and quickly

So of course he will do the opposite, because he fancies himself some kind of freakonomics unconventional genius who's too smart to do what's obvious to mere regular people.
posted by ctmf at 12:18 AM on November 1, 2022 [2 favorites]

Honestly at this point I hate the ubiquity of the ad-supported internet a great deal. The existence of terrible "free" solutions has mostly destroyed the market for better paid ones, and has also helped foster the precedent that all services - paid or not - are expected to additionally monetize users in ways they may not know, expect, or want.

At the same time I can't deny that the free-to-use internet services enable the impoverished and powerless to have an online presence, to participate. In ways (however flawed by data harvesting and toxic ad targeting) they would not easily be able to otherwise.

But again, all this rests upon the idea that satisfaction of common needs is rightfully (or at least acceptably) delegated to private enterprise. That public oversight of the implementations are by default limited. And that in virtually no situations is it ever acceptable to bring any domain delegated to private enterprise back under public control.

I submit this is dysfunctional bullshit and that if we want to stop experiencing our lives being endlessly yanked around by succession of narcissistic monsters, we need to start pushing for collective control of the satisfaction of our own needs. And when so much of our lives takes place online, when it becomes a necessity to carry out daily routines and meet societal, professional, and legal responsibilities, I think it's no longer arguable that the capabilities that Google, Twitter Facebook, etc provide is really simply "entertainment" or "luxury" for most people any more.
posted by allium cepa at 12:19 AM on November 1, 2022 [15 favorites]

Dave Troy: Elon and Jack are collaborating.
posted by rhizome at 12:51 AM on November 1, 2022

Kadin2048: And it doesn't surprise me that one of Musk's ideas is probably to axe about 80% of the technical staff, because honestly Twitter seems to have a suspicious number of employees for a service that doesn't really do very much, at least from the perspective of a user.

this is a very common view. when I worked at twitter, I got it all the time. I thought I could give a little context. I won't say that twitter as it exists today doesn't have a little "fat", but I think that is somewhat inevitable with any large company. of course, the startup types, the VCs, the muskrats will say that this is why the twitters of the world fail...but it really isn't: a large, established company has a different set of constraints than a startup which lead to them being more conservative. but I digress.

on a technical level, every scale you add to a service general leads to incredible increases in complexity. of course, poor technical leadership and bad decisions can greatly exacerbate this...but still, this is the fundamental reality that is hard for people who haven't worked on services with such immense scale to understand.

a vaguely technical person can make a twitter prototype in a weekend. this is absolutely true. but how many people can use it? with every order of magnitude more of users, systems that you used to be able to take for granted start falling over. this is exactly what happened to twitter...originally they were a pretty straightforward rails app, that then had to introduce more and more extreme hacks because a standard rails app simply cannot handle the sort of usage that twitter has...is why they ended up rewriting everything on the JVM, in scala particularly...that is its own conversation, the point being that simple solutions start falling over at scale. and what ends up happening is you need more and more people to manage smaller and smaller things. one team of engineers can manage a twitter-like service when it has thousands or tens of thousands of users...but as it gets into the millions? especially if those users are heavily engaged? especially if there are times when people tweet in unison? these are a lot of aspects of twitter's platform that aren't necessarily unique, but do present particular scale challenges that do not exist in chat, for example.

so what happens is with every notched increase in users and usage, you need a lot more people to make sure things don't fall over. you have an entire team dedicate to a single cache...why? because it's complicated, has a bunch of business logic, and most critically...if it falls over, the company stops functioning and stops making money. this starts to apply to everything. twitter is conceptually simple but making it feels as reliable as a "utility" takes an immense amount of work. another things which greatly increases the technical burden is just that: reliability. a service that can go down 10% of the time is much easier than one that can only go down 1% of the time. as you push that further...99.9% reliability, 99.99% reliability, the complexity of problems that arise to handle all of the users you have ALL the time with extreme reliability are immense, though at times hard to explain to people who haven't seen them themselves. to get to these high levels of reality with such a complicated service (remember, it's complicated because the usership and usage patterns) requires a very complicated game of whack-a-mole...it requires real technical leadership and vision, it requires a deep understanding of what the system looks like and how to evolve it into something that does what you need it to do. this all requires a lot of technical energy, technical expertise, etc.

I was at twitter during the era of the rewrite to the JVM. it was controversial, but the truth of the matter is that ignoring the financial or product side of twitter, the rewrite was a success. the infrastructure they put in place let twitter scale up incredibly well, in a maintainable way, meeting incredibly stringent requirements. twitter very rarely goes down.

As an aside, since this is sort of all over the place...I should mention, just for context, what makes twitter, technically difficult. asymmetry in follows. this is the problem chat does not have. people all over the world can follow a single person, and there is an expectation that that person's tweets will be available to all of them in a timely manner. alternately, every person follows a bunch of people all over the world, and they expect to get all of those tweets in a timely manner. this is not trivial. twitter's graph has spikes in it that other social networks tend not to have...because nobody has 100 million friends on facebook, but there are people who have 100 million twitter followers. or follow 10 thousand people. there are ways to deal with all of this, but...they require engineers! to create, and to manage. it is not at all trivial.

as an ex-tweep who has a love/hate relationship with the service, the area that always frustrated me was not twitter's technology, but rather the product vision--or lack thereof. my personal theory is that nobody really ever "got" why twitter was successful...why would this weird platform that restricted you to 140 characters get so popular? there are a lot of theories that I find plausible, but the reality is that product leadership at twitter has always been terrified of making any bold moves with the product because the value proposition has always been so murky. there is this thing called twitter that a lot of people seem to enjoy for some reason...but why? how? huh? there was never a crystal clear answer to that internally, which meant that evolving the product got quite difficult. remember when they were set to allow blog post length tweets then decided not to do it at the last minute? or earlier than that, there was a massive redesign of twitter that they then scrapped completely. these are more extreme examples but this lack of vision permeates how they've tackled the product. they had twitter blue, but had no idea what to do with it. they had all of these celebrities and media people, but didn't really know what to do with them. they have power users, but don't know what to do with them. why? because twitter does not understand why twitter is successful.

but behind the scenes? twitter put into place some truly incredible technology to enable the site. I think it's also important to underscore that a lot of technology which is considered "commodity" right now did not exist at the time. there was no AWS or GCP for twitter to build on (twitter is probably the last of the giants that will have built their own data centers, hard to imagine new companies wanting to take on that giant PITA). a lot of now commoditized technologies in data, message queues, RPC, pretty much anything you choose...did not exist. and twitter helped push some of them forward! scalding came out of twitter and was a giant conceptual shift for how people attacked data. twitter's futures were cutting edge. and on and on. but all of this requires lots of engineers.

I'm not saying there weren't inefficiencies in the system, I'm sure there was. but it's not like twitter was setting out to be a retirement home for mid-career engineers. it's just that services at the level of scale and complexity of twitter...both technically and from a product perspective...move slowly. but twitter's technical execution has always been strong--and its product vision completely absent.
posted by wooh at 1:03 AM on November 1, 2022 [129 favorites]

I should also mention: if management is good and incentives generally aligned (a gigantic if!), in my personal opinion you want a bit of slack in your eng org. it depends on a lot of factors but if you want to really move the needle, it almost always involves a lot of exploration and risk taking that is impossible when everyone is terrified of losing their jobs and thus incentivized to just bang out as much obvious, low-hanging fruit. I mean, during the printer debacle people were joking (but truthfully) about how instead of actually writing anything, you should just rewrite code in a super verbose way. one line becomes 5! 5 lines become 30! look at how productive I am!

I know of a single person at twitter who saved the company ~100 million a year with a project they envisioned and executed. it was a gigantic success. in musk et al's vision of the world, he would fire everyone except that person. but the thing is, that person could only do the project they did because there was space for them to do that. if they had their nose to the grindstone to implement some stupid user facing eccentricity, they wouldn't have done it (let's be real: this person would have quit). but instead, there was infrastructure letting the site continue to move forward, there were people owning, maintaining, and investing in various pieces of the new, JVM infrastructure...and that created the space for some really incredible innovation. there's a balance here, of course, as too much slack can lead to a lot of inefficiency, a lot of design by committee, a lot of gamesmanship as engineers try to game the promotion system instead of doing what's good for the company...but if you run everyone too intensely and force them to think too narrowly, innovation in product or infrastructure becomes impossible. and of course, the exact people you want to stay are the ones who will have the easiest time leaving.

in pure speculation, I imagine space x and tesla can "handle" musk's style of leadership because the "product" is, conceptually, much clearer: making a car. making rockets. what they need to do is fairly straightforward. of course, those companies also have their own serious issues...and there are also other technical leaders who have been essential to saving them from musk, and whose work musk relentlessly takes credit for. and even now, we see with tesla how musk's style of company starts to get into serious issues, because crunch cannot solve the fundamental issues brewing under the surface as overworked, overestressed, poorly incentivized engineers stack hack on hack on hack until one day, your cars start catching on fire.

still, I do think that twitter is a fundamentally different beast than musk is used to, and it doesn't "help" him that he doesn't have a strong team of engineering leaders whose work he can steal. his product vision is laughable, his technical prowess is laughable, and he is "chief twit" surrounded by sycophants and yes men.
posted by wooh at 1:37 AM on November 1, 2022 [78 favorites]

Handbasket, meet hellscape.

@jackiedavalos1 [Bloomberg]: "NEW: A wide swath of Twitter's trust & safety team had access to content moderation/enforcement tools frozen last week. Usually, hundreds of people on the team could remove posts w/misinfo, hate speech etc. It's now down to 15 people. Scoop w/ @KurtWagner8 @daveyalba @EdLudlow"
posted by Buntix at 1:54 AM on November 1, 2022 [6 favorites]

@wooh

From the perspective of someone else working in tech, more than once at the edges of problem spaces dealing with outsized scaling issues, yeah, 100%. It's not that the basic functionality is complicated, it's that the implementation at this scale pushes all sorts of limits in underlying technology which are invisible to smaller scale problems.

Whenever your problem space's requirements begin to fit more and more poorly into the obvious abstractions of the tech stack available, the solutions get much harder. This is because it becomes necessary to decompose or recast the problem into a form that can be solved with the available tools. Often this means dropping down levels of abstraction.

Consider the problem of writing early video games. Today a 2d game would have libraries and sprite objects and coordinate systems. In 1979, a 2d game had memory maps and optimized arithmetic routines to pick preshifted bytes to copy to correct memory locations and self-modifying code and cycle counting.

Given Twitter's scale, I expect there's an enormous amount of struggle and effort at maintaining eventually-consistent data sets in real-time with as little lag as possible so that arbitrarily-forming sets of users have the sense they're in the same place at the same time no matter how far apart they are or how recently they connected. And all those connections and interactions then feed into constantly updating ad and interest profiles.

The effort of building, modifying and operating a solution that is very different from the imagined problem is hard to get a feel for unless you've suffered through it.
posted by allium cepa at 3:46 AM on November 1, 2022 [10 favorites]

if management is good and incentives generally aligned (a gigantic if!), in my personal opinion you want a bit of slack in your eng org.

That was the thinking behind Google's fabled 20% time. You had a cool idea, you could put some spare cycles into it. Then maybe add a few others who liked it. Then a show and tell could turn it into a full project.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 5:40 AM on November 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

Looks like the layoff number is 25%.
posted by clawsoon at 5:49 AM on November 1, 2022 [2 favorites]

Fantastic comment, wooh, flagged as such.
posted by clawsoon at 5:57 AM on November 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

Looks like the layoff number is 25%.

That's the first round.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 6:33 AM on November 1, 2022

Thursday, Oct 27: Twitter's CCO (head of ad sales) tweets

Had a great discussion with @elonmusk last evening! Our continued commitment to brand safety for advertisers remains unchanged. Looking forward to the future!

Tuesday, Nov 1: an update

Hi folks, I wanted to share that I resigned on Friday from Twitter and my work access was officially cut off last night.

posted by Nelson at 6:57 AM on November 1, 2022 [39 favorites]

^ I assume from this update it means they spent Friday through Monday doing whatever they pleased with their work access.
posted by some loser at 7:14 AM on November 1, 2022

That'd be delicious but sadly, no

While uncertain how many there would be, I spent my last few days at the company continuing that commitment. And I want everyone to know I do believe the new administration understands the importance of holding up the standards of GARM.

Imagine publicly bending the knee to your new shitty boss, then being pushed out the next day, then a few days later tweeting nice things about the new boss. If you can imagine doing that, you may have a future career in sales!

(at least GARM is safe.)
posted by Nelson at 7:44 AM on November 1, 2022 [7 favorites]

at least GARM is safe

So Say We All!
posted by jclarkin at 7:54 AM on November 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

GARM
posted by Artw at 7:57 AM on November 1, 2022

Twitter should simply move to a Something Awful model for its user flair.

$5, and you can change your own profile avatar and name icons, such as a Verified blue check.
$10, and you can change someone else's.
Don't pay anything, and your profile avatar becomes a drooling wombat and your name gets changed to "please pour cottage cheese into my butt hole."
posted by delfin at 8:00 AM on November 1, 2022 [6 favorites]

Let’s face it that’s the default assumption for where they are going.

Or 4/8chan.
posted by Artw at 8:04 AM on November 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

WaPo links:

Musk mulls Twitter verification charge, barters with Stephen King on fee

King lambasted the idea of requiring payment, tweeting to his almost 7 million followers on Monday: “They should pay me. If that gets instituted, I’m gone like Enron,” he said, alluding to the energy company that collapsed in scandal and filed for bankruptcy.
In response, Musk suggested that charging for verification would help the site to make a profit and appeared to barter with King, tweeting: “We need to pay the bills somehow! Twitter cannot rely entirely on advertisers. How about $8?”
“I will explain the rationale in longer form before this is implemented. It is the only way to defeat the bots & trolls,” Musk added. King did not reply.

Musk tweeted an employee’s Slack message.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:13 AM on November 1, 2022 [7 favorites]

Imagine publicly bending the knee to your new shitty boss, then being pushed out the next day, then a few days later tweeting nice things about the new boss. If you can imagine doing that, you may have a future career in sales!

There was at least one site reporting Friday that she'd been fired and didn't just resign. I may have seen the link in the Verge's reporting, if I may infer because they've now issued a correction:

Correction November 1st, 10AM ET: An earlier version of this story said there was a report Sarah Personette was among the executives fired on the evening of October 27th. This was not correct, in fact, she resigned on October 28th. We regret the error.

(at least GARM is safe.)

Won't somebody please think of the GARM. (The Verge's update includes an explanatory GARM link. "GARM is the Global Alliance for Responsible Media, a cross-industry initiative established by the World Federation of Advertisers to address the challenge of harmful content on digital media platforms and its monetization via advertising.")
posted by fedward at 9:29 AM on November 1, 2022 [5 favorites]

So pretty much everything Elon was kicking against when he got the dumb idea to buy the thing.
posted by Artw at 10:20 AM on November 1, 2022

This problem seems obvious to everybody but Elon. He wants shitposters (like himself) to have free rein, he seems to like hanging out in the part of the Venn diagram where "libertarians" and fascists find common cause, and he clearly either doesn't understand the harm caused by hate speech and violent rhetoric or doesn't care because the people being "trolled" aren't his own in-group. Meanwhile he's bought into a company that has multiple conflicting laws to follow and relies on revenue from advertisers who may seek literally any other platform lest their ads be seen as supporting the hate speech and violent rhetoric he doesn't want to have to moderate. Basically the parts of Twitter that are valuable are the parts that make it different from Parler. If he runs those parts off (which seems almost inevitable) he'll just end up with a very expensive version of Parler, but written in Scala so it supports a number of simultaneous users it'll never again reach.

On top of the moderation problem, he's added a billion dollars worth of debt service to the annual cost of running Twitter. Twitter's total annual cash flow last year (per the NYT article I linked above) was just $630 million. Just to make the debt payments they basically need to double that revenue. He's not going to cover that just by slashing payroll. And again, if he turns Twitter into Very Expensive, Scala-Flavored Parler, what advertisers are going to stick around? He needs a lot of new revenue and it's not going to come from a shrinking supply of advertisers, a sales team that no longer exists, or developers who leave for less stressful and/or more stable jobs.

What's he going to do, partner with sports leagues? The only one that might not take him to the cleaners is LIV (and again, that's dirty oil money). Most of the other sports leagues will be too afraid to run afoul of their existing broadcast partners or fan bases, and making partnerships still relies on having people in your sales teams who have the relationships and loose connections that make that sort of deal happen. If he fires all the sales people or they simply leave for greener pastures, who's going to be left to bring in new partnerships, and how valuable will those partnerships even be? Twitter isn't going to have a very strong negotiating position in those talks.
posted by fedward at 11:05 AM on November 1, 2022 [12 favorites]

Some people, when shown the cliff edge, turn away.

Others just floor the accelerator:

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.

You will also get:
- Priority in replies, mentions & search, which is essential to defeat spam/scam
- Ability to post long video & audio
- Half as many ads

Can't make this shit up, not nearly enough drugs in the world.
posted by NoxAeternum at 11:43 AM on November 1, 2022 [6 favorites]

Look, if I'm gonna pay $96 a year to be angry and stressed all the time, I'd rather spend it on, I dunno, video games that I can't play because of my middle-aged reflexes and arthritic thumbs.
posted by RakDaddy at 11:49 AM on November 1, 2022 [26 favorites]

For comparison, the existing Twitter Blue service costs $5/month and gives you a one-minute “undo” window, an improved thread view, and some minor customization features.
posted by mbrubeck at 1:05 PM on November 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

The grand mind of Elon has a couple of other selling points:

-paywall bypass for publishers (which, wouldn't they charge Twitter for that ability?)
-this will also give Twitter a revenue stream to reward content creators (wait, what?)
posted by nubs at 1:29 PM on November 1, 2022

The amount of money being wasted here is truly mind-bending.
posted by aramaic at 1:42 PM on November 1, 2022 [6 favorites]

paywall bypass for publishers (which, wouldn't they charge Twitter for that ability?)

That’s sort of similar to the business model for Scroll, which Twitter acquired last year. The idea is that news/content sites would partner with Twitter to provide ad-free (or paywall-free) access in exchange for a cut of the subscription fees. It’s another way to try to let users pay for content without a separate subscription for each site, sort of like Apple News+.
posted by mbrubeck at 1:43 PM on November 1, 2022

Power to the people! Blue for $8/month.

But also:

Price adjusted by country proportionate to purchasing power parity

I am sure no bad actors will take advantage of that.

I will admit that I have also in my life taken advantage of this classic white guy method of learning, where you throw out dumb ideas and wait for other people to think through the pros and cons for you.
posted by clawsoon at 1:45 PM on November 1, 2022 [3 favorites]

news/content sites would partner with Twitter to provide ad-free (or paywall-free) access

Ironically, Twitter discontinued that feature yesterday (specifically the ad-free thing). Or maybe they are just changing it? Hard to understand what the plan is for all the chaos. Also a lot of folks (including myself) are confused about $8/mo for a new Twitter Blue vs. paying $20/mo for verified status or whether those are the same thing.
posted by Nelson at 1:50 PM on November 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

Nelson: Also a lot of folks (including myself) are confused about $8/mo for a new Twitter Blue vs. paying $20/mo for verified status or whether those are the same thing.

There will be a secondary tag below the name for someone who is a public figure, which is already the case for politicians

Clear?
posted by clawsoon at 1:54 PM on November 1, 2022

This is glorious, it is like bull in a china shop except the china shop is one of the Canada Souveniers stores on Spadina and the bull is a toddler with a fish bat.
posted by seanmpuckett at 2:15 PM on November 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

I will admit that I have also in my life taken advantage of this classic white guy method of learning, where you throw out dumb ideas and wait for other people to think through the pros and cons for you.

Interesting, I had no idea this was commonly known to be a white thing. My first exposure to this learning style was not white, so I had no way to make the connection to race.
posted by some loser at 2:19 PM on November 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

It is a privileged caste / unmarked case thing. Here, that means white guys. Elsewhere it’ll mean something else.
posted by migurski at 2:36 PM on November 1, 2022 [12 favorites]

Yeah, it’s a strategy that works if you aren’t penalized for stupid and aren’t called on it if you claim someone else’s idea. I’ve known families where one brother could do it to another.
posted by clew at 3:14 PM on November 1, 2022 [4 favorites]

(Abel, Cain.)
posted by clew at 3:15 PM on November 1, 2022

I think you guys are being too hard on Elon. Twitter's definitely going to make him a millionaire!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 3:18 PM on November 1, 2022 [58 favorites]

My local Mastodon instance (mastodon.nz) has experienced a four-fold increase in new users over the past few days. I am sure other Mastodon sites are seeing similar growth. It seems a lot of people don't want to hang out with fascists on a site now owned by some weird billionaire.
posted by vac2003 at 3:26 PM on November 1, 2022 [5 favorites]

Trump is not dead but #TrumpisDead is currently trending on Twitter, apparently as some sort of protest to Musk or push back on the Pelosi jokes. It could equally well be a 4chan troll I suppose.
posted by roolya_boolya at 4:20 PM on November 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

My local Mastodon instance (mastodon.nz) has experienced a four-fold increase in new users over the past few days. I am sure other Mastodon sites are seeing similar growth. It seems a lot of people don't want to hang out with fascists on a site now owned by some weird billionaire.

God knows what the number for Mastodon.Social are, it was around 900% but it's becoming a little unstable with all the sign ups so I don't know if fresher numbers are out there.

Presumably some of those people will drop out and it'll scale to match whatever the new numbers are but right now it all feels a little wobbly.

(Possibly I should look for a new instance. Possibly they are all going to be like this with maybe less ability to scale)

Also, critically, some of those people are beginning to have conversations about things other than Twitter, and those interactions are not just dwindling out, so maybe some kind of threshold has been passed.
posted by Artw at 4:37 PM on November 1, 2022 [1 favorite]

The banks that lent Elon money to take over Twitter are admitting that they're in for a "huge" haircut
posted by roolya_boolya at 11:31 PM on November 1, 2022 [6 favorites]

On the tangent of leaving Twitter: in about 2 weeks my country will be having a general election. Long story short, voter disenfranchisement is systemic in ways much more basic than the US for example. One consequence of this environment is that people literally cannot vote by proxy unless you're one of the very few sectors within the civil service. Postal votes were just introduced but like the UK (uh, again) we won't know when is the election until it's announced, and our campaign period is a very generous 10 days to a month typically. A month is standard nowadays with postal voting introduced but votes must arrive on the day, there's no exceptions or using the postmark as criteria.

That means twitter and Facebook especially have been useful for coordinating because it works on weak links and i don't need to know these people after the elections is done. Coordinating as in: carpools, flight ticket sponsorship, piggybacking luggage space for overseas Malaysians etc.

I bring this up only because you know, whenever Facebook is being discussed on how much it's been destroying democracy, these days the typical (N. Am) mefite response has been, lol who's been using FB, or, you foolish sheeple, why are you using FB. It's only in the more recent discussions where this at least has more visible pushback.

I'm not saying don't consumer activist your way out of this, but what next? Inevitably very few of those who's publicly commented their satisfaction for leaving has much followed up if they've done other forms of civic action that could help. Out of sight, out of mind... Surely that's not a political strategy?

Anyway, a couple of tweets:
Hopewell Chin'ono: (Zimbabwean journo) Good morning @elonmusk

For a lot of journalists in Africa, verification has helped us to not fall victim to State tactics to use our names to spread propaganda.

I have been to jail 3 times inside 6 months for exposing corruption.

Few African journalists will afford the US$20.

Tim Wise: (via a RT from Dr Amina Wadud; i'm quoting partially from the thread) 6/ That day was the day I forever understood that Black people are possibly the only thing standing in the way of utter destruction. White folks, even liberal ones, will often fold up their tents and go home when it gets too difficult…
7/ But Black people cannot, by and large, do this. They have never been able to do this. They have to stay and fight no matter the cost. Now, back to the “Twexodus”…

8/ I can’t say it scientifically. Not even sure how to prove it quantitatively. But I can say that after much careful observation, the people threatening to jump ship (and from what I know those who have) have been overwhelmingly white…9/ Even as Black Twitter catches the most hell, deals with racism, misogynoir, all the things, all the time…they are here, fighting and refusing to concede this ground…

12/ To those white folks worried about Twitter toxicity. Please, AMERICA has been toxic for Black people for hundreds of years. If they can manage to fight on, survive and thrive despite it, you can deal with ugliness in your timeline.

Michael Harriot: (counterpoint-ish): It’s weird to hear people ask where everyone is going as if we GOTTA be on a social media site

Maybe Twitter is just a thing that happened, like AIM or MySpace or Democracy. Trust me—wherever we go, there’s gonna be some white people screaming “n------”

That’s in the Bible

I do think if you have the ability to do something you should. Just. Don't 'out of sight out of mind' us, that's all.
posted by cendawanita at 3:40 AM on November 2, 2022 [13 favorites]

The banks that lent Elon money to take over Twitter are admitting that they're in for a "huge" haircut

There's some interesting detail in the linked article at the FT:

The $12.7bn in debt has been split between a $6.7bn term loan, along with $3bn each of secured bonds and unsecured debt, obligations that are ultimately expected to be financed as fixed-rate bonds.

A sharp sell-off in credit markets has saddled banks with more than $35bn of debt from takeovers that they have been unable to sell to investors.

Big banks are currently left holding a number of bags of takeover debt they didn't plan to hold this long as a result of the market downturn, and while the Twitter debt is only one of the bags, it accounts for fully a third of the total unwanted debt they're carrying. Oopsie. The article ends by mentioning bankers' hopes that "a period of market stability could mitigate losses on the financing package that could stretch to $1bn." The way things look to me, losing only one billion on unsecured debt of three billion seems like a neat trick.
posted by fedward at 7:32 AM on November 2, 2022 [11 favorites]

Meanwhile, Elon Musk’s Twitter Faces Exodus of Advertisers and Executives (NYT):

At least five top Twitter executives — including the chief marketing officer, the chief customer officer, the head of people and diversity, and the head of product — have departed the company in recent days, according to seven people with knowledge of the matter and public statements. Two announced their departures on Twitter on Tuesday; they did not say why they had quit. More executives may leave, the people said.
…
IPG, one of the world’s largest advertising companies, issued a recommendation on Monday through its media agencies for clients to temporarily pause their spending on Twitter because of moderation concerns, three people with knowledge of the communication said. The Global Alliance for Responsible Media, a coalition of platforms, advertisers and industry groups that is fighting harmful content on social media, also said this week that it was monitoring how Twitter planned to deal with content moderation.

Warms the cockles of my cold, dead heart to see GARM pop up again, since two days ago I'd never even heard of it.
posted by fedward at 7:51 AM on November 2, 2022 [8 favorites]

Paused spending goes elsewhere in a hurry - gotta spend that budget! - and takes a long time to come back…
posted by Bottlecap at 7:55 AM on November 2, 2022 [1 favorite]

Right wing disinfo machine ran at a loss it is then…
posted by Artw at 7:56 AM on November 2, 2022 [1 favorite]

I assume the banks have some accounting shenanigans in mind for what otherwise appears to the the nonsensical decision to set a few billion dollars one fire.
posted by interogative mood at 8:08 AM on November 2, 2022 [2 favorites]

I guess I'm wondering, what does "fighting for Twitter" look like? My experience of that under the prior regime has been "wade into ugly threads, find something that crosses the threshold into maybe-actually-actionable by Twitter Safety, report it by attaching other tweets & explaining context in the form box to reduce the rate of it being auto-rejected; follow up by flagging that account red on the Eyes as applies"

Which, y'know, I didn't mind that *too* much when Trust & Safety was still at least mouthing words about moderation & occasionally acting like it. But given that sounds like it's being gotten rid of as one of Musk's top priorities... what sort of 'fight' is there to be had? Trying to rope Musk into "Ligma" jokes?
posted by CrystalDave at 8:26 AM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

Engaging always has been and always will be a mistake. I’ve done quite of bit of reporting in the past with some success and some declining success. My assumption now would be that it would be a complete waste of time or actually open you to some form of blowback.

That said there have been a LOT of suspensions lately, mostly because the dumber Nazis crawling out of the woodwork have zero shreds of subtlety about it and immediately start posting the N word or other slurs that are hard to deny.

Unclear how long they’ll bother suspending those.
posted by Artw at 8:43 AM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

My assumption now would be that it would be a complete waste of time

I think a real bellwedder/red flag here is that he is actively trying to weaken protection for trans people to make the place more hostile for them.

@chadloder: "BREAKING: Months after Elon Musk's ex-wife left him for a trans woman, Musk has completed his takeover of Twitter and immediately began pushing back against Twitter's policies prohibiting misgendering and deadnaming of trans people."

[image on tweet with alt text: "Musk has also asked the team to review Twitter's hateful conduct policy, according to the people, specifically a section that says users can be penalized for "targeted misgendering or deadnaming of transgender individuals."
In both cases, it is unclear if Musk wants the policies to be rewritten or the restrictions removed entirely."]

(Also worth noting his transgender daughter changed her surname and completely disowned him).

It's kind of reminding me of the fall of Stumbleupon, where the folks running it tried to pivot away from what made it work and in doing so drove away all the social keystone species peeps who were obsessively providing the content.

Anecdotally Mastodon seems to be hitting a critical mass (in terms of providing enough content to keep my ADHD brain clicking), particularly in terms of science people migrating.

It wasn't the company accounts and checkmarks that made Twitter, even though it was handy to have verified newsfeeds via them. Doubt they'll be enough to save the place if all the interesting people bail.
posted by Buntix at 9:34 AM on November 2, 2022 [4 favorites]

I had tended to think of Musk running Twitter like an unsafe driver who would inevitably wreck the car.

After his first few days in charge, I'm now thinking it's more like a maniac accelerating as he approaches a cliff.

I had thought we'd probably have three to six months before Twitter cratered and became an unbearable hellscape.

I'm wondering now if three to six weeks is optimistic.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:40 AM on November 2, 2022 [6 favorites]

I'm now thinking it's more like a maniac accelerating as he approaches a cliff. Same - looks like a complete clusterTruss
posted by sarble at 9:50 AM on November 2, 2022 [5 favorites]

I'm wondering now if three to six weeks is optimistic.

I said tomorrow it becomes a hellscape :P

That said, even I'm not sure how we define "hellscape" as someone who doesn't use it. It sounds like he's delaying a few weeks to let Trump back on, at the bare minimum.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:54 AM on November 2, 2022 [5 favorites]

This is actually the post-acquisition honeymoon, before any of the customer losses and damage to revenue become apparent. The real death spiral is probably at least 6-12 months away.
posted by ryanrs at 10:07 AM on November 2, 2022 [10 favorites]

Anecdotally Mastodon seems to be hitting a critical mass (in terms of providing enough content to keep my ADHD brain clicking), particularly in terms of science people migrating.

I seem to be somehow following a lot of astroscience nerds if you need any pointers.
posted by Artw at 10:11 AM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

RE: "lords & peasants" + "power to the people"

Someone with a lot of money thinks the greatest injustice is when something can't be bought with money.
posted by RobotHero at 10:16 AM on November 2, 2022 [14 favorites]

I have tried to get started on Mastodon twice and it has really highlighted the limits of my technical aptitude, because I did not get close to succeeding.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 10:32 AM on November 2, 2022 [6 favorites]

Seems like a good Ask, DirtyOldTown
posted by clew at 10:48 AM on November 2, 2022 [5 favorites]

There’s a reason half the bios I see have the words “software developer” in them, I think. Supposedly it is all becoming more friendly and embracing, though as mentioned above whenever something alarming happens at Twitter all the popular instances become unstable as fuck.
posted by Artw at 10:49 AM on November 2, 2022 [1 favorite]

I have tried to get started on Mastodon twice

(after checking) I've had an account since ~2017 on mastodon.social (or whatever it was back then).

Created a new one on the yesterday on mastodon.scot as I do like some local content.

And that there's the recommendation.

Join the node that most matches your interest and hit the local newsfeed first, and then if that gets slow the federated one.

I seem to be somehow following a lot of astroscience nerds if you need any pointers.

It was the astro and ento and archeo peeps all showing up (and with long form posts) that makes me think there could be a sea change. (No myco yet, but hope spawns eternal).
posted by Buntix at 11:00 AM on November 2, 2022 [2 favorites]

As someone who has never used Mastodon, I found this thread and the responses somewhat helpful in understanding the differences between Twitter and Mastodon. If nothing else, it highlights the fact that you shouldn't think of Mastodon as a Twitter clone, and if you do you'll end up disappointed. It sounds like it will serve the needs of some Twitter users, but not the needs of many others.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 11:02 AM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

The banks that lent Elon money to take over Twitter are admitting that they're in for a "huge" haircut

Then why did they lend him the money? There's nothing known now that wasn't either already known or knowable with a little homework.
posted by ctmf at 11:15 AM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

Is there a Metafilter Mastodon server? Should someone set one up?
posted by heathkit at 11:20 AM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

Then why did they lend him the money? There's nothing known now that wasn't either already known or knowable with a little homework.

I guess class solidarity is a hell of a drug.
posted by Artw at 11:21 AM on November 2, 2022 [2 favorites]

Agreed, Mastodon does some interesting things, but it seems like it's falling into a weird spot where its most vocal supporters are simultaneously going "Come over here, it's better!" and "But why would you have those issues/objections? It works for my use-case" reminiscent of the worst "Year of Linux on the Desktop" days.

When I've seen multiple people go "Why would you want DMs to be private? You should use Signal if you want privacy. Just think of DMs as more-private posts that instance admins can look into at any time!", I think there's a heavy enough disconnect that it'll be an uphill battle for me to want to wade through it.
posted by CrystalDave at 11:23 AM on November 2, 2022 [9 favorites]

You SHOULD use Signal if you want DMs to be private. You certainly should not trust them on Twitter or probably any Meta owned property.
posted by Artw at 11:32 AM on November 2, 2022 [5 favorites]

It's kind of reminding me of the fall of Stumbleupon, where the folks running it tried to pivot away from what made it work and in doing so drove away all the social keystone species peeps who were obsessively providing the content.

Ditto the very rapid decline of Digg, which basically killed itself with a bad redesign. Although commenters -- on Twitter, ironically -- have noted that in that case Reddit was a well-placed substitute to flee to; there aren't such immediately obvious substitutes for Twitter.

(Yes yes, Mastodon, but that seems to involve a great deal of Learning About Mastodon to even get started. I have to choose an instance to join? How do I make that choice? I'm sure there's guides out there but it's not frictionless and any kind of "oh, I don't know" hump to clear will keep some users from making the jump.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:53 AM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

One key bit of info about Mastodon instances is that it is a simple process to switch instances. There is software support for moving from one place to another and transferring all your follows/followers automatically. So there's no huge pressure to get it right the first time. Just pick one that's reasonably responsive given the load and sort it out from there.
posted by seanmpuckett at 11:55 AM on November 2, 2022 [2 favorites]

Speaking of private DMs... Musk and his inner circle have been plumbing archived messages in the systems, ostensibly looking for people to fire and budgets or projects to slash. This article is about Slack private messages, one of which Musk himself tweeted out a screenshot of. But it seems quite possible that Twitter DMs are now more likely to be read by random Twitter employees / owners than in the past. Not just new DMs either; Twitter keeps an archive of past messages.

Deleting Twitter DMs is effectively impossible. The web UI offers a way to delete them one message at a time. The mobile UI has them one conversation at a time. But all of these delete them for you only; the other side of the conversation still has a copy of the DM, and so therefore does Twitter and any Twitter employees / owners.

Twitter does offer full account deletion. You have to deactivate your account, wait 30 days, then they say they delete the data. Not sure what that means for DMs you sent to other people though. You'd think they would be more interested in good compliance with the GDPR and the CCPA.
posted by Nelson at 11:57 AM on November 2, 2022 [2 favorites]

> DirtyOldTown: "I'm wondering now if three to six weeks is optimistic."

Well, we're 6 days away from the US midterm elections and the Republican noise machine has already been ramping up the same election disinformation & denial playbook they ran in 2020. I'm sure Twitter under Ol' Elon's steady hand will be more than up to the task of.... well... uhhh... hmmm... I seem to have lost my train of thought there.
posted by mhum at 12:47 PM on November 2, 2022 [2 favorites]

Mike Masnick, Techdirt: Hey Elon: Let Me Help You Speed Run The Content Moderation Learning Curve
posted by tonycpsu at 12:56 PM on November 2, 2022 [5 favorites]

The Masnick article has its own FPP here: You own a social network. Isn’t it fun?
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 1:01 PM on November 2, 2022 [2 favorites]

MeFi's own cstross learns the hard way why you don't give Elon ideas.
posted by NoxAeternum at 1:40 PM on November 2, 2022 [13 favorites]

MeFi's own cstross learns the hard way why you don't give Elon ideas.

lol

looooool
posted by clawsoon at 1:54 PM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

Musk is the guy who read "A Modest Proposal" and responded "Some good ideas here", isn't he?
posted by clawsoon at 1:57 PM on November 2, 2022 [10 favorites]

Just think how MeFi's Own Adrian Hon (and erstwhile Transition Team contributor) feels about it.
posted by cortex at 2:01 PM on November 2, 2022 [11 favorites]

Good link, Winnie the Proust.

Although I was reading it with disquiet leaking into fright because it was so clearly describing "convenient for journalists" centralized into "terrifying security hole". Journalism is having a hard enough time with the previous collapse of the advertising market and here comes the next one.

Like, now I want the various journalists’ professional associations to stand up ActivityPub servers optimized for journalists. Let them variously specialize in identity verification and protection, talk a lot to each other, the rest of the world can read/federate with them. (That’s one of the nascent things that Mastodon is an example of - servers that specialize in different kinds of content but parts of them talk to each other gracefully.)
posted by clew at 2:31 PM on November 2, 2022 [6 favorites]

Like, now I want the various journalists’ professional associations to stand up ActivityPub servers optimized for journalists.

Interesting. Kind of like how the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists has effectively built its own more responsible version of Wikileaks?
posted by clawsoon at 2:36 PM on November 2, 2022 [1 favorite]

I don't understand why Elon doesn't just put Twitter on the blockchain in order to fix everything.
posted by srboisvert at 2:48 PM on November 2, 2022 [13 favorites]

The banks that lent Elon money to take over Twitter are admitting that they're in for a "huge" haircut

Then why did they lend him the money? There's nothing known now that wasn't either already known or knowable with a little homework.

Banks are gamblers.
posted by srboisvert at 2:52 PM on November 2, 2022

Buying a company for 44 times total revenue is an impressive (-ly bad) gamble.
posted by clawsoon at 2:55 PM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

I have emailed ICIJ suggesting the build-their-own Twitter idea. Seems unlikely that they'll even read my message, but worth a shot.
posted by clawsoon at 2:58 PM on November 2, 2022

Buying a company for 44 times total revenue is an impressive (-ly bad) gamble.

Oops, I was wrong. I was looking at quarterly revenue. The purchase price was closer to 10 times yearly revenue.
posted by clawsoon at 4:26 PM on November 2, 2022 [4 favorites]

From Bloomberg, "Musk Plans to Eliminate Half of Twitter Jobs in Cost-Cut Drive":

Elon Musk plans to eliminate about 3,700 jobs at Twitter Inc., or half of the social media company’s workforce, in a bid to drive down costs following his $44 billion acquisition, according to people with knowledge of the matter.

Twitter’s new owner aims to inform affected staffers Friday, said the people, who requested anonymity discussing non-public plans. Musk also intends to reverse the company’s existing work-from-anywhere policy, asking remaining employees to report to offices -- though some exceptions could be made, the people said.

Hm, didn't Elon give like a one week deadline to implement that whole $20 $8 per month verification badge fee thing? I wonder if you were given that assignment and knew that around half the company was getting fired by the end of the week, how hard would you really be working to complete the task?

Oh, there's also this (emph. added):

Senior personnel on the product teams were asked to target a 50% reduction in headcount, a person familiar with the matter said this week. Engineers and director-level staff from Tesla reviewed the lists, the person said. Layoff lists were drawn up and ranked based on individuals’ contributions to Twitter’s code during their time at the company, the people said. The assessment was made by both Tesla personnel and Twitter managers.

Deffo would love to be evaluated by random jagoffs from Tesla who were parachuted in less than a week ago and who likely have no idea about Twitter's software architecture.
posted by mhum at 6:07 PM on November 2, 2022 [10 favorites]

This is the best "rebuild the Argo while it's sailing" epic I have ever seen.
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:15 PM on November 2, 2022 [5 favorites]

Here's a somewhat relevant thread on the destruction of SomethingAwful. Spoiler alert - giving in to the free speech crowd. I found it interesting that they were another big strict moderation forum. I had always thought from peeking in sometimes it was more of an 'anything goes' kind of a place.
posted by ctmf at 6:43 PM on November 2, 2022 [11 favorites]

Here's a somewhat relevant thread on the destruction of SomethingAwful.

a bunch of people rallying around an idealized vision of the past just fucking ruined it for everyone else while providing nothing of value in return.

Relevant. To... everything, pretty much?
posted by clawsoon at 6:58 PM on November 2, 2022 [11 favorites]

Something Awful has undergone a great many changes. There was a user revolt and Lowtax was overthrown. The site is under new management now.
posted by ryanrs at 7:16 PM on November 2, 2022 [1 favorite]

"Musk also intends to reverse the company’s existing work-from-anywhere policy, asking remaining employees to report to offices"

Hahahahahaha fuck off. And also, like literally this week there's been a ton of breathless reporting on the biggest drop in American productivity since records began, and many (most?) economists are correlating it to REQUIRING PEOPLE TO RETURN TO THE OFFICE. I was literally in a (remote) meeting about this this morning where senior people were going over the reports and analyses and deciding that not only was the evidence compelling (verging on overwhelming) that people worked better when given the choice to be at home or at the office, but that only bad managers NEEDED people to return to the office -- because they don't know what their people are actually supposed to be doing, and so can't manage them other than by requiring butts-in-seats-for-8-hours. And that requiring return-to-office (without a very strong reason!) is a sign of dangerously clueless management who don't know what their people do or how to manage or measure it.

(Now, some teams within my org are meeting in the office weekly. And other teams in my org are going in person NEVER. But that's left up to the teams and what they find effective and efficient!)

How will Twitter retain talent when Google and Meta and Amazon allow permanent remote?

Also I have a friend of 30 years who's an engineer at Tesla and I don't know if he's been imported to Twitter, but his totally benign work-related posts are always kinda, "Dude, what is going on at your workplace?" Also he's been very open that when Tesla gets particularly fucked up about something, all the engineers start working on something they can patent, both because Tesla pays them a (very small) bonus for patenting something ($1500 I think he got), and because having four patents on their resume makes them much more hire-able. The patents are owned by Tesla but don't have to be related to ANYTHING TESLA DOES. Every time Musk loses focus and/or tells the Tesla engineers to do something random and/or stops managing his companies at all, the engineers all start inventing minor-but-patentable inventions that they can "afford" to give to Tesla in exchange for the prestige of having another patent. Because Musk rewards them for patents NO MATTER HOW UNRELATED TO TESLA and counts it towards promotion, AND beacuse when Musk takes off on a wild hare, the incentive is to get patents, not improve Teslas. Because he doesn't actually know what improves Teslas, but patents are sexy. So you could work on AI that runs into pedestrians 1% less often, which is HARD and not sexy and will be ignored, ORRRRRR you could get a patent for some random minor improvement on some random thing, and get promoted even if it's not related to Tesla, because PATENT!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:17 PM on November 2, 2022 [26 favorites]

That better be $1500 per patent application, because getting a patent granted takes forever.

But the real key is the co-inventor bonus. At Apple, it was $1500 per person, up to 3-4. Which meant that you could chat with a coworker about a patent over lunch, add them as a co-inventor, and put $1500 in their pocket. If your direct manager encouraged people to file 1 patent/quarter, everyone goes home with over $10k in patent bonuses each year.
posted by ryanrs at 7:44 PM on November 2, 2022 [4 favorites]

...but I guess I also don't understand how you could patent any random bullshit.

At Apple, a "patent application" was basically a knowledge transfer from a software engineer to a patent attorney. The patent attorneys had a pretty good technical background and they had to actually understand the invention. Not the gory implementation details, but the inputs, algorithm, the reason it's useful and novel, etc.

Come to think of it, I don't know if Apple officially required patents to be related to your day job, but I guess I just kinda assumed so? The thing is, with enough lawyers, you can patent most anything even slightly interesting. I expect it's actually less work to just patent the crap you are already working on full time. That's what my group did.
posted by ryanrs at 8:02 PM on November 2, 2022 [2 favorites]

Twitter is going to go bankrupt and be sold in a firesale. The question is how long that takes to materialize, and just how distressed the sale will be.

So I hope everyone loves Twitter: A Salesforce Company.

Trying to think of who the likely buyers would be: Salesforce, Amazon, Google, Meta, Microsoft...who else has 5-20Billion to spend on a social media boondoggle? I'm sure they exist, just wondering who will have access to all our data after musk drives the platform into the ground...
posted by wooh at 8:04 PM on November 2, 2022 [6 favorites]

Yahoo!
posted by ryanrs at 8:09 PM on November 2, 2022 [11 favorites]

I have no specific information about Tesla patenting, but there have definitely been large tech companies that didn’t distinguish between patent applications and patents granted.

Guess what they ended up subsidizing to huge expense? Their outside law firm fucking loved them. Still do love them, albeit at a reduced rate.
posted by aramaic at 8:24 PM on November 2, 2022 [1 favorite]

You can't base employee compensation on patents granted, it takes too long. The time to grant a patent is longer than the average length of employment at many tech companies.
posted by ryanrs at 8:35 PM on November 2, 2022 [1 favorite]

Seriously, options vest faster than patent applications.
posted by ryanrs at 8:36 PM on November 2, 2022

just wondering who will have access to all our data after musk drives the platform into the ground...

All I have to say is, may whatever "data" they they manage to squeeze out of my silly random joke posts (which is literally all I post there) do them much good.
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:10 PM on November 2, 2022

You can't base employee compensation on patents granted, it takes too long.

Hahahaha! It takes too long? Welcome to large midwestern tech firms with government contracts. You are dedicated, aren’t you? Of course you are, that’s why you’re going to wait, right? You do want to be employable, right?

Right?
posted by aramaic at 9:25 PM on November 2, 2022 [1 favorite]

I've worked at places that gave $1000 for patent applications and $1000 for grants - writing them is excruciating, partly because patent lawyers write in another language with words that seem similar but have subtly different meanings, it even has variables, arrays, loops and recursion
posted by mbo at 10:17 PM on November 2, 2022 [1 favorite]

More evidence for the “patents are garbage and shouldn’t exist” theory.
posted by Artw at 11:22 PM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

who else has 5-20Billion to spend on a social media boondoggle?

Clearly it's going to eventually be Pinboard. Just need to knock a few more zeros off that price first...
posted by vibratory manner of working at 11:27 PM on November 2, 2022 [3 favorites]

Greg_Ace: All I have to say is, may whatever "data" they they manage to squeeze out of my silly random joke posts (which is literally all I post there) do them much good.

My impression is that they gather data from everything you do on the site. Every friend you have, everything you click on, everything you hover over, every spot on your timeline that you pause on or scroll past.
posted by clawsoon at 4:07 AM on November 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

This Twitter stupidity instantiates a trope that probably goes back centuries —

Unfun rich guy buys struggling hangout.
When it fails, he has gained no friends or insight.
posted by Glomar response at 5:40 AM on November 3, 2022 [8 favorites]

My impression is that they gather data from everything you do on the site.

I repeat, good luck with that.
posted by Greg_Ace at 8:51 AM on November 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

Is there a Metafilter Mastodon server? Should someone set one up?

This might be a MetaTalk thing, but I'd be all about a Metafilter Mastodon instance. But if it were to happen, I think it should be official, and live under the actual metafilter.com domain, not an 'unofficial' thing. Because the key selling point IMO would be the guaranteed 1:1 mapping of someone's Metafilter username to their name on Mastodon. Doesn't really make sense to me otherwise.

But I think that's the model for growing Mastodon into something that can at least partially replace Twitter. Affinity groups like Metafilter need to be able to easily and inexpensively (in both hardware and maintenance costs) set up an instance for their own users, control federation with like-minded instances, implement their own TOS, policies, and general etiquette, etc.

The federated-service model looks like it's capable of scaling pretty well, although there are usability wrinkles (what shows up in the 'Federated' feed on your local instance, just f.ex., is totally not obvious).

a vaguely technical person can make a twitter prototype in a weekend. this is absolutely true. but how many people can use it? with every order of magnitude more of users, systems that you used to be able to take for granted start falling over. this is exactly what happened to twitter...

wooh, thanks for the fantastic comment and response.

I don't have the inside knowledge of Twitter that you do, so I defer to your expertise in terms of what things were like inside the company. But I would push back gently on the claim that "a lot of now commoditized technologies in data, message queues, RPC, pretty much anything you choose...did not exist".

They might not have existed in the sense that they were familiar to web developers but those technologies certainly existed in the marketplace more generally. Yes, Twitter handles a lot of messages. But there are lots of other systems that do similar volume and have for a while. The basic challenge of Twitter isn't that far off from an OLTP system.

IIRC, Twitter at one point during its scaling difficulties was processing about 6,000 tweets/second. That's a lot... for a web app built on a web app framework like Rails. It's not that big for an actual backend business application. SABRE handles in excess of 100,000 transactions per second. I'm not sure exactly when it hit 6,000 TPS, but it was reportedly doing about 1M transactions per business day in 1978.

I always found the "how would you rebuild Twitter if someone put a gun to your head" to be an interesting intellectual exercise, but I've always thought that if presented with that problem, I wouldn't fire up an IDE... I'd pick up a telephone. Call IBM, call STAR, call Pulse... this is not a green-field technical problem.

That's what I think a lot of the frustration in the non-web-centric technical community was driven by: Twitter seemed determined to ignore the existence of, like, 30 years of prior art and industry experience, because... web? I guess? I dunno.
posted by Kadin2048 at 11:42 AM on November 3, 2022 [10 favorites]

"if you think your life has taken a turn for the worse, spare a thought for the guy who started out swearing he'd colonise Mars for humanity and is currently out here on social media begging everyone to give him 8 bucks for a blue tick icon"
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:51 AM on November 3, 2022 [14 favorites]

Did Elon Musk Tamper With AOC's Twitter Feed After She Criticized Him?
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:58 AM on November 3, 2022 [3 favorites]

I always found the "how would you rebuild Twitter if someone put a gun to your head" to be an interesting intellectual exercise, but I've always thought that if presented with that problem, I wouldn't fire up an IDE... I'd pick up a telephone. Call IBM, call STAR, call Pulse... this is not a green-field technical problem.

I'm not sure I'd have called any of those. The banking system relies on batch processing with a fallback onto fees when the batched updates create a race condition. SABRE may handle a lot of transactions, but it still shows you stale inventory and allows you to book a seat that's no longer available, because, again, it's relying on batch processing for inventory updates. Twitter's design problem was that you could have near-real-time performance locally up to a certain threshold or you could have something broadly distributed that maybe didn't work in real time. They needed near-real-time performance that was also broadly distributed, in a model that required eventual consistency between all those distributed nodes and didn't misbehave too much when distribution lagged. If I have that problem I'm not calling the people who take my credit card number and then say, "oh, that seat you wanted isn't available, but do you want to pay $60 more for it now, Y/Y?."
posted by fedward at 12:05 PM on November 3, 2022 [5 favorites]

Oops, I was wrong. I was looking at quarterly revenue. The purchase price was closer to 10 times yearly revenue.

Their most recent report included an $800 million+ lawsuit settlement payout to their shareholders for lying about their growth so that might also affect the numbers. But then maybe they will make a near billion settlement every year at the rate they are going so the most recent annual number might be a decent predictor.
posted by srboisvert at 5:31 PM on November 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

I think a bigger predictor of Twitter's eventual demise than Musk being in charge is that the Saudis are heavily invested. They are truly spectacular at setting money on fire with bad investments.
posted by srboisvert at 5:36 PM on November 3, 2022 [2 favorites]

There's a whole lot of reporting today about how much chaos and misery there is inside Twitter. No official communications from management since Musk took over. 50% layoffs happening tomorrow. Folks working 20 hours a day, being threatened with firing if they are an hour late on a deadline. It's all just awful.
posted by Nelson at 5:40 PM on November 3, 2022 [6 favorites]

50% layoffs happening tomorrow.

on that note, NYT reporting Elon Musk Begins Layoffs at Twitter:

Twitter employees were notified in a company-wide email that the layoffs were set to begin, according to a copy of the message seen by The New York Times. About half the company’s workers appeared set to lose their jobs, according to internal messages and an investor, though the final count may take time to become clear. The email instructed Twitter employees to go home and not return to the offices on Friday as the cuts proceeded.

"Stay home and wait to hear if you still have a job" sounds like a *shitty* way to be laid off.

(The cynic in me notes that this is probably to side-step providing the press with a photogenic, and interviewable, stream of laid-off workers leaving Twitter offices.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 5:59 PM on November 3, 2022 [7 favorites]

WaPo has more detail on the emails:

The email kicked off an anxious wait for many employees, who would not find out immediately whether they would be affected. Instead, it said that by 9 a.m. Pacific time Friday, workers would receive an email with the subject line: “Your Role at Twitter.”



Those keeping their jobs would be notified on their company email. Those losing them would be told via their personal email.

How stressful. I once got laid off when I was on vacation. I came home and my VPN endpoint and desk phone had blinking lights, and I couldn’t log into webmail. I guess if your work email won’t let you log in, you know without checking your personal account.
posted by fedward at 6:09 PM on November 3, 2022 [5 favorites]

Musk orders Twitter to find $1 billion in infrastructure savings

A number suspiciously close to the $1 billion in interest now owed by twitter on the debt used to finance the buyout. Slashing infrastructure and cutting staff by 50%, he’s just destroying the company out of spite that they called his bluff about buying it
posted by dis_integration at 6:44 PM on November 3, 2022 [8 favorites]

A fun aspect of the hellride to come is that the revised checkmark will have no user verification associated with it. It's no longer "this person is whom they claim to be," it's merely "I spent money on this." There will be an interim period in which existing verified accounts and pay-for-blue accounts will have the same flair.

"Want to call yourself Citibank Password Verification? Here's your blue tick, thanks for the $8. Want to say you're the Democratic Party of Wisconsin and announce you're abolishing the police? $8. Call yourself WXBM Local News Arkansas and invent a school shooting? Yours for $8. Oh, and this will launch the day before the US midterms."
posted by delfin at 7:02 PM on November 3, 2022 [16 favorites]

Musk orders Twitter to find $1 billion in infrastructure savings

Leveraged buyouts are so dumb. So, so, so dumb.
posted by clawsoon at 7:05 PM on November 3, 2022 [9 favorites]

Kind of hoping this finally kills them.

I know, I know.
posted by Artw at 7:22 PM on November 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

tbf they won't need so much infrastructure as the user pop declines
posted by ryanrs at 7:23 PM on November 3, 2022 [3 favorites]

"Want to call yourself Citibank Password Verification? Here's your blue tick, thanks for the $8. Want to say you're the Democratic Party of Wisconsin and announce you're abolishing the police? $8. Call yourself WXBM Local News Arkansas and invent a school shooting? Yours for $8. Oh, and this will launch the day before the US midterms."

Am I missing something or is this no different than the current set up? I know I’ve seen plenty of people with blue checks who change their handle to a “spooky” name around Halloween or comedians like Jaboukie Young-White or Patti Harrison who change it to the name of a particularly awful brand or politician and tweet out something hilariously offensive. (Of course, they almost always receive temporary suspensions, but the capability still exists.)
posted by Atom Eyes at 7:28 PM on November 3, 2022

Many have to work pretty hard to get a blue check under the current system. If you choose to act badly after that point, you can. But $8 no-questions blue checks will make it trivial to shit-and-run with throwaway accounts that look somewhat authentic.
posted by delfin at 8:16 PM on November 3, 2022 [6 favorites]

Twitter's dies irae has arrived, with half the company on the chopping block:

Team,
In an effort to place Twitter on a healthy path, we will go through the difficult process of reducing our global workforce on Friday. We recognize that this will impact a number of individuals who have made valuable contributions to Twitter, but this action is unfortunately necessary to ensure the company’s success moving forward.

Given the nature of our distributed workforce and our desire to inform impacted individuals as quickly as possible, communications for this process will take place via email. By 9AM PST on Friday Nov. 4th, everyone will receive an individual email with the subject line: Your Role at Twitter. Please check your email, including your spam folder.

If your employment is not impacted, you will receive a notification via your Twitter email.
If your employment is impacted, you will receive a notification with next steps via your personal email.

If you do not receive an email from twitter-hr@ by 5PM PST on Friday Nov. 4th, please email [e-mail].

To help ensure the safety of each employee as well as Twitter systems and customer data, our offices will be temporarily closed and all badge access will be suspended. If you are in an office or on your way to an office, please return home.

We acknowledge this is an incredibly challenging experience to go through, whether or not you are impacted. Thank you for continuing to adhere to Twitter policies that prohibit you from discussing confidential company information on social media, with the press or elsewhere.

We are grateful for your contributions to Twitter and for your patience as we move through this process.

Thank you.
Twitter

This is going to be an amazing shitshow.
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:59 PM on November 3, 2022 [10 favorites]

lawyers are already starting to circle. tweeps are making each other aware of their rights and of the law. musk of course has never cared about the law but I think he has gone way further than he can get away with, especially given a lot of people involved can afford lawyers, and a lot of lawyers are itching to get in on the action, given how flagrant he has been

I hope they flay him alive. probably won't make a dent in his largesse but certainly won't help
posted by wooh at 10:26 PM on November 3, 2022 [7 favorites]

Can't believe he just Thanos-snapped the company.
posted by rouftop at 10:34 PM on November 3, 2022 [10 favorites]

The cynic in me notes that this is probably to side-step providing the press with a photogenic, and interviewable, stream of laid-off workers leaving Twitter offices.

Maybe, but there are going to be coffee shops (and bars) full of maybe-ex Twitter workers sitting around tomorrow, waiting for the emails to roll in like campaign workers on election night.

I don't think the press will have a hard time getting their B-roll.
posted by Kadin2048 at 10:58 PM on November 3, 2022 [6 favorites]

A lot of those fired are now posting on the #OneTeam tag. Many of them do seem to have found out when their work email (and other) logins failed to work. FWIW it seems Twitter may have actually been quite a nice place to work given the obvious sense of community. Guessing there could be a lot more resigning over the next year or so as that disappears.

It looks to me from those posting on the tag that it may be women getting axed preferentially, although whether that's due to the initial workforce makeup or other factors is hard to say.

If it were the case (and the chances of Musk being a misogynist are...?) then there's even more potential for a class action lawsuit:

@LisaBloom

Also, CA's strong antidiscrimination laws apply to Twitter's big layoff tomorrow. Are people of color, women and/or older workers disproportionately chosen, for example?

This was done so hastily, so slapdash, so that the world's richest man can get even richer faster.

(This entire thread is worth reading for the WARN act legal implications, as is this from @dogemperor)
posted by Buntix at 11:26 PM on November 3, 2022 [5 favorites]

Here is the WARN suit (archive):

Twitter Inc. was sued over Elon Musk’s plan to eliminate about 3,700 jobs at the social-media platform -- half of its workforce -- which workers say the company is doing without enough notice in violation of federal and California law.
A class-action lawsuit was filed Thursday in San Francisco federal court.

posted by migurski at 11:35 PM on November 3, 2022 [7 favorites]

WTAF.

Elon Musk, Under Financial Pressure, Pushes to Make Money From Twitter [NY Times]

One product team is working on paid direct messaging, which appears to be focused on Very Important Tweeters, or V.I.T.s, on the network, said the two people with knowledge of the work and according to the internal documents. According to the product mock-ups seen by The Times, users would be able to send private messages to their favorite celebrities for a nominal fee. A fee structure, which had not been set in stone, could be as little as a few dollars per direct message.

Of all the heinous ideas in social media tech Stalking as a Service has got to be one of the worst.
posted by Buntix at 12:09 AM on November 4, 2022 [12 favorites]

This is actually the post-acquisition honeymoon, before any of the customer losses and damage to revenue become apparent.

guess the honeymoon is over
posted by ryanrs at 12:25 AM on November 4, 2022 [5 favorites]

By 9AM PST on Friday Nov. 4th

Note: We're still in Daylight Savings Time until Nov. 6.
posted by mikelieman at 12:36 AM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

In reality, every Twitter employee is awake right now, watching coworkers drop off the internal slack groups in realtime.
posted by ryanrs at 12:41 AM on November 4, 2022 [7 favorites]

Twitter & the Saudi Arabian connection.
Alarm on Capitol Hill over Saudi investment in Twitter.
Possible access to users’ data could pose national security risk and could be used to target kingdom’s dissidents
posted by adamvasco at 3:01 AM on November 4, 2022 [2 favorites]

Alarm on Capitol Hill over Saudi investment in Twitter.
Possible access to users’ data could pose national security risk and could be used to target kingdom’s dissidents

Ah! So Musk is a patriot for destroying Twitter. Man, plot twists happen fast in these fucked-up timelines.
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 3:50 AM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

Can't believe he just Thanos-snapped the company.

Oh, the Musk fans have been posting memes along that vein since he took over - a photo of Thanos with Musk's face photoshopped on snapping his fingers, and then the "Twitter office" with a whole bunch of "crying liberal"s photoshopped in a row dissolving into dust, stuff like that.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:57 AM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

A sobering thread from actor Robert Kazinsky on verification:

Years ago, before verified accounts were a thing, back when I was on Eastenders, I was contacted multiple times by parents of children who had been “conversing” with me online. 11-15 year old children that had been talking with a fake me. I was informed one of these children went missing.

I didn’t have social media at the time, I didn’t understand it. It’s a horror show, for years people pushed for some way, to root out the fakes. There was a phase, if you remember, of people posting images of themselves with their URL. I did that on every site I could find, Facebook, myspace, Bebo, anything.

I felt powerless to stop people using my name and face to scam or groom people. That’s why verification came to be. Because it was important to protect people. It wasn’t for clout, or for leveraging money from a platform. It was to protect people from utter scumbags.

I think that perhaps, in this age of social media, there are some CEO’s who may have forgotten the importance of protecting people, of having trustworthy sources.

posted by clawsoon at 5:46 AM on November 4, 2022 [28 favorites]

Right at the end @dogemperor throws in how collect action is legal and protected federally and that firings targeting organisers are yet another actionable that can be used to beat new management with. If one of Musk's companies forms a union because of something like this i'm ging to laugh my ass off.
posted by Mitheral at 5:48 AM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

I have so much frustration and anger that I can't productively focus anywhere over rich people like Musk buying services I like with the sole purpose of destroying them for the sake of making more money added to an endless pot they could never spend in a single lifetime. Twitter is going down the drain and taking half of the staff with it, HBO Max's new boss gutted its animation projects and is going to smash Discovery+ programming into it that I will never watch and do not want and raise the price to accommodate the so-called "added value", it just goes on and on. I'm sick of it, and I'm just a customer. I can't imagine the rage of the staff. Someone gets to just parachute in and upend your life? Unconscionable (of course, if the wealthy had consciences, they wouldn't be wealthy).
posted by Servo5678 at 5:57 AM on November 4, 2022 [10 favorites]

An interesting thread here from @garius:

One of the things I occasionally get paid to do by companies/execs is to tell them why everything seemed to SUDDENLY go wrong, and subs/readers dropped like a stone.

So, with everything going on at Twitter rn, time for a thread about the Trust Thermocline /1

...

But with a lot of CONTENT products (inc social media) that's not actually how it works. Because it doesn't account for sunk-cost lock-in.

Users and readers will stick to what they know, and use, well beyond the point where they START to lose trust in it. And you won't see that.

But they'll only MOVE when they hit the Trust Thermocline. The point where their lack of trust in the product to meet their needs, and the emotional investment they'd made in it, have finally been outweighed by the physical and emotional effort required to abandon it.
At this point, I normally get asked something like:

"So if we undo the last few changes and drop the price, we get them back?"

And then I have to break the news that nope: that's not how it works.

Because you're past the Thermocline now. You can't make them trust you again.

...

[Truncated, quite a bit more on the thread itself.]

Quite curious as to what the 20 accounts he's watching are to try and detect the tipping point.

There's also a corollary thread here from @PennyOaken about how a bunch of RW saboteurs tried, and failed, to cause a similar collapse of trust at Reddit.
posted by Buntix at 6:28 AM on November 4, 2022 [14 favorites]

Of all the heinous ideas in social media tech Stalking as a Service has got to be one of the worst.

Given how fucking seedy this is, perhaps it's fitting that Elon's ideas increasingly remind me, more than anything, of noted thirteen-year-old's-idea-of-a-strip-club social network FetLife.

It's an open secret that, while FetLife presents itself as a "community for kinky people" for reputation-laundering purposes, its actual money comes from paid memberships that let users watch amateur porn videos and get more access to "top" content, which is more-or-less just more vanilla porn. Its main draw to (primarily-male) consumers is that, because this is a "social network," all those amateur porn stars will totally be your friend and sleep with you—and on the flip side, it doesn't even have to pay its "performers," who voluntarily make content for the same reasons that lets Instagram psychologically bully people into doing yoga poses on lake docks. It's this amazingly gross human-harvesting operation that grooms and packages its own users up to sell to the worst kinds of people in the world. (Not surprisingly, this leads to actual abduction more often than feels plausible.)

The difference is that Twitter's most famous users are... I dunno... rich, famous, and accustomed to a modicum of dignity? While I love Elon's being too stupid to keep "you're the product being sold" quiet enough that the would-be product doesn't hear him saying it, I'm trying to work out how on earth he thinks he'll retain users if this shit ever happens. Not even celebs on Cameo will put up with something this hideously exploitative. Not even if he plans to pay them, which lol let's be real he 100% will not.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 6:32 AM on November 4, 2022 [6 favorites]

It strikes me that one of the reasons that Twitter, despite being a relatively small social network, gets as much press coverage as it does is that the verification system makes it easy for reporters. They know the quotes they're using came from a verified source, so they don't have to check.

Destroying the verification system means that you can't just quote someone famous who said something on Twitter anymore without ascertaining that it really was them. Which means a lot less press for Twitter moving forward.
posted by MrVisible at 6:59 AM on November 4, 2022 [20 favorites]

Dear Twitter Advertisers part 2:

@elonmusk: Twitter has had a massive drop in revenue, due to activist groups pressuring advertisers, even though nothing has changed with content moderation and we did everything we could to appease the activists.

Extremely messed up! They’re trying to destroy free speech in America.
posted by Artw at 8:55 AM on November 4, 2022 [5 favorites]

Musk hates Twitter more than I do, and is destroying it more ruthlessly than I could have.

This feels so strange.
posted by ryanrs at 9:11 AM on November 4, 2022 [10 favorites]

There's a few True Believers still working at Twitter, or at least folks willing to posture to keep their jobs. From Wednesday, there's a manager tweeting photos of her sleeping at the office. (Read the whole thread + husband's endorsement for more). Today there's a leaked Slack message to her team

I recognize this is a crazy moment where Tweeps are losing access and the layoff is in progress... so it's totally understandable if you can't make it to the standup tonight... we'll be on at 9:30PM (in 15 mins.)

posted by Nelson at 9:12 AM on November 4, 2022 [5 favorites]

Extremely messed up! They’re trying to destroy free speech in America.

Has any billionaire ever been more desperate for approval, or placed himself in a position where he was more likely to be skewered by the most vicious skewerers on the Internet?

I sincerely mean it when I say that I'm not positive Elon Musk's insane amounts of wealth or power is going to be able to protect him from the massive amounts of psychic damage he's about to take. This might literally break him.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 9:21 AM on November 4, 2022 [4 favorites]

Except, you underestimate the ability of a narcissist to find someone else to blame. It's already in the tweet: "activists."
posted by seanmpuckett at 9:25 AM on November 4, 2022 [11 favorites]

One product team is working on paid direct messaging, which appears to be focused on Very Important Tweeters, or V.I.T.s, on the network, said the two people with knowledge of the work and according to the internal documents. According to the product mock-ups seen by The Times, users would be able to send private messages to their favorite celebrities for a nominal fee. A fee structure, which had not been set in stone, could be as little as a few dollars per direct message.

PAY US $5 AND DONALD TRUMP HIMSELF WILL PERSONALLY RECEIVE* YOUR IMPORTANT MESSAGE!

* (For an additional $49,995, you become an exclusive TWITTER ULTRAPLATINUM CLUB member and he might actually READ it.)
posted by delfin at 9:25 AM on November 4, 2022 [1 favorite]

NYT: two Twitter employees at the time of the interview are interviewed on a podcast with disguised voices.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:29 AM on November 4, 2022 [1 favorite]

I sincerely mean it when I say that I'm not positive Elon Musk's insane amounts of wealth or power is going to be able to protect him from the massive amounts of psychic damage he's about to take. This might literally break him.

It's not nice to tease and get my hopes up. :(
posted by curious nu at 9:43 AM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

There's a few True Believers still working at Twitter, or at least folks willing to posture to keep their jobs. From Wednesday, there's a manager tweeting photos of her sleeping at the office. (Read the whole thread + husband's endorsement for more). Today there's a leaked Slack message to her team

Her defense of this is insane:

doing hard things requires sacrifice (time, energy, etc). I have teammates around the world who are putting in the effort to bring something new to life so it's important to me to show up for them & keep the team unblocked.

There is literally no need for this since the deadlines they're working against were just invented out of thin air by the man who financially destroyed the company by acquiring it. At companies like Twitter, the only deadlines are the self imposed ones or regulatory ones. For the regulatory ones, you should have lots of lead time to plan the work in a way that makes it manageable. For self-imposed ones, you can just *move them*. If you're making someone sleep in the office to rush out a new feature or product against an artificial deadline you're just doing it because you're an asshole. There's literally no other explanation. If it takes an extra week or two to build something, it literally makes no difference!
posted by dis_integration at 9:47 AM on November 4, 2022 [26 favorites]

>> Extremely messed up! They’re trying to destroy free speech in America.

> Has any billionaire ever been more desperate for approval, or placed himself in a position where he was more likely to be skewered by the most vicious skewerers on the Internet?

Yes, Trump.
Musk's recent tweet even sounds just like Trump.
posted by ryanrs at 9:51 AM on November 4, 2022 [9 favorites]

dis_integration: There is literally no need for this since the deadlines they're working against were just invented out of thin air by the man who financially destroyed the company by acquiring it.

It fits in nicely, though, with the utterly cynical career-advancing advice in Stealing the Corner Office. Never criticize people above you. When your company gets taken over, suck up to the new owners. During times of big change, be the person who jumps in and "solves" problems. (Be sure to move on to a new problem before the cracks show in your hastily assembled hack of a solution, though.) Let everybody know about all the things you're doing for the company - self-promote, self-promote, self-promote.
posted by clawsoon at 9:59 AM on November 4, 2022 [8 favorites]

Her defense of this is insane

TBF her husband has a .eth postfix username and a hex avatar. It's entirely possible they lost their life savings/kids' college fund not too long ago.

This really emphasises just how little Musk understands about creating a healthy, and hence productive, environment to create good code. Long hours and intense LOC-focused deadlines will just produce shit that will require an order(s) of magnitude more time to fix than it would have taken to write properly in the first place. He's like the boss who once did some COBOL on a weekend training course back in the 80's and refuses to accept that anything has changed.
posted by Buntix at 10:03 AM on November 4, 2022 [8 favorites]

Yeah TBH if you buy crypto you deserve to have some Musk type turn your job into some weird torturous excecise then fire you anyway, because that is the world you’re voting for.

But anyone normal there I have sympathy for and wish them well in whatever slacking or petty theft they get in before the whole thing collapses.
posted by Artw at 10:15 AM on November 4, 2022 [5 favorites]

A lot of people who survived the layoff are likely just putting on a happy face until they get another job lined up and can quit.

And that's fine. It's not like this whirlpool of fail is lacking momentum. Even people who are legit intending to stay for the long haul might change their minds once the reality sets in.
posted by ryanrs at 10:16 AM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

So WARN is "basically" just mandatory severance right? Honestly this is just more evidence that twitter needs to die: a bunch of screaming about something that hasn't happened, that actually won't happen and then nothing.
posted by Wood at 10:18 AM on November 4, 2022

WARN is mandatory *notification* of mass layoffs. The penalty is essentially mandatory severance.

I suspect details of Twitter severance packages will leak soon; I suspect also that they generally won't be good.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 10:21 AM on November 4, 2022

Buntix: He's like the boss who once did some COBOL on a weekend training course back in the 80's and refuses to accept that anything has changed.

Funny thing... here's a quote from a Musk biography:

They took one look at Zip2’s code and began rewriting the vast majority of the software. Musk bristled at some of their changes, but the computer scientists needed just a fraction of the lines of code that Musk used to get their jobs done. They had a knack for dividing software projects into chunks that could be altered and refined whereas Musk fell into the classic self-taught coder trap of writing what developers call hairballs—big, monolithic hunks of code that could go berserk for mysterious reasons.

posted by clawsoon at 10:23 AM on November 4, 2022 [10 favorites]

> clawsoon: "They had a knack for dividing software projects into chunks that could be altered and refined whereas Musk fell into the classic self-taught coder trap of writing what developers call hairballs—big, monolithic hunks of code"

Lol. A perfect match for a company that's well-known for embracing microservice architecture, aka something on the the exact opposite end of the spectrum from big and monolithic. I'm sure Elon will feel right at home.
posted by mhum at 10:34 AM on November 4, 2022 [6 favorites]

I bet Musk could write 50 pages of code in 30 days.
posted by clawsoon at 10:36 AM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

10 print "I am the best!"
20 goto 10
30 end

posted by mazola at 10:39 AM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

WARN is mandatory *notification* of mass layoffs. The penalty is essentially mandatory severance.

I suspect details of Twitter severance packages will leak soon; I suspect also that they generally won't be good.

Details leaking around are the employees who are being laid off are "working" and on payroll with benefits through to February 2, 2023; but they're not just allowed to login or do any actual work. Actual severance after February to vary based on the individual.

To be honest this is a lot better than I expected. Folks at Twitter probably told Musk, "ok, fine you can have your tantrum but do you really want to be sued ... again?"
posted by bl1nk at 11:04 AM on November 4, 2022 [4 favorites]

Details leaking around are the employees who are being laid off are "working" and on payroll with benefits through to February 2, 2023; but they're not just allowed to login or do any actual work. Actual severance after February to vary based on the individual.

You can't just make shit up and call it whatever you want!!!!! I mean you can, but god dammit!!!!
posted by dis_integration at 11:27 AM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

@CheckMyAdsHQ (thread):

"Thanks for the shout out — but we *really* can't take credit for this one. No one has been more effective at pressuring advertisers to drop Twitter than Elon Musk himself..."

posted by JoeZydeco at 11:34 AM on November 4, 2022 [12 favorites]

oh, it's Business Insider, but here's a public copy of that layoff letter with the 2/2/2023 date
posted by bl1nk at 11:40 AM on November 4, 2022 [1 favorite]

it's what can be called 'gardening leave';

'A garden leave refers to the period of time during which an employee stays away from the workplace, The employee remains on the payroll and is in the process of terminating their employment, but is neither permitted to go to work nor to commence any other employment during the garden leave.'

Problem is if you take another job or contract prior to feb 2 2023 you lose any severance or seperation benefits. Which could include medical benefits.

If you wait till Feb 2 you'll be competing with a large number of ex Twitter employees

It's not as great as it sounds.
posted by yyz at 12:09 PM on November 4, 2022 [8 favorites]

Yeah, my immediate thought was that there's gonna be a *lot* of candidates on the market seeking Feb 3 start dates.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 12:13 PM on November 4, 2022

What exactly is Twitter trying to protect with offering garden leave, other than trying to fend off WARN Act lawsuits? Are all these employees too dangerous to let out into the marketplace? Seems like exactly the opposite given Musk's behavior.

If I was an ex-Tweep and offered this kind of leave I'd skip it, get on COBRA, and go right into the next job before things really get nasty.
posted by JoeZydeco at 12:21 PM on November 4, 2022 [1 favorite]

WARN requires 60 days, but Feb 2 is in 3 months.
posted by ryanrs at 12:27 PM on November 4, 2022

That might be related to the fact that NY state has a 90-day WARN period.
posted by mhum at 12:35 PM on November 4, 2022 [5 favorites]

ryanrs, fantastic comment earlier. When I read that comment, I immediately thought of Trump as well. I especially enjoyed this response on Twitter to Musk's Trumpy-sounding comment.
posted by Bella Donna at 12:36 PM on November 4, 2022

LOL: @CraigCalef: "Right now a disk is filling up on a server somewhere in some data center that a person who has just been laid off has been manually clearing every few days and when that disk fills up Twitter will go down."
posted by JoeZydeco at 12:52 PM on November 4, 2022 [22 favorites]

If you're on garden leave you are still an employee of the company and are still expected to follow company policy.
Talking trash about the company or your new boss could result in your position being terminated for cause. No severance for you. Taking another job means you have voluntarily quit.
Pushing it a bit talking to a competitor or supplier without permission may result in being terminated for cause.

If you were handed a 3 month severance check you could act as you wanted immediately
posted by yyz at 12:59 PM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

Right now a disk is filling up on a server somewhere in some data center that a person who has just been laid off has been manually clearing every few days

Oof, I relate to this way too much.
posted by wierdo at 1:16 PM on November 4, 2022 [12 favorites]

Oof, I relate to this way too much.

I once found a server that had been literally walled up (erroneously, by contractors working for the building owner who were subdividing the space) in a closet; the disk had died and thereby broke a number of processes; the only way we figured out wtf had happened was by arduously working through the failure cascade, manually tracing which port on the switch was involved, and then following that ethernet cable back to where it disappeared into the drywall.

...we actually found three servers in there, but only one had broken, and nobody still at the company realized they were there, operational, and necessary. In the many years since I've heard similar tales on multiple occasions so clearly it's A Thing that happens, but I wouldn't have believed it if it hadn't happened to me myself.
posted by aramaic at 1:31 PM on November 4, 2022 [39 favorites]

In a move that surely won't spook any advertisers, Elon Musk fires Twitter’s human rights team.
posted by clawsoon at 1:57 PM on November 4, 2022 [9 favorites]

Confusion and Frustration Reign as Elon Musk Cuts Half of Twitter’s Staff: the newspaper of record summarizes the cruelty and chaos of how half of Twitter's employees were fired.

Sandra Sucher, a professor of management at Harvard University who has studied layoffs for more than a decade, said Twitter’s cuts were among the most poorly handled that she had seen. While the scale was not unprecedented, it was unusual to see layoffs done so quickly without a detailed explanation provided to workers about who was being laid off and why, she said.

“This is a master class in how not to do it,” Ms. Sucher said. “If you were going to rank order ways to upset people, telling them you’re going to do it in advance, without rationale, that is a particularly inhumane way to treat them.”

posted by Nelson at 2:17 PM on November 4, 2022 [6 favorites]

Accessibility team apparently gone, too.
posted by clawsoon at 2:21 PM on November 4, 2022 [4 favorites]

I once found a server that had been literally walled up

Hang on, have I wandered into the the discovery podcast of bash.org:5273? Because that would really put the whole collapse of Twitter into the b reel.
posted by Buntix at 2:31 PM on November 4, 2022 [4 favorites]

This lovely bit of color in the NYT article Nelson linked:

Twitter’s communications team, which was almost entirely laid off, did not respond to a request for comment.

posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 2:37 PM on November 4, 2022 [18 favorites]

his new communication strategy
posted by ryanrs at 2:45 PM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

"communication"
posted by Greg_Ace at 2:58 PM on November 4, 2022 [1 favorite]

So today is Hellscape Day, correct? Off by 2 days, I suppose. But once the moderation goes...
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:03 PM on November 4, 2022 [2 favorites]

Checking in on the Jane Austin thread performance seemed a we bot shakey, though it got there in the end.

Completely out of curiosities sake what do you think the most computationally complex action a user on Twitter can take is?
posted by Artw at 3:28 PM on November 4, 2022 [1 favorite]

Completely out of curiosities sake what do you think the most computationally complex action a user on Twitter can take is?

It you've been active, then requesting a download of your data (via settings -> Your Account -> Download Archive) would be, I've put in requests for both my main account and one I set up to watch Ukraine news, both requests sent more than 24 hours ago. The latter account is fairly new and quiet (Feb, last year). Not had a notification that either is ready, suggesting that part of their system is already overloaded.

Also getting a data download is something everyone should be doing given they're both firing everyone who knows how to run the place and trying to cut infrastructure/data storage costs.
posted by Buntix at 3:53 PM on November 4, 2022 [10 favorites]

You can also waste cycles by shit-talking Musk on his own platform until he blocks you.

Musk's relationship to Twitter is a little like Trump's relationship to TV. But while it's hard for your average poster to go mock Trump on TV, you can totally @elonmusk with all your sick burns and hot takes.

Look, this asshole just spent $44 billion to buy Twitter because he loves fighting on Twitter so much. Of course he reads every mention.
posted by ryanrs at 3:56 PM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

DDOSing Elon personally by overwhelming his feed — I like it.
posted by aramaic at 5:17 PM on November 4, 2022 [3 favorites]

From Kara Swisher on Twitter:

From ad tweep who knows: The drop off is mostly self inflicted. First: The CRO [@SEP] walked out Friday. She's trusted by the marketing community. So, Elon goes to meet agency heads in NY. The Twitter exec who runs the US walked him in and is a trusted partner at these agencies.

He is fired at end of day. Those agencies start to pause/shift because everything feels uncertain and they don’t know who they should be coordinating with. Then, Elon gets dozens of advertiser CMOs on a call yesterday. It's amazing oppty.

And basically Elon is asked: What's the plan? And it's clear he hasn't either really prepped for this/doesn’t really want to tell anybody what the plan is/has no plan. No kidding: There were CMOs who literally paused/shifted budgets DURING the call because of the uncertainty.

And then followed up with this from Chad Loder:

Something people are failing to grasp is just how TINY companies' Twitter advertising budget is compared to the rest of their digital marketing program spend.

Pausing Twitter ads is an easy decision for these companies, because they're barely spending on Twitter to begin with.

Pretty grim stuff. I wonder how much of Twitter's ad revenue is concentrated in these big ad buyers (e.g.: the kind that have CMOs) versus the rest.
posted by mhum at 7:51 PM on November 4, 2022 [24 favorites]

My current theory - he is being so shit at leading this that the other investors will reduce the debt repayments / buy him partially out in return for him stepping aside to another person and not burning the whole thing down. Not saying that’s Musk’s plan. Just can’t imagine being happy as an investor right now….
posted by inflatablekiwi at 8:16 PM on November 4, 2022 [1 favorite]

Angelo Carusone on Twitter explains how Musk blew next year's revenue.

7/ My point here is: It's actually worse than that I think a lot of people even appreciate all because Musk's conduct and commitments to roll back brand safety and community safeguards essentially obliterated Twitter's new front sales event that woulda secured 2023 revenue.

posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 9:00 PM on November 4, 2022 [11 favorites]

For context, Lou Paskalis is president of the largest marketing trade association in the world.
posted by ryanrs at 9:12 PM on November 4, 2022 [34 favorites]

Sounds like Wee Boy needs himself some lawyers.
posted by aramaic at 9:18 PM on November 4, 2022

Lawyers won't help. Musk needs these people to want to give him hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

Musk has made the classic customer/product blunder! He's sucking up to (some) twitter users and blowing off the advertisers.
posted by ryanrs at 9:25 PM on November 4, 2022 [2 favorites]

Perfect intersection between Twitter and the NYTimesPitchBot:

Times have been tough in this Ohio town ever since the woke mob shut down the old rainbow fentanyl factory. So when Elon Musk promised everyone they could post Nazi slogans on Twitter, they finally had something to celebrate. But then the advertiser boycott began.

posted by Rumple at 9:29 PM on November 4, 2022 [12 favorites]

lawyers won’t help

I apologize — click the link; I’m saying he’s utterly fucked and has ruined every escape route he might have had because he’s a puerile manbaby.

We all laughed, but then it actually happened.
posted by aramaic at 9:32 PM on November 4, 2022 [4 favorites]

An outgoing Twitter employee reportedly suspended Elon Musk’s account on their way out.
posted by rosiroo at 3:11 AM on November 5, 2022

Does twitter allow unicode in usernames? Serms like a malicious person could create a lot of havok by impersonating say Elon Musk with their new $8 verification process.
posted by Mitheral at 4:05 AM on November 5, 2022

It's too bad we won't see next year's financials now that Twitter has gone private. Twitter has been increasing its revenue (though not profit) every year for the past decade. From 2020 to 2021 revenue jumped from $3.7 billion to $5.1 billion. How much will it be in 2023?
posted by clawsoon at 6:10 AM on November 5, 2022

You're assuming that it even survives to the end of 2023.
posted by octothorpe at 6:40 AM on November 5, 2022 [5 favorites]

You’re assuming that it even survives to the end of 2022.
posted by notoriety public at 6:50 AM on November 5, 2022 [16 favorites]

So in this situation, does Occam's Razor point us toward the explanation that Elon is incompetent or malicious? Did he buy Twitter for cool points and he's so dumb he's destroying it in short order; or did he buy it specifically to wreck it?
posted by LooseFilter at 7:56 AM on November 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

So the plan is to sic his right wing mob on advertisers to force them to pay him? That’s rough.
posted by Wood at 8:03 AM on November 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

The fact that the "trust thermocline" concept even has to exist is that most businesses don't understand how relationships work.

"Yes, she put up with all that crap for years, and then you did this *tiny* thing...

But we're not here to talk about that, we're just here to collect her stuff for her"
posted by tigrrrlily at 8:29 AM on November 5, 2022 [4 favorites]

Elon's lucked out twice in picking things that smart and passionate people think are really fucking cool, and those smart people doing an excellent job of working around him to do things that they deeply and seriously believe in. After two rounds of that, I think Elon got high on his own supply, and thinks he can just do things and they will magically work out.

I don't think there was a plan at all. Initially I think it was a troll, a really big elaborate troll that he really got into. Consequences? What are those? And when it turned out that if you go that far pretending to buy a company, it isn't pretending anymore, and you will have to go through with it, he didn't have a plan.

But because of point 1), I don't think he was even much worried! Things just work out for him because of how smart and cool he is! Except that Twitter isn't a thing that extremely smart and passionate people think are cool. "Trying to get people to get along and not be toxic assholes online" has nowhere near the cachet of rockets or electric cars. So he doesn't have the massive tailwind of True Belief behind him, and, uh, turns out that was really important for his otherwise-lacking management style.

I have a little bit of empathy. Earlier in my career, I lucked out into a small startup opportunity that did really well. If I'd stayed with it, I would probably be retired by now, but I was both going through a tough breakup and I also got high on my own supply, and I cashed out early to move to California as a sort of premature midlife crisis. I thought I was really hot shit, and while I'm reasonably skilled, I am not hot shit. It took me a while to get over myself, Eventually running out of the cashout money helped with that, although it took me a while because I didn't do much with it. Elon got much luckier than I ever did. I can't imagine he's not entirely sucked up into his own bullshit.

Or, rather, he was, up until this particular debacle. This failure (and it's going to be a pretty legendary failure) is going to crack that nigh-invulnerable shell, and I don't know if he's going to survive the experience. Financially, socially, politically, or even literally. I could see him overdosing in a bathtub, maybe by accident, or even by design.

All the people thinking he's going to sail out of this okay, and are pissed about the lack of personal consequences? I don't think they need to worry about that. I don't think he's going to be okay after this. I don't think he's even currently okay. It won't make anything up to the people whose lives he's ruining right now, of course.
posted by notoriety public at 8:48 AM on November 5, 2022 [19 favorites]

What does it mean for a company to become privately held? Did Musk have to buy every single share? Could some obstinate small-time holder have stopped it? No, right? I’m picturing, like, the one house in a neighborhood with an 87 year old crank owner and no sidewalks. I realize this is kind of a basic/ignorant question.
posted by eirias at 8:48 AM on November 5, 2022 [2 favorites]

Did Musk have to buy every single share?

No. Musk put together a consortium to buy out the previous shareholders. (Some of whom, like Musk, were already shareholders.)
posted by SPrintF at 8:55 AM on November 5, 2022

[e-mail]:

Every single Mastodon explanation is like "It's very simple, your account is part of a kerflunk, and each kerflunk can talk to each other as part of a bumblurt. At the moment, everyone you flurgle can see your bloops but only people IN your kerflunk can quark your nerps. Kinda like email."

posted by DirtyOldTown at 8:57 AM on November 5, 2022 [28 favorites]

Hm. Say I buy one share of Coca-Cola and then later some big money guy wants to take it private, puts together an offer, puts it before the board, the board likes it. Do I have to sell my one share? If so, what does it mean that I own that share now? If not, how does something like this ever happen?
posted by eirias at 8:59 AM on November 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

Do I have to sell my one share?

Your share is voided for you and you get a check in the mail. Oh, and you owe capital gains tax on it now. =)

If you have it in some kind of brokerage account you typically just see the cash deposited there and the shares disappear.
posted by JoeZydeco at 9:02 AM on November 5, 2022 [6 favorites]

It will be more relevant in two years or so when Musk sells Twitter for like $65 million and we can all buy many more shares.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 9:05 AM on November 5, 2022 [2 favorites]

Certain hurdles need to be overcome in order to do the forced sale like that. It does not happen casually. Bigger shareholders can get a different outcome, but generally only if they are big enough that they can credibly block the deal (at which point nobody gets cashed out and things continue on as usual), or they can cut a side deal in order to obtain their cooperation (like the Saudi investors that chose to roll over their ownership rather than cashing out). But minor holders? If the deal meets management, majority, and regulatory approval? You get your check and that’s that.
posted by notoriety public at 9:07 AM on November 5, 2022 [6 favorites]

If not, how does something like this ever happen?

That's the thing, right? It really is the luck of the draw. You could have an "enlightened", less-problematic (but still problematic because of how the 1% function) ceo takeover, or you could have a vain, psychopathic despot ruin everyone's lives.

It's like we live in feudal times.
posted by ishmael at 9:11 AM on November 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

Thanks. Sorta feels like we’ve been eminent domained a la Foxconn. Perhaps the community results will be approximately as useful.
posted by eirias at 9:12 AM on November 5, 2022 [2 favorites]

When free speech comes up, I keep thinking about Westboro Baptist Church. They never violated free speech laws, but I can't think of any advertisers who'd want to associate their name with Fred Phelps.
posted by clawsoon at 9:20 AM on November 5, 2022 [3 favorites]

Did Musk have to buy every single share?

No. Musk put together a consortium to buy out the previous shareholders. (Some of whom, like Musk, were already shareholders.)

to be clear, musk plus a few others (including the saudi sovereign wealth fund) did have to buy every single share, and at quite a premium. an incredible deal for twitters largest shareholders, who really wouldn’t have been able to liquidate their positions without causing the price to fall as they were selling. now they get a big fat check at $54.20 a share
posted by dis_integration at 9:20 AM on November 5, 2022 [8 favorites]

It’s unlikely that Twitter in particular had paper stock certificates, so that payout all just happens based on electronic records of “book shares.” If you’re old or you inherited certificates from someone who bought them when they were a thing, after a sale you’ll still receive a check for paper certificates if they can trace the ownership. Or you may get mail from an unclaimed property clearinghouse that basically says, “if this is you, here’s how to prove your ownership.” And then you’ll get a check. And if nobody can find the registered owner of a paper share, the money will be deposited into an unclaimed property registry administered by the last known state of residence for the last known owner of the shares. Every now and then it’s worth checking those to see if your relatives had assets that have become unclaimed for one reason or another.

Also if the stock was sold because a publicly traded company went private (and didn’t just merge with a different company) the IRS calls this an involuntary conversion and in some cases you’re allowed to defer the capital gains taxes. Although in most cases paying the taxes that year may be the best choice; talk to your financial advisor.
posted by fedward at 9:32 AM on November 5, 2022 [4 favorites]

So in this situation, does Occam's Razor point us toward the explanation that Elon is incompetent or malicious? Did he buy Twitter for cool points and he's so dumb he's destroying it in short order; or did he buy it specifically to wreck it?

Much as I want to answer "Both! Both!", Musk is dumber than wet toilet paper so it's probably deliberately the first one. notoriety public probably has it right in that he picked "cool" things before. Like, I love space exploration and I'd love a self-driving car, but with this numbnuts running those, I seriously worry about people's lives and I can't root for them.

Trump, Musk and Kanye are my three most loathed celebrities these days. I don't normally hate celebrities if they suck/are awful, but those three (in order from most to least damaging) are actively harmful to society. I hate Twitter but I am hatewatching these shenanigans (and Kanye's, but we don't have a post running on that and the subject matter is too depressing for me to make one) in hopes that something bad finally happens to Elon. Too bad that a gajillion people have to be harmed first before anything happens bad enough to make Elon a sad, broker panda and he'll probably not have that much in the way of consequences happen to him other than losing a lot of money.

Also, I'm so grateful he can't run for president, because we'd have the Musk/West ticket immediately if he could.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:34 AM on November 5, 2022 [13 favorites]

@@kurteichenwald: "Twitter shut its operations in Ireland today, putting thousands of people out of work with no notice. Oops. Elon broke the Unfair Dismissals Acts 1977–2015. And the thing about Ireland…they ain’t the United States. They don’t slobber all over people for just being rich. Ugly."

I have been wondering if/how Musk's cuts are likely to disproportionately impact non-US users, particularly non-English speakers (if he's willing to piss off the Irish then a lot of others can't be far behind). With the massive culling of the moderation team, there can't be many languages covered by actual speakers, and translation apps just aren't going to give the nuance and context required to accurately assess hate speech. There have already been pogroms organised via Facebook, seems like Twitter is really opening itself up for the same and worse.
posted by Buntix at 9:44 AM on November 5, 2022 [6 favorites]

It’s so weird to me that both Musk and Jessamyn own money-losing companies and, as fraught as MetaFilter’s future may be, Jessamyn is still in the stronger position.
posted by Bella Donna at 11:16 AM on November 5, 2022 [17 favorites]

Dorsey is apparently now grovelling with users on Musks behalf, which is fun.
posted by Artw at 11:39 AM on November 5, 2022

MetaFilter: everyone you flurgle can see your bloops
posted by oulipian at 11:43 AM on November 5, 2022 [13 favorites]

Scoop: all of Musk’s companies use MS Teams for comms, where new channels are private by default.

When software engineers from Tesla, Boring and SpaceX came in to Twitter a week ago, they created Slack channels to communicate amongst themselves.

Several channels were public.
posted by ryanrs at 12:04 PM on November 5, 2022 [4 favorites]

Several channels were public.

I haven't even clicked on the link and I can smell a shitshow coming.
posted by clawsoon at 1:12 PM on November 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

Dorsey coming in and trying to frame this as: my bad, I grew the company too fast is a shameless attempt to make himself a scapegoat for current management. The implication is that he supports Musk’s cuts, but he’s too spineless to say that aloud.
posted by Wood at 1:43 PM on November 5, 2022 [3 favorites]

Is he rich enough to just turn the whole thing off? I mean, now that every other media property is worthless and untrustworthy, and the ones who are largely depend on Twitter as part of their workflow/lead generation (citation needed, but that's what I feel like). He could just 404 the whole site, then the right doubles down on misinformation on Fox/CNN/MSNBC/NYT/the usual suspects.

I mean in my case, the big outlets are where I hear the "issue" of the day, Twitter is where I get the "more to the story", corrections, here's why that published piece was full of shit.

(and metafilter)
posted by ctmf at 2:15 PM on November 5, 2022 [2 favorites]

I kinda thought Dorsey oughta shutter the place when Trump won, but that clearly wasn’t gonna happen (shareholders for starters). I guess Musk doesn’t have that same constraint but presumably his backers would also be pissed. I think “Twitter gets boarded up” is more lurid fantasy borne of frustration than credible outcome.
posted by eirias at 2:25 PM on November 5, 2022

Jesus christ, following someone on mastodon is difficult. I've clicked I don't know how many times on several different popups and I still don't know if it worked. This is not going to be the thing.
posted by ctmf at 2:50 PM on November 5, 2022 [3 favorites]

I'm starting to like Cohost, but it's not quite the same thing. More of a blogging platform with follows -- I wouldn't want to follow 300 people there like I do on twitter, I don't think.
posted by rifflesby at 2:59 PM on November 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

Jesus christ, following someone on mastodon is difficult.

This is one of the things that should definitely be trivial that is made complex due to the federated nature of the ecosystem. It can be done by copying and pasting the URL of the person or their full address into the search box on your own logged-in account, e.g for well-known Astro person Katie Mack you could paste either https://mastodon.social/@AstroKatie or @[e-mail]

This will then bring up a search result with a follow widget.

But yeah, there's a lot of things like that could prevent it from ever really being a mainstream replacement for Twitter.

Kinda on the fence as to whether that's a good or bad thing.
posted by Buntix at 3:22 PM on November 5, 2022 [2 favorites]

No one owns share certificates anymore.

In the US all shares in public companies (except for a few paper certificates in Grandma's lock box) are owned by Cede and Company what you own in your brokerage are essentially pointers to the stock that Cede holds, no actual stock certificates change hands. Cede in turn is owned by DTC
posted by mbo at 3:41 PM on November 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

I'm starting to like Cohost, but it's not quite the same thing.

And apparently the Cohost TOS is a hot mess, full of ridiculous and unreasonable demands, including requiring users to pay Cohost's taxes on profit that Cohost makes from any commercial use by the users. Also no parody or fannish accounts, and a ton of other restrictions.

I grabbed an account, but I'm not using it until people I trust tell me it's ok.
posted by suelac at 3:44 PM on November 5, 2022 [2 favorites]

Interesting. Would like to see a comparison between those TOS and the boiler plate on similar services.
posted by Artw at 4:10 PM on November 5, 2022

Is he rich enough to just turn the whole thing off?

He's rich enough. He's also rich enough to lay people off in a way that they can feel good about. Or to not fire anyone. Or to hire lots more human moderators and pay them well. Even if much of his wealth is just on paper.

But people like that never feel like they're rich enough, and the idea of letting go of money as anything other than an investment is anathema.

But laying people off, destroying companies, and doing anything, no matter how destructive, for clicks or sales is not actually something people that rich ever "have" to do.
posted by trig at 4:24 PM on November 5, 2022 [4 favorites]

And apparently the Cohost TOS is a hot mess, full of ridiculous and unreasonable demands, including requiring users to pay Cohost's taxes on profit that Cohost makes from any commercial use by the users. Also no parody or fannish accounts, and a ton of other restrictions.

I grabbed an account, but I'm not using it until people I trust tell me it's ok.

so that long thread about cohost's tos that went viral is getting some pushback, so it might be a little more of a complex situation than that thread implies.

some of the claims made against cohost are not true

some of cohost's problematic tos terms are also in dreamwidth's (notable, because the person making the original viral thread... founded dreamwidth

the legal issues may not be issues
posted by i used to be someone else at 4:46 PM on November 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

Google has all the code from G+ lying around. I bet they could get an invite-only Twitter replacement going in a few months, and a full-blown beta in 6 if they wanted.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 5:49 PM on November 5, 2022 [1 favorite]

I bet they could get an invite-only Twitter replacement going in a few months, and a full-blown beta in 6 if they wanted.

And close it down just when we all got happy with it.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 6:13 PM on November 5, 2022 [33 favorites]

This failure (and it's going to be a pretty legendary failure) is going to crack that nigh-invulnerable shell, and I don't know if he's going to survive the experience.

Have we learnt nothing from trump? Elon cannot fail, he can only be failed. Folks like this do not allow themselves credit for failure.
posted by Chef Flamboyardee at 6:51 PM on November 5, 2022 [3 favorites]

There's a rumor that some twitter folks are being asked to come back. A lot of replies saying things like "say no" or "ask for more money", but I thought they were technically on garden leave, not laid off until Feb. So they kind of have to go back to work or get fired-fired right?

Not sure if it were me I'd be the most engaged employee ever, under the circumstances, though.
posted by ctmf at 7:29 PM on November 5, 2022

Yeah, it that's really the case it does seem to be inviting sabotage - by neglect, if nothing else.
posted by Greg_Ace at 7:36 PM on November 5, 2022

Sherrilyn Ifill

Twitter played a powerful role in sustaining & strengthening the fight for racial justice. The truth about racist and violent policing in America - a truth that Black people have lived with and known for a century - was exposed to the world on Twitter.

...

Don’t minimize the significance of the brutal dismantling of this site. It is of a piece w/the overall attack on the health of our democratic institutions by forces that have no use for or interest in democracy.

(Thread)
posted by aneel at 7:42 PM on November 5, 2022 [20 favorites]

And close it down just when we all got happy with it

Close it down again when we all got happy with it. Once the initial growing pains were over, G+ was actually a pretty nice place to be. It was like they took the good parts of Twitter and smashed them together with the good parts of Facebook, added a sprinkling of their own good ideas and then couldn't figure out what to do with it.

One of the most annoying things about companies that do social media is their belief that if it's not the biggest it's worthless. Good enough just isn't good enough for them. A view that has sadly infected the rest of Google so much that people constantly make fun of them for it. I get why they'd can something like Stadia, what with its need for constant touching and the vast amount of bandwidth per user it had to consume. But killing things like Reader, G+, etc, that get at least a decent number of users and can't cost all that much money to run makes no goddamned sense.
posted by wierdo at 9:00 PM on November 5, 2022 [10 favorites]

How to Mastadon
posted by The Power Nap at 12:11 AM on November 6, 2022 [2 favorites]

While Musk is going off blaming the people he fired remember he says they're losing $4M a day .... but we also know he's paying $1B a year on his loans .... that's about $3M a day .... so roughly 3/4 of it is on him, not on the people at Twitter
posted by mbo at 1:00 AM on November 6, 2022 [7 favorites]

So they kind of have to go back to work or get fired-fired right?

Some/a lot of the laid-off employees are probably working in the US on a visa, which limits their ability to say no (and is one more reason these self-inflicted "necessary" firings are so fucked up).
posted by trig at 1:42 AM on November 6, 2022 [1 favorite]

Does the culture of Mastodon work for having sort of … federated selves? The way one might have a personal Twitter account and a public/professional one?
posted by eirias at 1:44 AM on November 6, 2022

As it's been mentioned a few times:

The 20 accounts I'm watching as a Trust Thermocline indicator aren't picked in a scientific way. They're just big, active accounts that are key creators in various ways, that (based on experience) I have a Spidey Sense are bellwethers.

It's a sort of 50/50 mix of people with big followings who do thoughtful stuff, and celebrities who clearly manage their own presence.

They're the ones who are the most visible indicator of Twitter's USP to advertisers: which is that it draws unique audience eyes on buys that they can't reach by just slamming down YouTube, tv, generic display via ad platform or twitch ads.

They're the big names that users engage with, and who engage back with a subset of those users.

Use that logic and you can build your own list and run your own sense checks. But I'll give you two of mine as a starter:

Neil Gaiman
The Rock

Also, I should note that I've already set up on Mastodon as a fallback. It's NOT Twitter. But I'm finding I'm enjoying it a lot more than I did when I first tried it back in 2018. Even if twitter doesn't die, I suspect I'll be splitting my efforts between both platforms now.
posted by garius at 2:14 AM on November 6, 2022 [16 favorites]

Twitter shut its operations in Ireland today, putting thousands of people out of work with no notice. Oops. Elon broke the Unfair Dismissals Acts 1977–2015. And the thing about Ireland…they ain’t the United States. They don’t slobber all over people for just being rich. Ugly."

I wonder if that is going to end up having US tax implications. I know there is a pretty common dodge involving Ireland and US Corporate tax though maybe not applicable to never turn a profit Twitter.
posted by Mitheral at 5:30 AM on November 6, 2022 [4 favorites]

So I didn't predict Valerie Bertenelli becoming an agent of chaos....

....But she's changed her Twitter handle to "Elon Musk" and started retweeting Democratic candidates for the midterms and making similar talking points ("Vote Blue" "Save Social Security"). And because she already had the blue checkmark....
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:39 AM on November 6, 2022 [25 favorites]

Neil Gaiman moving would be huge. He could probably make a service a solid bet by setting up shop there. Also, and not saying it would happen, one of the few celebs I could see wanting to and making a success of having their own instance.
posted by Artw at 7:51 AM on November 6, 2022

Am seeing increasing numbers of high-profile Twitter peeps setting up shop on Mastodon as well.

https://journa.host/@WalterShaub has been doing some running update posts on them. (Just noticed the Greta Thunberg link appears to be a twitter repeater bot account, so possibly some of those he's listed aren't real accounts.)

There's an updating google docs spreadsheet here listing Journalists who now have accounts.

Was quite odd seeing my local MP (Alyn Smith - of "keep a light on" fame) turn up. One of the Scottish Green co-convener turned up a couple of days ago as well (along with an SGP account). Quite a lot of ScotPol/Indy twitter in general seem to be more or less relocating.

Perhaps not quite a sea-change yet, but it does increasingly appear to be auguring that way.

Could definitely see Gaiman at least dual-accounting as I'd guess increasing numbers of his peer/social group will, @GreatDismal, Doctrow, Jeff VanderMeer (awesome nocturnal animal content), and (MeFi's own) CStross are already there.

Will be very unsurprised if Stephen King dips a toe in the water.
posted by Buntix at 9:19 AM on November 6, 2022 [3 favorites]

Little worried that the journalists getting si much prominence now means trolls have someone worth going after, increasing that problem, but we’ll see how the fediverse deals with that.
posted by Artw at 10:28 AM on November 6, 2022 [1 favorite]

eirias: Does the culture of Mastodon work for having sort of … federated selves? The way one might have a personal Twitter account and a public/professional one?

There's no "the culture of Mastodon/the Fediverse", there's a wild variety of sub-cultures. You can participate in many at once by using one account and following people across many federated instances. Or you can make accounts on a number of more special interest servers and participating in their "local" timelines. Or mix and match by having what you think of as your "main" account, but keeping some other accounts as well. Some clients make this easier than others.

I'm thinking of moving my electronics/computers/makery stuff to a different account than my cat pictures stuff.
posted by aneel at 10:34 AM on November 6, 2022 [3 favorites]

About federated selves: there are definitely marked-group servers that are pretty cautious about Inter posting with everyone else (they occasionally mention how to request admission, when their identity comes up on a wider thread). And everything I see is careful about putting painful stuff behind warnings. As aneel says, kind of the point is that there can be different neighborhoods.

Speaking of which, aneel, is there a client you’d recommend that helps? I know I’m bad at not mixing my personae so I habitually keep a separate browser/app (with different colors!) for each. Bit of a hassle maybe.
posted by clew at 1:24 PM on November 6, 2022 [2 favorites]

Sorry, no. I only have a single account that I use right now, so I haven't developed any preferences.
posted by aneel at 2:08 PM on November 6, 2022 [1 favorite]

Twitter asks some laid off workers to come back: report

After Twitter Inc laid off roughly half its staff on Friday following Elon Musk’s $44 billion acquisition, the company is now reaching out to dozens of employees who lost their jobs and asking them to return, Bloomberg News reported on Sunday.

Some of those who are being asked to return were laid off by mistake. Others were let go before management realized that their work and experience may be necessary to build the new features Musk envisions, the report said citing people familiar with the moves.

posted by clawsoon at 3:37 PM on November 6, 2022 [5 favorites]

Imagine having as much money as the owner of Twitter has and yet such wafer-thin skin. (via Nitter)

Going forward, any Twitter handles engaging in impersonation without clearly specifying “parody” will be permanently suspended.
posted by vac2003 at 3:59 PM on November 6, 2022 [3 favorites]

I saw a tweet earlier that indicated they fired the entire accessibility team. Add this act to the pile of evidence that Musk and his team are facing a really steep learning curve as they try to manage and operate this business. This isn’t 1994 anymore there are laws and regulations to ensure that your site accommodates those with disabilities.
posted by interogative mood at 4:34 PM on November 6, 2022 [8 favorites]

Becoming a cautionary tale is one of the classic ways of achieving immortality.

Musk's (mis)management of Twitter will be fodder for business school case studies for decades to come.
I just wish the site content could be preserved for future historians.

On a lighter note, be sure to check out Twiddor.com, backed by national treasure Chuck Tingle.
posted by cheshyre at 5:16 PM on November 6, 2022 [9 favorites]

More on the Mastodon journalist/troll situation.
posted by Artw at 6:31 PM on November 6, 2022 [2 favorites]

Love to see people choosing a permanent ban. Just “quitting” with the option to easily rejoin later is comparatively weak.

I’m totally sure I don’t care about Twitter-header/identifier modification based art. Love Patti Harrison but obviously don’t follow her on Twitter.
posted by Wood at 7:50 PM on November 6, 2022

Mastodon has gained 311,000 new users in the last week. Although I don't think it's quite at critical mass stage, I think it's starting to approach it
posted by thebotanyofsouls at 8:28 PM on November 6, 2022 [4 favorites]

Twitter asks some laid off workers to come back: report

I sincerely hope they all found good jobs and can give their former employer the finger. How can any company treat its employees this way and expect them to come back willingly afterwards?
posted by eye of newt at 10:40 PM on November 6, 2022 [4 favorites]

@rakyll: "I'm hearing from multiple personal sources that key engineers who survived the layoffs are resigning. These key engineers are mostly old timers and probably have a lot of financial freedom to do whatever they desire to do."

[@rakyll is an engineer at GitHub in SF, so seems likely to be genuine]

Not really surprising with Musk implementing eternal-crunch mode and understaffing the place. Would guess a lot of those left are just there till they get a new gig elsewhere.
posted by Buntix at 1:22 AM on November 7, 2022 [5 favorites]

Jeph Jacques of Questionable Content has been suspended for funny Musk parody tweets, along with several other accounts.
posted by eirias at 2:15 AM on November 7, 2022 [7 favorites]

That development crunch was about giving him a "suspend" button next to the block button, wasn't it?
posted by polytope subirb enby-of-piano-dice at 2:37 AM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

Sarah Kendzior at Gaslit Nation on Twitter’s function as historical record, in a time when rewriting the record is part of the autocratic agenda…
posted by progosk at 2:48 AM on November 7, 2022 [2 favorites]

I don't regret to inform you that apparently, Irish Twitter has relocated en masse to Mastodon, and are calling themselves #MastoDaoine.
posted by Buntix at 6:58 AM on November 7, 2022 [9 favorites]

How can any company treat its employees this way and expect them to come back willingly afterwards?

Desperation, I guess. I look forward to finding out how many people give them the finger today.
Unless they do shit like pull their "garden leave" pay or whatever to force them :/
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:08 AM on November 7, 2022

I assume that if you don't come back you will lose any severance. Rather than give them the finger the easiest thing to do is to come back to work and do the absolute minimum while looking for a new job.
posted by interogative mood at 8:15 AM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

It feels to me like they might be setting themselves up for sabotage, unfortunately. As I understand it, a major reason you turn everyone’s access off when you fire them is because some small percentage of fired people will use their access to do crazy shit. You just fired half your staff in a very public way, and some of those were the wrong people, and you’d damn well better be sure the ones you bring back, in this sensitive time where everyone’s egos are bound to still be sore, are the right ones, or you might be taking on what seems to me like an unacceptable amount of risk.

(I have never worked for Twitter, I do not know anyone who was fired from Twitter, I do not even really know what damage a mad person could do; this is pure spitballing from me.)
posted by eirias at 8:21 AM on November 7, 2022 [2 favorites]

I hope at minimum they engage in as much petty theft as possible. Get that laptop!

Jack’s tweet about how everyone let go was hired by mistake now especially funny.
posted by Artw at 8:26 AM on November 7, 2022 [7 favorites]

@elonmusk: "Shared power curbs the worst excesses of both parties, therefore I recommend voting for a Republican Congress, given that the Presidency is Democratic."

Quelle surprise.
posted by mazola at 8:36 AM on November 7, 2022 [3 favorites]

Elon Musk
@elonmusk
Twitter needs to become by far the most accurate source of information about the world. That’s our mission.
7:25 PM · Nov 6, 2022
·Twitter for iPhone

I can't stop laughing. I mean . . . good luck? I guess?
posted by exlotuseater at 8:43 AM on November 7, 2022 [5 favorites]

Irish Twitter has relocated en masse to Mastodon, and are calling themselves #MastoDaoine.

It was pretty fascinating watching this take place over the weekend. The en masse-ness seemingly made the transition a lot easier - most people ended up on the mastodon.ie server, for example. Not having to worry about which server to use was extrememly helpful, I think, and there's been a fair amout of muddling along with everyone helping each other. Most importantly, it meant that it was easy to find a community there, and not have that initial feeling of not knowing everyone.

(For people without Irish, the "Daoine" of #MastoDaoine means "people". I haven't yet encountered the singular but that would be #MastoDuine.)
posted by scorbet at 8:48 AM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

it was easy to find a community there

It has been similar on mastodon.scot, especially with the indy and political left peeps as that was already a fairly solid community unbounded by any single social network.

Also, a lot of artists, writers (including that there Irvine Welsh as of earlier today), musos, photographers, hikers, &c. so there's quite a lot of further interlinking going on among interest groups. It really is speed-running the online community building in a fairly spectacular way.

Was particularly glad to see https://mastodon.scot/@Yourwullie turn up, he does great social history photo posts, but is also the main way I learn that it's a Friday.

Still not sure that Twitter is going to die, but increasingly convinced that Mastodon/Fediverse is going to live (in a much more active way).
posted by Buntix at 9:05 AM on November 7, 2022 [2 favorites]

The paradox of choice has prevented me from creating a mastodon account. I can't figure out a server.
posted by interogative mood at 9:09 AM on November 7, 2022 [4 favorites]

I love seeing Jack and Elon fight online because they're both hacky idiots, but Jack is a far more integral kind of hacky idiot and it's neat watching him encounter his inevitable successor.

I am skeptical that Mastodon will ever catch on, but I'd love to be proven wrong!
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 9:17 AM on November 7, 2022

Jack isn't just encountering Musk for the first time. Jack was part of Elon deciding to buy Twitter and in April endorsed Musk as "the singular solution I trust. I trust his mission to extend the light of consciousness." He's been largely silent for weeks, his tweets in the last 24 hours are a change.
posted by Nelson at 9:39 AM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

I can't figure out a server.

Yeah, the whole "choose a server" is most people's sticking point, which is why mastodon.ie and mastodon.scot and the like are handy for their respective communities. I'd advise just going for one with rules/polices that suit you, and remember that you can always change later. (Or have multiple accounts, if you want!)
posted by scorbet at 10:01 AM on November 7, 2022 [2 favorites]

Mastodon is certainly not designed with ease of adoption and use in mind. In fact it’s a fucking nightmare.
posted by Rumple at 10:06 AM on November 7, 2022

TBH everyone seems to be doing just fine.
posted by Artw at 10:15 AM on November 7, 2022 [2 favorites]

I have no idea what "server" to join.
posted by Ahmad Khani at 10:18 AM on November 7, 2022

There is some talk over on the grey about maybe setting up a server for MeFites.
posted by eirias at 10:21 AM on November 7, 2022 [6 favorites]

TBH everyone seems to be doing just fine.


Except all the people who get frustrated by the sign up and opaque use issues and never join or use and therefore you don't hear about? Survivorship bias in action.
posted by Rumple at 10:24 AM on November 7, 2022 [8 favorites]

TBH everyone seems to be doing just fine.

I mean, eventually all of these default servers are going to have to define their own policies on impersonation and everything else people have been fighting about on Twitter right? It's gonna be a shitshow.

Perhaps a fantastic worthwhile shitshow though. My hate for Twitter is primarily linked to its size. When the honeymoon is over and it turns out that "everyone on Twitter who hates Musk and is Irish (or Scottish)" doesn't equal a homogeneous ideology and schisms happen, so much the better.

What if metafilter had a fork button instead of a button button?
posted by Wood at 10:35 AM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

New Zealand Mastodon is positively buzzing. We have gone from 500 users to nearly 5000 since Musk acquired Twitter. That's huge within the context of our social media population. The degrees of connectedness are low here so those 5000 users are will be having quite an impact. Interestingly my local feed is now full of Aotearoa/New Zealand stuff in a way my Twitter timeline never was. Which of course is a design feature of Mastodon - it's local. Will it last? Don't know of course, but the growth of Mastodon here feels like sea-change.
posted by vac2003 at 10:48 AM on November 7, 2022 [9 favorites]

Mastodon is a lot healthier for humans than Twitter ever could be. It's okay to grump about its UX issues and the moderate learning curve, but there's so much more to it than just the global party line that Twitter offers. It would be nice if folks would ease up a little on the dunks, at least on the "it'll never work" talk.
posted by seanmpuckett at 10:58 AM on November 7, 2022 [5 favorites]

Instance.social is a good way to search instances based on policies. It's not as good for finding specific interest based instances - maybe someone has a better tool to link for those trying to find an instance to sign up in?
posted by thebotanyofsouls at 11:08 AM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

New Zealand Mastodon

Speaking of Aotearoa, there's a lot of truth in this.

https://cloudisland.nz/@sitharus/109294473158535073

I keep seeing people say Mastodon is nothing like Twitter. And they’re right.

Mastodon is an echo of the old internet, it’s decentralised, chaotic. What you get depends on your sysadmin. You can’t search, everything has to be shared to you by a human. Networks split apart and rejoin. What you see is your unique connection to it.

Is this good? Maybe. But for me that’s the internet I grew up with. No algorithms, no targeted adverts, just human interaction, and it was glorious.

--

This also is very much like early Twitter. I joined in 2007. Twitter was a cheap group SMS service, it connected you to your friends not to companies and celebrities.

I get that I’m not like most people. I grew up in a very conservative rural area so the internet has always been my connection to friends and peer groups, a way to converse with people rather than a way to escape or get famous.

I am seeing a lot of the long-toothed who have been on all the sites moved, and happy. (Hell, I remember once upon a time I [in a previous incarnation] just got so out of sorts with SlashDot I ended up migrating time to this more chill site called MetaFilter -- wonder whatever happened to that!). Admittedly not before almost ending up in a decentralised DNS cult.

Another post, though.

There have been those slagging off those who have found it difficult to move over (and who haven't been doing it regularly since the 80's).

mastodon.scot/@[e-mail]

People on here being disdainful towards birdsite folk SHOW LESS

Hey folk - making fun of people who find Mastodon difficult and claiming that it "weeds out anyone too stupid to use Mastodon" or "they're too attached to Twitter so their opinion of Mastodon is suspicious" is really not the move.

Firstly, this was the kind of rhetoric that got me infamously racially harassed my first few hours on Mastodon back when it was super new.

Mainly though - it's unneeded superiority, it's ignoring very valid accessibility concerns, and it's just straight up exclusionary.


And there is some of that although the amount of bile towards Mastodon on Twitter is weird, people I follow and respect have suddenly gone all eagle will steal your beagle about it.

This is a very weird fortnight to be alive.

posted by Buntix at 11:35 AM on November 7, 2022 [6 favorites]

Just to tighten up one thing: you can search Mastodon, just not full text. It's an intentional design choice to not index everything you type. Hashtags are indexed, though, so if you tag your stuff appropriately, it will show up not just in searches, but in the new-ish dedicated tag feeds. So if you like to watch a bunch of art scroll by, follow the #mastoart tag.
posted by seanmpuckett at 12:33 PM on November 7, 2022 [4 favorites]

Oh neat, the EU is standing up institutional ActivityPub servers for video and… governmental stuff. Clearly an independence move on their part on many axes. Also a built-in audience and presumably some funding to improve the software.
posted by clew at 1:05 PM on November 7, 2022 [2 favorites]

I have no idea what "server" to join.

Nor did I, until I understood that you can quite easily change server later, so it doesn’t really matter as categorically as it’s made to seem. After having browsed a few lists, a solid, generic choice seems to be the server that the creator of mastodon is also on, mas.to - as good an initial port/flag as any…
posted by progosk at 1:38 PM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

Maybe there should be an Ask thread just for "how to Mastadon" for folks who want to do that?

If buying Twitter had ever seemed like a lark for the world’s richest man, by November it all seemed quite serious. At some point this week, Musk changed his location on Twitter to “Hell.” A few days later, hell came to his workforce.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:42 PM on November 7, 2022 [2 favorites]

Beginning to wonder if the true revenue model for Musk at this point is charging people to close their accounts.
posted by nubs at 1:50 PM on November 7, 2022 [4 favorites]

> Irish Twitter has relocated en masse to Mastodon

> Quite a lot of ScotPol/Indy twitter in general seem to be more or less relocating.

Not to be left out, toot.wales is rapidly filling up, although mostly with pictures of sheep.
posted by ceiriog at 1:52 PM on November 7, 2022 [4 favorites]

Brexit and Trump were initially seen as jokes, but the new owner of the social media giant could pose a serious threat to democracy – and a boon for Vladimir Putin.
Musk’s Twitter Buy Makes No Sense – Unless It’s Part of Something Bigger.
Musk and his “new world currency” crew are aiming to usher in a new “multipolar order,” which was the subject of Putin’s recent talk at the Valdai Discussion Club.
posted by adamvasco at 1:58 PM on November 7, 2022 [3 favorites]

Oh look, hellscape.
posted by jenfullmoon at 3:04 PM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

Re. my earlier comment on destroying musk

Now would be an excellent time to yank his security clearance. Need to investigate rumors of erratic behavior connected to frequent drug use. Use his drug use or lies about not using drugs, as appropriate, to force him out of Space X.

Dumping that on him right now could break him.
posted by ryanrs at 3:05 PM on November 7, 2022

And, look, there's Tesla stock down 5% as Wall Street starts to realize Musk probably runs Tesla the way he runs Twitter, that he's doing incredible damage to the brand, and that shareholder lawsuits are DEFINITELY incoming.

Not to mention all the stuff about how Tesla is now the prime target for every authoritarian regime in the world and that Tesla's second-largest market is China, which will definitely demand Twitter concessions for Tesla's continued ability to sell cars/acquire raw materials.

You've also got to think the US government is having some very serious discussions with/about SpaceX right now and its reliability and desirability as a partner.

And like, I'm no great believer in The Market as an arbiter of wisdom, but I'm really starting to question how many companies are actually run by assholes with no idea what they're doing who are motivated by spite and hurt feelings? "More skepticism about corporate management as a whole" is ... probably not a great outcome for a country where most of our retirement funds depend on 401(k)s and similar rather than pensions or the social security. (I mean intellectually I approve of market skepticism, but it's likely to have the very real outcome of retired people going hungry, so, um, maybe try to pretend to be competent, CEOs?)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 4:32 PM on November 7, 2022 [15 favorites]

Are there any intelligent, reliable, and honest CEOs? The three tech companies I worked at - Intel, Apple, and 3DO - never had intelligent, reliable CEOs. They had arrogant ones, dumb ones, egotistical ones, etc. At Apple one day, Scully asked to join us at lunch in the cafeteria. My salad had more personality and insight. Muskrat is not atypical. He just has a bigger megaphone. Becoming a CEO, a billionaire, etc does not require competence. It requires inherited money, luck, the skill to collect people smarter than you to do the work, and people dumber than you to give you money to play with. It’s not merit. It’s who you know, who you can take advantage of, who you can exploit. And yes, a whole lot of us have our retirement savings wrapped around the behavior of these people.
posted by njohnson23 at 5:19 PM on November 7, 2022 [4 favorites]

Stripe just laid off almost a sixth of the company and did it in the most humane, thoughtful way I’ve seen from a tech CEO. Friends have commented that they wish they could work for Stripe just to be fired by Stripe. It’s a stark contrast to whatever idiocy is driving E**n’s decisions and shows that other ways are possible right on Twitter’s doorstep.
posted by migurski at 5:28 PM on November 7, 2022 [9 favorites]

For those asking for a how-to, An Increasingly Less-Brief Guide to Mastodon seems pretty good.
posted by fedward at 5:32 PM on November 7, 2022

I don’t know about good CEOs. I don’t know any CEOs (I’ve never worked in a real company).

Good leadership is possible, though. It comes down to good character: the humility to surround yourself with people who know things you don’t, the confidence to listen to them because you know they make you stronger, not weaker. When I see it in action, I find it inspiring in the way that Olympic athletes are inspiring.

It, uh, it doesn’t look a hell of a lot like Elon Musk. I’m glad he’s not the only game in town.
posted by eirias at 5:36 PM on November 7, 2022

Today's Platformer is A Lot. One of three crazy things:

Musk has discussed putting the entire site behind a paywall, Platformer has learned ...

But all of that could be a prelude to the biggest change of all: charging most or all users a subscription fee to use Twitter.

Both Musk and Sacks have discussed the idea in recent meetings, according to a person familiar with the matter. One such plan might allow everyone to use Twitter for a limited amount of time each month but require a subscription to continue browsing, the person said.

posted by Nelson at 6:28 PM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

"Are there any intelligent, reliable, and honest CEOs?"

I mean, I'm not going to stan for CEOs generally. But more of my experience of C-suite types has been people in manufacturing companies (like, rebar and cables and copier chemicals and bulldozers), which don't have quite the mystique of tech prophet CEOs and can't get away with quite so much bullshit. But the CEOs and COOs and CFOs I've known personally have mostly been pretty deep into actual data about their companies, deeply educated on their (usually relatively mature) sectors, and listening closely to their lawyers, accountants, and auditors. (And, frequently, listening to their union reps or factory foremen -- an early signal a manufacturing company is about to have problems is when their factory relationships suddenly sour. Which is often because they bring in a CEO from a financialized sector, who has great experience working with data or customer service or debt to make a company more profitable, but does not know how to make a factory floor run, but I digress.)

Like, CEOs are often pretty careful in their public statements because they're being vetted by lawyers and accountants and PR. They're being warned about SEC violations. They're managing analyst expectations, and trying not to sour their relationships with lenders or shareholders or large institutional fund managers. But Elon being so busy Eloning in public is making me go "... but even though the CEOs of 3M and P&G and McDonald's are SAYING these boring and well-vetted things, what are they actually DOING behind closed doors? Are they seeking revenge on people who mock them, and tanking company value to chase whims, and breaking SEC rules for funsies?" Because, very clearly, the traditional guardrails and rules and laws that are supposed to prevent that sort of thing? DO NOT PREVENT THAT SORT OF THING, EVEN A LITTLE.*

And, sure, maybe the CEO of McDonald's gets enough press to keep his mouth shut when his lawyers tell him to. But there are like 2500 companies listed on the NYSE, another 3300 on the NASDAQ. How many are run by Elons who just haven't been noticed yet? How many are waaaaaaaaaay outside the guardrails that we now know DO NOT WORK?

*I realize this is, like, The Story of American Law Since the Year 2016 (Or Honestly Really Since Some Asshole Put Alito on The Court). But it's one thing to know that intellectually, and another thing for skeptical nerds to know it, and a whole different thing for Wall Street to suddenly discover it.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 6:47 PM on November 7, 2022 [14 favorites]

But all of that could be a prelude to the biggest change of all: charging most or all users a subscription fee to use Twitter.

Elon wants a paywall for the public square.
posted by nubs at 7:16 PM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

If you can't afford it, you don't get to have an opinion, peasant.
posted by pianissimo at 7:18 PM on November 7, 2022

Free speech. Now eight bucks a month.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:22 PM on November 7, 2022 [1 favorite]

How many are waaaaaaaaaay outside the guardrails that we now know DO NOT WORK?

My best guess is, assuming that's the case for pretty much all of them is less misguided than assuming otherwise. You may say I'm being needlessly snarky, but that's been my considered opinion since long before social media was a thing. And yeah, it's pretty depressing.
posted by Greg_Ace at 7:28 PM on November 7, 2022 [3 favorites]

I’m starting to think this is some kind of producers style scheme where Elon Musk is deliberately tanking what’s left of Twitter as part of some scheme to cover up some larger fraud. I mean on Twitter right now the surge of alt right bozos as actually made it springtime for Hitler.
posted by interogative mood at 7:32 PM on November 7, 2022 [2 favorites]

One of three crazy things

What were the other two things by your count? Mine would be the “raise your hand if you still work here” people making lists of teammates, and the recommendation that people to listen to a podcast, for fuck’s sake.
posted by fedward at 7:49 PM on November 7, 2022

From Ed Zitron's Substack newsletter, "Musk's Kobayashi Maru":

Musk is currently in a Kobayashi Maru of his own making - an unwinnable scenario created by his own arrogance and ignorance. Musk does not understand online communities, nor does he appear to understand the business of social media, asking random Twitter accounts how YouTube monetization works, something he should have already known or learned about before buying a social network. He does not know what is going on, and has decided that every decision he makes must be tweeted first (he has fired most of Twitter’s communications staff), which is a terrible idea because it reduces what should be a large decision into a compressed < 280 character message, shared on a website that is currently used to make fun of its owner.

[...]

The only way Musk can really “save” Twitter as a meaningful revenue-generating company is to somehow lure back the advertisers he alienated. While he may believe that he can replace that revenue with features, that would first involve building features (which is much harder to do when you just fired half of your company), and then making sure said features were things people would pay for (harder when you’ve fired all those people, considering you do not know anything about social media). Twitter’s power users - people who post 3-4 times a week, make up 90% of all tweets, but account for less than 10% of overall users - were already leaving the site, and I can’t imagine what offering something for them to pay for is going to do to keep them. And that’s before you consider how much he’s alienated them just by existing.

And absolutely none of this has made him more popular, which is killing him.

Tough to pick out a key excerpt out of this one, it's jam-packed with lots of good observations about Elon and this whole situation. In particular, Zitron picks up and elaborates on an observation posted by former SomethingAwful mod David Thorpe (@arr on Twitter) that Elon desperately wants to be a poster but is simply not up to the task.

Back in 2017, there was a Buzzfeed article about certain conflicts within the alt-right movement and how they paralleled message board drama, "The Alt-Right’s Meltdown Is Just Like Any Other Message Board Drama" (FPP about it). In Elon's case, however, it's not an analogy or metaphor. This whole thing is basically world's biggest mod drama unfolding on a scale heretofore unknown.
posted by mhum at 8:08 PM on November 7, 2022 [14 favorites]

I think this short thread is relevant to people frustrated with mastodon: https://twitter.com/lenazun/status/1589347499533561856 (lena and I overlapped at twitter, she is great)

I get the frustrations people have. heck, I have a bunch of mastodon related tabs open and just...haven't gotten to it. it's annoying! I'm currently trying to make cohost.org work (I like it so far! it's queer and quirky and nice, though who knows if that will last!), though if mefi does create a mastodon instance I will def be motivated to check it out

but I do think her thread gets to the sort of core issue at play here...the super slick user experiences we are used to, especially on social media websites, are fantastically expensive. they require an immense amount of engineering talent. also, they are the way they are to get the most number of users on them. they are websites that are, quite literally, trying to be for everyone on earth

mastodon is not that. cohost is not that. there are tradeoffs here. not being for everyone lets you focus on the people you are for...it lets you ignore all of the growth "hacks" that contribute to making twitter so unbearable. but not being for everyone also means some people will bounce off of the service (including me off of mastodon thus far!). you can't have it both ways!

I think in the most optimistic scenario, we enter an age of bespoke social media. sort of livejournal, but ideally having learned lessons from the last 10+ years of social media. but I think sites at the scale of twitter are just filled with too many internal contradictions. I don't want twitter to disappear, but I think the internet will be a lot healthier is every social media platform isn't a giant trying to eat the world
posted by wooh at 9:18 PM on November 7, 2022 [8 favorites]

Not sure which thread this should go, but sharing a tweet thread from Singaporean journo, Kirsten Han:
🧵 on Twitter and Mu*k, from the perspective of a journalist/activist from #Singapore (me)

1/ I am from a country that has significant issues with civil, political, and human rights. But my government also puts significant effort into public relations to bolster its reputation.

2/ I'm constantly meeting people who have no idea that, in #Singapore, you can be arrested for holding up a placard in public. That 11 men have been executed this year for #drugs. That we have serious issues with press freedom and media diversity.

3/ In this context, Twitter has been, and is, an extremely valuable tool in allowing me — a freelance journalist and activist with limited resources and no big institutional backing — to talk to people outside of #Singapore about our problems.

4/ Twitter has allowed me to talk to the world about the death penalty, freedom of expression, freedom of assembly, politics and democracy, migrant workers and labour exploitation, LGBTQ+ and discrimination against minority communities, etc.

(...) 8/ But what's been unfolding since EM took over doesn't inspire confidence. As I told @erinhale, I don't think he really understands the complexities that exist in managing a global platform, where different countries have different concerns and dynamics. (links to: From China to Thailand, dissidents fear Musk’s Twitter reign)

(...) 13/ If content moderation goes to shit on Twitter — whether on purpose, or 'cos the people who know what they're doing have been fired — and this platform ends up with even more problems with misinformation and hate speech, it once again gives governments an excuse...

14/ ...to justify passing more laws, implement more regulations, and generally give themselves more power to further regulate and clamp down on online expression. This might not be too horrendous if you have a democratically elected govt with sufficient oversight...


And on the point of bespoke socmed, lest we forget, LJ was so synonymous with blogging in Russia it was apparently the word for blogging in Russian, and the heavy use of the platform by dissidents was pretty much the reason why Russia (via private enterprise) bought it up. Arguably something similar is happening here, but more idiotically.
posted by cendawanita at 10:17 PM on November 7, 2022 [16 favorites]

I don’t know about good CEOs. I don’t know any CEOs

I knew one once. He was a Big Business Guy (legit credentials; you've heard of his business and it was very successful under his leadership) who parachuted into an appointed government advisory position, came to my office, and started giving orders. We were around 9 links down the chain from his org chart position. We had no idea who he was at first. He just showed up one day. I ended up working semi-directly with him.

He had a commanding presence and a habit of barking orders that he would not repeat, making demands that were outside the scope of our office, and in at least two cases he used our public government office resources for his own business gain when everyone was too afraid to tell him no. Eventually that was exposed, but nothing came of it. He called a meeting for Christmas Day at 8am on a Saturday using the argument that he knew everyone would be at home that morning and thus had no plans. He had a plan to secretly eminent domain the poorest part of the city, forcibly bus the residents across the state, and build a country club for him and his rich buddies on the site. Thankfully, that did not happen.

He was a friendly guy if you were obeying his every command, but tell him that we can't make the sun set in the east for him like he wants and he'd fly off the handle. Even when he was in a good mood, we were afraid of him. I suspect that's a carefully cultivated image.
posted by Servo5678 at 6:11 AM on November 8, 2022 [13 favorites]

New from World's Greatest Author Chuck Tingle:

THE PHYSICAL MANIFESTATION OF TWIDDOR’S RAPID DESCENT INTO CHAOS THANKS TO INEPT MANAGEMENT FROM A MANBABY EDGELORD POUNDS ME IN THE BUTT
posted by MrVisible at 8:07 AM on November 8, 2022 [8 favorites]

Twitter just suspended the League of Women Voters' executive director in California, hours before the midterm elections.
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:44 AM on November 8, 2022 [3 favorites]

And the followup from Stephanie Doute who was suspended

Huge thanks to all for your outrage about my suspension from Twitter. Thanks to everyone for speaking up- I have now been reinstated with a note telling me that my account was mistakenly included in a batch of Spam accounts.

This is exactly the kind of fuckup that's going to become more common with the understaffing.
posted by Nelson at 8:47 AM on November 8, 2022 [9 favorites]

Huh. The logout button has stopped working for me. Probably not a nefarious trick to keep me from my habit of logging in, doing whatever I need to do, and logging out, just a sign of general instability.
posted by Artw at 8:57 AM on November 8, 2022

So https://mastodon.scot/@[e-mail] has just turned up on Mastodon, and gone from https://twitter.com/stephenfry? (Don't know if the latter is recent or I just missed the news at some point).

Which seems like it could be a big deal.
posted by Buntix at 9:44 AM on November 8, 2022 [5 favorites]

Hmmmm.

What’s their TERF level these days? (Always seemed a decent person but all British light ent people from the 90s are suspect)
posted by Artw at 9:55 AM on November 8, 2022

Since when is Stephen Fry a TERF ?
posted by Pendragon at 11:13 AM on November 8, 2022

TERF level: heavy side-eye, bordering on "ok, boomer"

"Since when is Stephen Fry a TERF ?"

Since he publicly "remained friends with" Joanne and did an audio book for her.
(this is kind of a derail tho)
posted by Horkus at 11:30 AM on November 8, 2022 [3 favorites]

It’s gonna be a factor sooner or later, having big accounts in mastodon.social.
posted by Artw at 11:46 AM on November 8, 2022 [2 favorites]

Absolutely correct, I just meant I was being deraily for the thread about twits.
posted by Horkus at 12:18 PM on November 8, 2022

And that's https://mastodon.scot/@[e-mail] arrived.

It’s gonna be a factor sooner or later, having big accounts in mastodon.social.

Really not looking forward to Joan Cherry and the Abla party types turning up. So far I've been following people back without too much scrutiny, but suspect that will change. Really is good that so far there does seem to be a good percentage of people adding their pronouns to their profiles.
posted by Buntix at 12:34 PM on November 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

Or possibly that isn't Gaiman there's a disclaimer saying he isn't there yet. Though, it's showing as verified by a backlink to his site, so perhaps it's his "people"?
posted by Buntix at 12:37 PM on November 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

That's what it looks like from here - he asked someone more techy in his circle to set up a profile and they did, providing that caveat so he wouldn't get a bunch of publicity until he was actually using the account himself?
posted by thebotanyofsouls at 12:50 PM on November 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

The Atlantic: Elon Musk’s Twitter Takeover, Explained in 19 Elon Musk Tweets. It’s only been two weeks.

Man offers to buy website, man tells advertisers he wants to keep it from devolving into a “hellscape,” man buys website, man tweets a link to a homophobic conspiracy theory at former first lady from a website that famously claimed she died on the campaign trail in 2016. An advertising veteran suggested to me that Musk’s now-deleted Paul Pelosi tweet was perhaps the most expensive tweet ever and may have cost Twitter billions in advertising revenue. And still we tweet on!

In this case, 81.5 percent of the more than 2 million respondents said they would not pay for Twitter verification. Musk saw this information and two days later announced that Twitter would charge people $8 a month to be verified.

Yesterday began the second workweek of Musk’s tenure. He celebrated it in the traditional way, by tweeting an image of a Nazi soldier in a meme about birds.

posted by jenfullmoon at 4:04 PM on November 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

Meanwhile, Twitter is rolling out some more news about verification vs. official accounts. Just so it doesn't get confusing or anything.
posted by nubs at 5:11 PM on November 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

The new system finally makes a sort of sense. There's two badges: one for officially verified / important person with government ID check, one for "I bought Twitter Blue". Twitter Blue is being expanded to offer some new features (*). This all makes a certain kind of sense, it's a reasonable change. Except...

The cynical, exploitative thing is that it used to be a blue check meant you were verified. Now the blue check means you bought Twitter Blue. Or as Twitter's former head of product characterized it, 'the blue check will now mean nothing except “I paid the richest man on earth $8”'. They are basically strip-mining the last decade of reputation building on Twitter to extract a little money from the thing they just bought.

(*) The other half of this is by many reports, if you aren't paying your tweets will get ranked at the bottom of the tweets below all the paying members. In other words, you now have to pay $8/month to be an equal member of the free speech town square.
posted by Nelson at 6:27 PM on November 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

In other words, you now have to pay $8/month to be an equal member of the free speech town square.

I hate to say it, but I don't think that's crazy. When you think about it like "a paywall for the entire site" but then add, you can read for free, but probably only your friends will see your posts.

$8/month is kind of a lot for a lot of people, though.
posted by ctmf at 6:57 PM on November 8, 2022

Non-Edit: not crazy as in morally offensive. It might be crazy from a "making your advertisers happy" standpoint.
posted by ctmf at 6:59 PM on November 8, 2022

$8/month is kind of a lot for a lot of people, though.

I absolutely guarantee they've sat in a meeting (mind, incl. online meetings) and come to the conclusion that anyone who has a problem with $8 is someone they're happy to ignore.

...because that's what they're proposing: if you can't pay $8, you're gonna be ignored. You can read things, sure, but ain't nobody gonna be reading your things.

On the one hand I find that vile, and on the other hand I think "oh, that's a nice way to extract money from Russia".

(I don't have a Twitter account, this is just what occurred to me immediately upon reading, plz forgive me)
posted by aramaic at 7:39 PM on November 8, 2022

I don't think charging $8 to have people's tweets be visible is crazy. I think it's reprehensible, and cynical, and the exact opposite of "free speech" or "digital town square". It is venal. Worse, I expect it's going to work pretty poorly. And because they've coupled it with slashing ad views, it may actually lose them money.
posted by Nelson at 8:04 PM on November 8, 2022 [5 favorites]

"oh, that's a nice way to extract money from Russia"

Wonder if they'll take rubles.

If a paid user retweets a non-paid user, would that retweet then get "priority"? If so, it seems like a "flaw" in the plan that only one person in a community would need to pay, and then act as the tweet amplifier for the whole group,
posted by ctmf at 8:05 PM on November 8, 2022

Elon Musk's Twitter Scramble - Between The Scenes | The Daily Show

What's happening with Elon Musk is a wonderful microcosm to show you how quickly people will abandon what they say is a principle when things aren't going their way.

posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:51 PM on November 8, 2022

Tesla recalls 40,000 U.S. vehicles over potential loss of power steering assist
By David Shepardson, Reuters, 11/8/22

Tesla has issued 17 recall campaigns in 2022 covering 3.4 million vehicles.

posted by MrVisible at 9:12 PM on November 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

...because that's what they're proposing: if you can't pay $8, you're gonna be ignored. You can read things, sure, but ain't nobody gonna be reading your things.

Thing is though, that Twitter Blue is only available in 4/5 countries at the moment - USA, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. (iOS says UK, too but web Twitter leaves it out.) So even if I were prepared to pay $8, I can’t, and I don’t see anything indicating when I should be able to.

Ideally, that would mean that tweets from users outsides those particular countries would not be pushed down, but…
posted by scorbet at 11:59 PM on November 8, 2022 [2 favorites]

"oh, that's a nice way to extract money from Russia"

Yeah, I'd been thinking that on the plus side it has the potential to cut down on spam and bot accounts, but I guess it's not actually remotely expensive enough to discourage campaigns by big actors.
posted by trig at 1:16 AM on November 9, 2022

Are they still saying that the cost of Twitter Blue will be adjusted by purchasing power parity, or did that get quietly dropped?

All of this looks like a typical pattern with autocratic leaders, where he says something stupid, people rush to make it a reality, but a few reasonable people among those rushers figure out a way to create a less stupid reality while saving face for the leader.
posted by clawsoon at 2:58 AM on November 9, 2022 [1 favorite]

The Checkmark situation just got hilarious. Musk has finally realized that verification is a security and anti-impersonation measure. That Twitter will need to actually verify accounts beyond what Twitter blue and $8/month can do. But he won’t just backdown. So the answer is a second gray checkbox to indicate it is an “official” account.
posted by interogative mood at 4:09 AM on November 9, 2022 [5 favorites]

This is quite a thread from @lopezlinette:

How do I know so much about how
@elonmusk
does things? I spent 3 years investigating Tesla at
@BusinessInsider
from 2018-2021. Here are some of sloppy, dangerous, callous, things I learned:

It includes links to 16 articles about the dubious goings-on at Tesla and really does evidence how cavalier, chaotic, and empathy-free his management is.
posted by Buntix at 4:33 AM on November 9, 2022 [7 favorites]

interogative mood: The Checkmark situation just got hilarious. Musk has finally realized that verification is a security and anti-impersonation measure. That Twitter will need to actually verify accounts beyond what Twitter blue and $8/month can do. But he won’t just backdown. So the answer is a second gray checkbox to indicate it is an “official” account.

A perfect example of my autocratic leader theory, I'd say.
posted by clawsoon at 5:40 AM on November 9, 2022 [6 favorites]

It may be hilarious, but it's also disingenuous. Very few people will understand the difference between a gray and blue checkmark. This UI will strengthen disinformation campaigns.

If they truly wanted to indicated "paying customer", they should use a blue dollar-sign rather than a check mark. But they must think showing that simple reality would be déclassé. And actually, it would be a cent-sign. If the $8 fee is adjusted for local economic conditions, as they've said it will be, there will be many jurisdictions where you can buy your bot an account with a checkmark for pennies a month.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 6:49 AM on November 9, 2022 [3 favorites]

So the answer is a second gray checkbox to indicate it is an “official” account.

This seems to be now live, and I'm glad to see that it's showing on each tweet, not just on the profile. At least based on the Taoiseach Micheál Martin's Twitter profile it's been added globally, not just for people in the countries where you can buy your blue tick.
posted by scorbet at 7:25 AM on November 9, 2022

The new grey Official marks are being applied haphazardly. Or maybe Elon Musk just killed them entirely? The story is, um, developing in real time.

Also the UI is apparently changing so that by default, your notifications tab only shows $8 Twitter Blue purchasers. Confusingly they've called this "Verified" even though those people's identities are not verified.

I'm liking $8chan as the new nickname for Twitter.
posted by Nelson at 8:48 AM on November 9, 2022 [10 favorites]

And actually, it would be a cent-sign. If the $8 fee is adjusted for local economic conditions,

8¢han
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:58 AM on November 9, 2022 [4 favorites]

So something strange is happening with that "Official" badge. I asked the Twitter employee who announced that badge in the first place and she graciously replied

The official label is still going out as part of the @TwitterBlue launch -- we are just focusing on government and commercial entities to begin with. What you saw him mention was the fact that we're not focusing on giving individuals the "Official" label right now.

It's probably not worth trying to track all these changes in real time.
posted by Nelson at 9:02 AM on November 9, 2022 [3 favorites]

This seems to be now live, and I'm glad to see that it's showing on each tweet, not just on the profile. At least based on the Taoiseach Micheál Martin's Twitter profile it's been added globally, not just for people in the countries where you can buy your blue tick.

I do not see the grey 'official' check on his account.
posted by roolya_boolya at 10:12 AM on November 9, 2022

I do not see the grey 'official' check on his account.

It disappeared an hour later, as it did from everyone's. It was weird though, who had been "chosen". Several Irish Times journalists, but not Charles Michel? I'm not sure if it was still propagating through the system when Musk killed it again.
posted by scorbet at 10:32 AM on November 9, 2022 [2 favorites]

I asked the Twitter employee who announced that badge in the first place and she graciously replied

imagine being so proud of sleeping in the office and pulling 80 hour weeks to come up with a bad idea (secondary verification) to help mitigate another bad idea (pay for checkmarks) only to have your new boss shit on it and kill it in public and then agree with your new boss and eat the that shit
posted by i used to be someone else at 10:39 AM on November 9, 2022 [8 favorites]

This is a bit wierd, but I just went to Musk's profile and it seems to be suspended. I presume it's some kind of fake account or something?

(it does appear to be that)
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 10:40 AM on November 9, 2022 [1 favorite]

I assume it's fake, but nevertheless I took a satisfying screenshot of it anyway. Or someone somehow managed to do it before getting the door slammed on their ass on the way out.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:50 AM on November 9, 2022

> Just this guy, y'know: "I presume it's some kind of fake account or something?"

Yeah, this is because of one of the most baffling UX problems that persists on Twitter: lowercase l and uppercase I appear identical in the default Twitter font. So, that wasn't @elonmusk that got suspended, it was @eIonmusk.
posted by mhum at 10:55 AM on November 9, 2022 [5 favorites]

I assume it's fake, but nevertheless I took a satisfying screenshot of it anyway. Or someone somehow managed to do it before getting the door slammed on their ass on the way out.

I think it’s one that’s been around for ages. The l(L) is an I(i).
posted by Artw at 1:13 PM on November 9, 2022

The billionaire owner is holding a meeting with advertisers days after threatening to name and shame them for leaving the site

The public meeting comes days after Musk — who acquired Twitter in a $44 billion deal last month — threatened a “thermonuclear name & shame” campaign against advertisers that leave the site out of concern for his approach to content moderation.

“A thermonuclear name & shame is exactly what will happen if this continues,” Musk tweeted Friday as more companies began their advertising exits, threatening to unleash his rowdy online fans on businesses and executives that desert the platform.

The company said it would instead give officially-verified accounts a new badge to denote they’ve been confirmed to be who they say they are. It began rolling out to government officials, celebrities, news organizations and corporations Wednesday, but then some people lost the new badges. Musk soon tweeted he had “killed it” and a Twitter executive clarified later that the company was focusing on using them for “government and commercial entities” instead of individuals.

You seriously bragged out loud to say you were going to NAME AND SHAME the people who you want to give you money?!?! Seriously, this guy gets literally dumber every single day. He's going to be in every business textbook as a What Not To Do for the rest of eternity.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:51 PM on November 9, 2022 [6 favorites]

Apparently all of Twitter Blue is getting unsubscribed.

So if you see someone with a crappy fake verification you’ll know they absolutely meant to have it.
posted by Artw at 2:19 PM on November 9, 2022 [5 favorites]

I can’t stop laughing at the idea of Elon thinking he can threaten Coca Cola, McDonalds, or some other major advertiser / huge company with this thermonuclear name and shame campaign. How can anyone be so dumb.
posted by interogative mood at 2:34 PM on November 9, 2022 [6 favorites]

but joe rogan said it was based!
posted by ryanrs at 2:43 PM on November 9, 2022 [1 favorite]

Colonel "Bat" Guano : "Okay. I'm gonna get your money for ya. But if you don't get the President of the United States on that phone, you know what's gonna happen to you?"

Group Capt. Lionel Mandrake : "What?"

Colonel "Bat" Guano : "You're gonna have to answer to the Coca-Cola company."
posted by SPrintF at 2:50 PM on November 9, 2022 [7 favorites]

Apparently all of Twitter Blue is getting unsubscribed.

That's what it looks like. But actual Verified Twitter users (the old program with verification) still have checkmarks. Some of my friends who have those are now asking how to get them removed because it looks bad.

Meanwhile, people are buying the new $8 not-verified checkmarks and using them to scam people. A crypto scam with 35,000 retweets. A fake sports rumor with 10,000 engagements. There must be hundreds of these already. If only anyone could have predicted this would happen.
posted by Nelson at 2:59 PM on November 9, 2022 [13 favorites]

While details of Musk’s changes have seemed to evolve by the hour, on Wednesday he suggested that Twitter will bury content published by anyone who doesn’t pay the monthly fee. “Over time, maybe not that long of a time, when you look at mentions and replies and whatnot, the default will be [to those who are] verified,” he said. Musk added that users will be able to find posts from unverified accounts, but it would be akin to sifting through the spam folder in Gmail.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 3:37 PM on November 9, 2022

Under More/About > Twitter blue it has "Rocket to the top of replies, mentions and search Tweets from verified users will be prioritized — helping to fight scams and spam."
Of course it is not really clear if Twitter Blue users are considered "verified" and it would be a very muskian move to put your Blue Account tweets at the top when YOU search, but not for anyone else.
posted by Lanark at 4:10 PM on November 9, 2022

Burying content from non-subscribers also implies getting rid of the "Latest tweets show up as they happen" viewing mode. And iirc, their attempt to get rid of that and force everyone to use the algorithmic view is what triggered the last twitter exodus.
posted by rifflesby at 4:50 PM on November 9, 2022 [4 favorites]

can't shake the thought that, for a while, Tesla's valuation was based on the idea that the company was run by a once-in-a-generation genius, a real-life Tony Stark, and yet Musk has been doing his level best for the past year or so to make it clear that, no, if anything, Tesla isn't even run by Robert Downey Jr.
posted by DoctorFedora at 7:00 PM on November 9, 2022 [6 favorites]

To be fair, Musk is running things as well as Robert Downey Jr would have. RDJ pre-sobriety that is.
posted by jclarkin at 7:10 PM on November 9, 2022 [3 favorites]

Meanwhile, Nomads4Pritzker is a joke Twitter account that not only exists but was name-checked by the IL governor in his acceptance speech last night.

That will never earn a checkmark, but is the highest and best use of Twitter.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:19 PM on November 9, 2022 [3 favorites]

Per reports the backup feature is glitching today. If you’ve not got a backup already you might want to consider doing that before it fails entirely.
posted by Artw at 7:18 AM on November 10, 2022

Seeing a report (on Twitter,but I don't know what that is worth anymore) that the CISO, chief privacy officer, and chief compliance officer all resigned last night, leaving it up to the engineers to self-certify compliance with the FTC/other legal requirements.
posted by nubs at 7:32 AM on November 10, 2022 [4 favorites]

The report is sourced to "Twitter Slack". FWIW I heard the same thing on the rumor mill before Casey's tweet.

In addition to the usual legal requirements, Twitter is in a special position with the FTC for violations going back to 2010. I should emphasize the second half of Casey's tweet:

An employee says it will be up to engineers to “self-certify compliance with FTC requirements and other laws.”

If you are a Twitter engineer being asked to certify anything like this, you should talk to an outside lawyer first.
posted by Nelson at 7:51 AM on November 10, 2022 [12 favorites]

A blue check account identifying themself as Twitter's former CISO has tweeted about stepping down. I would not have been able to pick Twitter's CISO out of a lineup but I've found news stories referring to the person by that name.

In theory, much of this could be faked at this point, I suppose. Which, lbr, makes quitting that role seem pretty damn attractive!
posted by eirias at 7:58 AM on November 10, 2022

Seeing a report (on Twitter,but I don't know what that is worth anymore) that the CISO, chief privacy officer, and chief compliance officer all resigned last night, leaving it up to the engineers to self-certify compliance with the FTC/other legal requirements.

Without any insider knowledge: considering the speed at which Musk is demanding new features, one can assume that, amongst other things, privacy and data compliance teams (what's left of them), are being skipped entirely. If anyone is certifying anything, it's a joke.
posted by UN at 8:13 AM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

So Musk fired the whole board, right? Does this mean there is literally nobody looking out for the best interests of the company as a company, who can serve as a check his idiotic impulses?
posted by eirias at 8:31 AM on November 10, 2022

A blue check account identifying themself as Twitter's former CISO has tweeted about stepping down.

It's a "proper" blue check (has "This account is verified because it’s notable in government, news, entertainment, or another designated category") rather than a paid one and the username matches the display name, which ups the chances of it being real.
posted by scorbet at 8:34 AM on November 10, 2022

It's a "proper" blue check (has "This account is verified because it’s notable in government, news, entertainment, or another designated category") rather than a paid one and the username matches the display name, which ups the chances of it being real.

How can we tell the difference between a proper and improper blue check? I missed some semiotics here. Although I will comment again that it is very stupid and a completely useless own goal that we have to parse this so closely.
posted by eirias at 8:38 AM on November 10, 2022

How can we tell the difference between a proper and improper blue check?

If you go to their profile and click on the checkmark, then it either says "This account is verified because it’s notable in government, news, entertainment, or another designated category" or "This account is verified because it’s subscribed to Twitter Blue". However, I believe it can show either if someone was originally verified and subscribed to Twitter Blue.
posted by scorbet at 8:41 AM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Although I will comment again that it is very stupid and a completely useless own goal that we have to parse this so closely.

Stupid... unless your goal is to weaken journalism and boost misinformation.
posted by umber vowel at 8:42 AM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

In the early months of TFG's presidency, the news would report every outrageous thing TFG tweeted and the guy owned the media landscape. At some point, in the part of Europe I'm in, the media ignored those tweets and everyone could breathe a sigh of relief.

Anyway, it feels like that with Musk. Every outrageous thing he's doing and the horrible UI changes he's making and then un-making gets attention and maybe that's the scam artist doing his work. The stupidity is the medium.
posted by UN at 8:55 AM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

WashPo: Top privacy executives quit Twitter, raising questions about data security

The Slack message cited Twitter owner Musk’s return-to-office directive but also noted that the departures were different from other protest moves because the quick release of products and changes without effective security reviews was “extremely dangerous” for users.

...

The Federal Trade Commission, which reached a consent decree with Twitter in May, said it was “tracking the developments at Twitter with deep concern.”

“No CEO or company is above the law, and companies must follow our consent decrees,” said Douglas Farrar, the FTC’s director of public affairs. "Our revised consent order gives us new tools to ensure compliance, and we are prepared to use them.”

Does this mean there is literally nobody looking out for the best interests of the company as a company, who can serve as a check his idiotic impulses?

According to rumors David Sacks and Jason Calacanis are providing that role right now. Hahahaha haha hahahahaha ahhahaah.
posted by Nelson at 9:23 AM on November 10, 2022 [3 favorites]

I would love to see this motherfucker in jail for breaking laws so blatantly and proudly.
posted by seanmpuckett at 9:42 AM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Does this mean there is literally nobody looking out for the best interests of the company as a company, who can serve as a check his idiotic impulses?

Well, "best interests of the company" seem to be tough to define in the Musk era, but I'd posit the Saudis.
posted by achrise at 9:43 AM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Will be interesting to see how long the (now officially verified) account @Heretostay1488 stays active for.

Bio:

100% American Cracker 🇺🇸 Conservative White Nationalist. If it ain’t White it ain’t right 23/16🫡✊🏻Morality, Righteousness, and a future for White Children

Posting large amounts of outright nazi hate speech and media.
posted by Buntix at 9:50 AM on November 10, 2022

Oh, and here we go, as predicted a week ago:

No more remote work for Twitter staff: Musk

Detrimental effects, employee morale, self-immolating clown show etc.
posted by hangashore at 10:08 AM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

The Verge has a full copy of the internal Slack message about the privacy officers quitting and the risk to the company.

All of this is extremely dangerous for our users. Also, given that the FTC can (and will!) fine Twitter BILLIONS of dollars pursuant to the FTC Consent Order, extremely detrimental to Twitter’s longevity as a platform.

posted by Nelson at 10:20 AM on November 10, 2022 [3 favorites]

The Verge reached out to Musk for comment. Twitter no longer has a communications department.

At this point I'm just waiting for literally everyone to quit.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:28 AM on November 10, 2022 [7 favorites]

Lol. This is hilarious. Parag had claimed that ~500k spam accounts were removed every day, so the increase in this mDAU chart *could* be... Twitter no longer removing those bot accounts, and the numbers match up... pretty nicely.
posted by ryanrs at 10:29 AM on November 10, 2022 [5 favorites]

seems like a really good sign to have your compliance teams start leaving after suggesting that twitter could get into finance

istg, the flailing musk is doing is very reminiscent of the kind of leg twitches you see after you smash only part of a cockroach
posted by i used to be someone else at 10:30 AM on November 10, 2022 [3 favorites]

seems like a really good sign to have your compliance teams start leaving after suggesting that twitter could get into finance


JFC - they already have the FTC all over them, and now this is being floated?

At this point, I feel like this is a Brewster's Millions situation where there's some weird incentive for Musk to burn money and destroy things that the rest of us can't see.
posted by nubs at 10:33 AM on November 10, 2022 [6 favorites]

Former Twitter outside council Riana Pfefferkorn has a commentary thread

So, here we are, they're violating the FTC order already. Twitter has a compliance notice due to the FTC *TODAY* - 14 days after change of control. Godspeed to the poor bastards dealing with that. ...

He's the boss, but he's not a god. His whims are not self-executing. Nobody in their right mind will be like "yeah, sure, I'll self-certify to FTC compliance, I'll FAFO whether I'll get investigated for perjury." Even in a tech recession with jobs scarce: He just ain't worth it.

posted by Nelson at 10:40 AM on November 10, 2022 [7 favorites]

Damn. I thought this would be a good time to take a break from Twitter. Now I’m wondering if I ought to go back and nuke my account entirely. Although it’s hard to know whether that would actually help… they’ve got 30 days before they really “have to” delete it and god only knows whether that actually happens.
posted by eirias at 10:48 AM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

I've read and linked more twitter in the last week than in my entire life, ha ha.

(I still haven't made a twitter account, but I did a password reset on some rando's twitter and hijacked their account just to get rid of the login window.)
posted by ryanrs at 10:55 AM on November 10, 2022

Now I’m wondering if I ought to go back and nuke my account entirely.

NPR are apparently recommending their presenters stop giving out their handles, or asking for those of guests/callers. But not to delete the account to avoid having anyone usurp it and pretend to be them.

At this point I'm just waiting for literally everyone to quit.

I've actually fired two major clients (one of whom was my biggest for a decade or so) for insisting on pushing feature development at the exclusion of refactoring and security work. They both handled sensitive personal data (one was group/event hotel booking, the other a mortgage agency ffs!) so even if it weren't for the ethics of enabling them, the risk of it coming back on me if people had things like personal and bank account details hijacked...

Anyone with any responsibility for sensitive data there should really be disappearing into the sunset now as they are risking their entire careers going down with the ship.
posted by Buntix at 10:57 AM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

Who has two thumbs and is verified? @jesus
posted by inflatablekiwi at 11:08 AM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

Do not nuke your account, as it leaves the name available to be taken by bad actors. Just stop posting, stop signing in and if needed go private.
posted by Artw at 11:57 AM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Also do not ever assume that .”deleting” anything via a websites UI tools actually deleted it, it most likely just hides it.
posted by Artw at 11:59 AM on November 10, 2022

I swear to God, if the FTC doesn't go completely apeshit on his ass I will ... well I don't honestly know. But goddamn.
posted by aramaic at 12:04 PM on November 10, 2022 [5 favorites]

It’s an interesting question. is the FTC and it’s rules real or are they just a figment of their own imagination like the SEC? For the most part laws do not apply to Elon but does that apply to his company as a whole?
posted by Artw at 12:06 PM on November 10, 2022

The FTC famously handed Facebook a $5B fine - which was both the largest fine ever issued by the FTC, as well as utterly insufficient as a deterrent to Facebook.
posted by NoxAeternum at 12:59 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Tumblr is now offering double blue checkmarks for $7.99 one-time payment. (Diane Duane, yes, the writer, says they look like this and they also display next to her name on my dash.) Tumblr has had A+++ troll game the last few weeks.
posted by I claim sanctuary at 1:13 PM on November 10, 2022 [6 favorites]

I feel like Elon Musk is acting like some 19th century hot shot surgeon walking into a modern hospital and thinking he can just run the place like they did back in the old days.
posted by interogative mood at 1:14 PM on November 10, 2022 [3 favorites]

Tumblr: Important Blue Internet Checkmark may turn into a bunch of crabs at any time 🦀
posted by Lanark at 1:29 PM on November 10, 2022 [3 favorites]

> Artw: "It’s an interesting question. is the FTC and it’s rules real or are they just a figment of their own imagination like the SEC? For the most part laws do not apply to Elon but does that apply to his company as a whole?"

In the Twitter thread by the outside counsel linked above, Pfefferkorn refers to the case of Joe Sullivan, former Chief Security Officer for Uber who was convicted for his role in covering up security breaches at Uber (sentencing is still yet to come). The subhed on this Wired article suggests that such criminal prosecutions & convictions are rare though, I guess, no longer unprecedented. I imagine the risk of this kind of personal liability could have been a non-trivial factor in all of those execs leaving at once since they would presumably the ones on the hook for Elon's brazen flouting of the law. In fact, it seems that the FTC has already taken notice, e.g.: from CNBC, "FTC says it’s tracking developments at Twitter with ‘deep concern’ after key security departures":

“We are tracking recent developments at Twitter with deep concern,” an FTC spokesperson said in a statement. “No CEO or company is above the law, and companies must follow our consent decrees. Our revised consent order gives us new tools to ensure compliance, and we are prepared to use them.”

posted by mhum at 1:33 PM on November 10, 2022

I feel like Elon Musk is acting like some 19th century hot shot surgeon walking into a modern hospital and thinking he can just run the place like they did back in the old days.

So basically he's a real life Percival Dunwoody, Idiot Time Traveller from 1909 (one of the recurring characters in Ruben Bolling's Super-Fun-Pak Comix series).
posted by hangashore at 1:35 PM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

Billionaire Voted Most Likely to Snap and Build an Underwater Volcano Fortress of Evil
posted by seanmpuckett at 1:40 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Shit's happening real fast right now. Musk called an emergency meeting at the company: see here or here for journalists live tweeting the meeting. (They weren't invited, mind you...) Highlights include Musk saying the company is about to go broke and he sold Tesla stock to "save the company". Also apparently threatening to fire any employees who didn't come to the meeting if they physically could.

Now there's a rumor Yoel Roth is leaving. Yoel is the current head of Trust & Safety (I think also the new head after Elon's initial firings). He's been one of the few visible Twitter employees tweeting publicly trying to create an impression things are going OK at the company.
posted by Nelson at 1:46 PM on November 10, 2022

He’s known for posting transphobic shit, and probably being the reason trust and safety has always sucked, making him a natural Musk ally, so if he goes you know shit is real bad.
posted by Artw at 1:48 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Musk Tells Twitter Staff Social Network’s Bankruptcy Is Possible

Always assumed bankruptcy would be the eventual outcome of the leveraged buyout dumping its debt on them, didn’t think it would be raised as an option so quickly.
posted by Artw at 1:51 PM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

You know, one thing I've learned in my decades of technology experience is that when entering a new gig/project, I KNOW NOTHING and won't know enough to start making good decisions for at least 6 months. So I don't go making changes to code, build pipeline, etc. Because everything that's there now is there for a reason -- even if I don't know (or in fact, NO-ONE remembers) the reason.
posted by mikelieman at 1:55 PM on November 10, 2022 [9 favorites]

Elon Musk just told Twitter staff: “If you can physically make it to an office and you don’t show up, resignation accepted."

Literally looking for any excuse to cut people some more, eh?

Seriously, y'all, enjoy tweeting while you can, because it doesn't sound like that site will literally work much longer.
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:02 PM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

I suddenly had a flash of a future headline "Elon Musk flees to Russia seeking to escape jail time in the US"
posted by some loser at 2:09 PM on November 10, 2022 [4 favorites]

> Nelson: "Musk called an emergency meeting at the company: see here or here for journalists live tweeting the meeting."

Omg, from that first linked Tweet from Mike Isaac:

currently an emergency twitter all-hands going on with Elon Musk answering employee Q's

Elon was asked: "How are you going to deal with the expected attrition and align everyone on a shared vision?"

Elon Answer: "I don't know....we all need to be more hardcore."

Gee thanks, Elon, for the sage advice. Elon has previously used the term "hardcore" specifically related to "software engineering, design, infosec & server hardware" as in this tweet from May. If my interpretation is correct, then Elon still persists in framing Twitter's problems as primarily technological/engineering problems and not, say, product (e.g.: is Twitter even good for people to use?) or business development (e.g.: how does Twitter even make any money?). Imho, this demonstrates a fundamentally blinkered view of what the deal is with Twitter.

Meanwhile, we have this great reply:

*Writing my Twitter self-eval*

Consistent with the stated corporate strategy of “being more hardcore”, in Q42022 I turned it up to 11 in the following areas:
- Fucks given: 0
- Headbutts: +35% from Q3
- Fingerless Glove Fridays: 100% team participation
- Longer guitar solos

posted by mhum at 2:09 PM on November 10, 2022 [12 favorites]

I wrote a skit many years ago about a douchebag walking up to random people and taking offense that they don't respect him enough with the repeating line "Don't mess with me, man. I'm hardcore!" With a couple lackeys behind him going "Yeah! He's hardcore!" after each time he said it. And then it got progressively sillier as he keeps trying to prove how "hardcore" he is. I see now that's just Musk and his followers.
posted by downtohisturtles at 2:17 PM on November 10, 2022 [5 favorites]

Tumblr is now offering double blue checkmarks for $7.99 one-time payment.

I see your cheeky Tumblr trolling and raise you a Substack choosing, at this specific moment in time, to legitimately roll out a checkmark badge feature.
posted by cortex at 2:18 PM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

Just saying - great fund raiser for Metafilter would be a blue check mark by your name (temporary etc)
posted by inflatablekiwi at 2:22 PM on November 10, 2022 [9 favorites]

As it is metafilter, it'd have to be a crouton. Or bean.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 2:23 PM on November 10, 2022 [16 favorites]

Plate of beans. The upgrade is a dead goat.
posted by clawsoon at 2:26 PM on November 10, 2022 [4 favorites]

oct 27: "the bird is freed"
nov 10: "the bird has flown right into the jet engines, let me show you my best impression of sully sullenberger"
posted by i used to be someone else at 2:27 PM on November 10, 2022 [5 favorites]

Farhad Manjoo, NYT: "In the spirit of confessing dumb mistakes, though, I should end by noting my own bad call. In April, after Musk first bid for Twitter, I wrote a column pooh-poohing alarmists who said he’d be the death of Twitter. He was an accomplished tech executive, I noted; how bad could he be at running Twitter? The answer: Much, much worse than I ever imagined."

I feel sorry for everyone even remotely sane involved and especially everyone losing livelihoods over this, but Elon getting dumber and dumber by the second also brings out the eating popcorn memes in my brain as well. Like, I knew he'd be a terrible fuckup, but he manages to get so bad you can't even imagine what dumbass thing he does next.
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:29 PM on November 10, 2022 [7 favorites]

All Twitter employees, upon returning to their desks have discovered several cases of cheap chocolate and a map indicating their new sales route. Anyone not meeting quota will be publication ridiculed.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 2:36 PM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

The Verge reached out to Musk for comment. Twitter no longer has a communications department.
posted by delfin at 2:46 PM on November 10, 2022 [5 favorites]

Elon Answer: "I don't know....we all need to be more hardcore."

He did say he was bring comedy back to Twitter, and for one brief $44 billion moment he is managing to unintentionally outdo himself every couple of days in that department.
posted by clawsoon at 2:51 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Had he not trapped himself in this purchase agreement, he could've invested that $44b in crypto on FTX last week and still come out ahead of where he is now.
posted by delfin at 2:54 PM on November 10, 2022 [8 favorites]

Twitter’s content moderation head quits as departures alarm the FTC

Several top privacy and security executives resigned from Twitter on Thursday, citing fears over the risks from Elon Musk’s leadership in a stunning exodus that prompted federal regulators to warn they might step in.

The company’s head of moderation and safety, Yoel Roth, who had become the public face of the company’s efforts to reassure users and advertisers that Twitter would not descend into a “free for all,” quit after Musk held his first all-hands meeting. That followed the resignations of Chief Information Security Officer Lea Kissner, the company’s chief privacy officer and its chief compliance officer.

The privacy departures prompted a rare warning from the Federal Trade Commission, which has emerged as the government’s top Silicon Valley watchdog. It marked the second time in two days that a federal official has expressed concern about the chaotic developments at the company, coming less than 24 hours after President Biden said Musk’s relationships with other countries deserved scrutiny.

The agency said that it was “tracking the developments at Twitter with deep concern” and that it was prepared to take action to ensure the company was complying with a settlement known as a consent order, which requires Twitter to comply with certain privacy and security requirements because of allegations of past data misuse.

Twitter was first put under a consent order in 2011, and it agreed to a new order earlier this year. If the FTC finds Twitter is not complying with that order, it could fine the company hundreds of millions of dollars, potentially damaging the company’s already precarious financial state.
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:55 PM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

I would like to thank this thread for helping me through the seven days it has been since I nuked my twitter account.
posted by Stonestock Relentless at 2:59 PM on November 10, 2022 [7 favorites]

"Verified" Eli Lilly account has announced that insulin is free.
posted by clawsoon at 3:01 PM on November 10, 2022 [9 favorites]

Elon has previously used the term "hardcore" specifically related to "software engineering, design, infosec & server hardware" as in this tweet from May.

When I Google 'musk hardcore', all of the stories that came up are about how Musk put up an ad for "hardcore streetfighters" for his litigation department, one day after a report revealed that SpaceX had paid a $250,000 sexual harassment settlement to a woman who alleged that Musk exposed his penis to her and offered to buy her a horse in exchange for an erotic massage.

So, you know... hardcore.
posted by clawsoon at 3:23 PM on November 10, 2022 [3 favorites]

The absurdity of our system where one man can saddle a company with billions of dollars of debt, immediately declare half the workforce redundant and then completely wreck the business with a series of arbitrary, insane and illegal ideas.
posted by interogative mood at 3:39 PM on November 10, 2022 [18 favorites]

I don't know what everyone is upset about. I missed The Conversatron
posted by xorry at 3:44 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

I love that the new Twitter is helping us find out how real, verified people really feel. People like

Tony Blair and George W Bush

Several popes and Martin Luther

And perhaps most importantly, Jesus.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 3:55 PM on November 10, 2022 [5 favorites]

It's been a little buried amid all the other executive departures, but apparently Twitter also lost Robin Wheeler who was Twitter's head of sales (apparently recently appointed/elevated into that position, I assume because whoever was doing it before left). I'm sure it's just a coincidence that both Wheeler and Yoel Roth were moderating Elon's livestream Q&A event yesterday. Perhaps Elon's not gonna need ad sales once he just pivots Twitter to a subscription model lol.
posted by mhum at 4:05 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

It’s all quite ironic that the seeming accelerated demise of this company is being documented on that company’s product, given the links posted every so often here. Sort of like watching an Ouroborus swallow itself bite by bite.
posted by njohnson23 at 4:17 PM on November 10, 2022 [12 favorites]

I guess it's too late to give the Monkey's Paw back to Liz Truss.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 4:52 PM on November 10, 2022 [7 favorites]

I suddenly had a flash of a future headline "Elon Musk flees to Russia seeking to escape jail time in the US"

That or he goes full on sovereign citizen and spends himself broke trying to avoid jail until he takes his last few millions and hides out on some ranch of a friend where inspectors from the Agricultural Inspection Agency use their powers over farm land to arrest him and bring him to jail.
posted by Mitheral at 4:59 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Twitter Buyout Loans Get Bid at 60 Cents as Banks Sound Out Investors

Sounds like the banks who loaned money to Musk are desperately trying to dump it. Gonna be hard after that whole "we might be on the way to bankruptcy" speech, I imagine.
posted by clawsoon at 5:10 PM on November 10, 2022 [4 favorites]

New edition of Platformer rounding up the last day or so of wreckage.
posted by cortex at 5:23 PM on November 10, 2022 [6 favorites]

I never expected this to go well, but holy shit I did not expect that there would be a good chance Elon would fuck everything up this rapidly. In my younger years I might have insisted that he had to be doing this on purpose just to end the company.

Of all the things Elon has said recently, the part about bankruptcy being possible is probably the most accurate. I see a good chance that Twitter may no longer exist in a year. Hell, maybe by the end of this year. At this rate there may not be time to unsuspend people like Donnie before it goes under. I don't think MyPillow guy, the "buy gold!!one" people, and the "male supplement"/nutsack tanning people have enough ad spend between them to keep the place afloat no matter how many of Twitter's staff get shit canned.

Worse for Elon personally is that the banks are not going to be pleased if the money they lent on this deal all goes poof because of his antics. They probably expected to lose something in the placement after all the chaos, but not the whole nut. Even if his Tesla shares stop falling like a fucking rock as a side effect of all this and manage to recover some value, who the hell does he think is going to let him borrow against them in any substantial amount? He'll be lucky if he doesn't end up like Trump. At best it's going to be "sure Mr Musk, we'll be happy to take those as collateral..valued at $20 a share."

What will really suck is if that inability to raise money extends to SpaceX. Falcon 9 is almost certainly making them plenty of money, but Starship and Starlink have got to be burning through an insane amount of cash. Actual good to humanity could come from them both, but they may very well be dragged down with this albatross. That would actually be sad.

Tesla has already served its purpose. Electric cars are happening with or without them, but SpaceX still has work to do dragging the rest of the world forward.
posted by wierdo at 5:24 PM on November 10, 2022

I see a good chance that Twitter may no longer exist in a year. Hell, maybe by the end of this year.

It may literally be non-functional by the end of next week at the rate that people are being fired or quitting.
posted by jenfullmoon at 5:33 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Musk also warned not too long ago that SpaceX could go bankrupt if they didn't achieve Starship flights every two weeks next year. I'm not sure if he believes it or is using it as a poorly thought out motivation technique. In this case I think it there are even odds on Twitter going under.

It's really too bad, there was a time when I thought he was actually going to do good things with his money, I even had a Model 3 on order until I cancelled it after they removed the radar unit and claimed it was planned and not due to part shortages.
posted by beowulf573 at 5:44 PM on November 10, 2022

Elon is trapped in one of two movies scenarios with this Twitter fiasco. It’s either The Producers or Brewsters Millions. Is he destroying Twitter with an epic crash and burn to hide some accounting / investment shenanigans? Or is there some situation where he can claim an inheritance of a trillion dollars if he can blow 100 billion dollars in 30 days.
posted by interogative mood at 5:54 PM on November 10, 2022

He moved fast, and he broke things.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 5:56 PM on November 10, 2022 [8 favorites]

How bad is it for the banks if Twitter goes into bankruptcy? Is this potentially bad enough that they’ll start talking bailout?
posted by disentir at 6:02 PM on November 10, 2022

Elon: "I want things to be different."
*smashes up the place*
Elon: "oh no."
posted by SPrintF at 6:04 PM on November 10, 2022 [4 favorites]

I just deleted all my DMs from two accounts. And almost all the tweets from one of them. But am still contemplating the scenario where Twitter is completely breached or accounts become easily hackable, or data is sold for scrap, and it turns out that "delete" just means fliping an archive flag. I imagine many people are regretting the hostages to fortune contained in Twitter's infrastructure.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 6:16 PM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

don't worry, the guy who makes the backups has almost certainly been fired
posted by ryanrs at 6:19 PM on November 10, 2022 [11 favorites]

MetaFilter: it turns out that "delete" just means fliping an archive flag.
posted by soylent00FF00 at 6:20 PM on November 10, 2022

and it turns out that "delete" just means fliping an archive flag.

Data protection authorities from 27 member states have entered the chat
posted by Chef Flamboyardee at 6:35 PM on November 10, 2022 [5 favorites]

My understanding is that Elon Musks loans for Twitter are secured against his Tesla stock and other assets. I also heard that it is trading at 60 cents on the dollar right now for the small slivers of it that banks are trying to unload.
posted by interogative mood at 6:44 PM on November 10, 2022

Lockheed Martin has entered the (verified) chat.
posted by JoeZydeco at 6:50 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

Ah yes, on googling I see Musk only took $13billion in loans. I don’t have a good grasp of how big a hurt that would be for the banks, is all.

Also, lol at the concept of “only” taking $13billion in loans.
posted by disentir at 6:51 PM on November 10, 2022

Inside Elon Musk’s first meeting with Twitter employees
With Twitter staff still reeling from mass layoffs and executive resignations, Musk took questions from employees for nearly an hour. Here’s everything he said.

transcript of that all-hands meeting
posted by ryanrs at 6:52 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

ryanrs: transcript of that all-hands meeting

Thanks for the link. Overall, it sounds like he's going for the Bank of Tik-Tok as built by comparatively small teams of employees in offices who work with a maniacal sense of urgency.
posted by clawsoon at 7:06 PM on November 10, 2022 [3 favorites]

The latest from Ol' Elon:

Going forward, accounts engaged in parody must include “parody” in their name, not just in bio

To be more precise, accounts doing parody impersonations. Basically, tricking people is not ok.

Insert Who Would Win meme template with "Free Speech Absolutist and World's Richest Person" on one side and "A Couple Dozen Shitposters Tricking People" on the other.
posted by mhum at 7:07 PM on November 10, 2022 [2 favorites]

I'll be completely honest, I did not even skim that meeting transcript. If you read it, please post the funny parts.
posted by ryanrs at 7:12 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

"From an information standpoint, not a huge difference between, say, just sending a direct message and sending a payment"

That's pretty fucking funny.
posted by JoeZydeco at 7:24 PM on November 10, 2022 [1 favorite]

> ryanrs: "If you read it, please post the funny parts."

I dunno if this is a "funny" part but it jumped out at me as a "oh my fucking god this guy has no idea what he's doing" part (emph. added):

I think there’s this transformative opportunity in payments. And payments really are just the exchange of information. From an information standpoint, not a huge difference between, say, just sending a direct message and sending a payment. They are basically the same thing. In principle, you can use a direct messaging stack for payments. And so that’s definitely a direction we’re going to go in, enabling people on Twitter to able to send money anywhere in the world instantly and in real-time. We just want to make it as useful as possible.

My dude, you are talking about being a money transmitter. The problems here are not mainly technological, they are regulatory (e.g.: Know Your Customer/Anti-Money Laundering laws, minimum capital requirements, reporting requirements, etc...). This little tidbit is further cementing my opinion that Elon has considerable difficulty in understanding any problem outside of a very narrow, technological/engineering lens.
posted by mhum at 7:27 PM on November 10, 2022 [17 favorites]

Reading the transcript made me think of wooh's comment, particularly this bit:

as an ex-tweep who has a love/hate relationship with the service, the area that always frustrated me was not twitter's technology, but rather the product vision--or lack thereof. my personal theory is that nobody really ever "got" why twitter was successful...why would this weird platform that restricted you to 140 characters get so popular? there are a lot of theories that I find plausible, but the reality is that product leadership at twitter has always been terrified of making any bold moves with the product because the value proposition has always been so murky. there is this thing called twitter that a lot of people seem to enjoy for some reason...but why? how? huh? there was never a crystal clear answer to that internally, which meant that evolving the product got quite difficult. remember when they were set to allow blog post length tweets then decided not to do it at the last minute? or earlier than that, there was a massive redesign of twitter that they then scrapped completely. these are more extreme examples but this lack of vision permeates how they've tackled the product. they had twitter blue, but had no idea what to do with it. they had all of these celebrities and media people, but didn't really know what to do with them. they have power users, but don't know what to do with them. why? because twitter does not understand why twitter is successful.

All of Musk's talk about making Twitter into a short-form video site like Tik-Tok and a payment/bank-ish site like Paypal made me think that he doesn't understand Twitter's value proposition, either, despite being a heavy user of the site.

Or, rather, he understands that whatever Twitter's value proposition is, it doesn't generate enough cash to pay off a $13 billion loan, and so it has to be transformed into something that will. It needs to become an "amazing" product, and then it will generate enough money to avoid bankruptcy.
posted by clawsoon at 7:27 PM on November 10, 2022 [3 favorites]

"From an information standpoint, not a huge difference between, say, just sending a direct message and sending a payment"

"It's one tweet, Elon. What could it cost? 10 dollars?"
posted by notoriety public at 7:28 PM on November 10, 2022 [20 favorites]

Elon is trapped in one of two movies scenarios with this Twitter fiasco. It’s either The Producers or Brewsters Millions.

And here I was thinking that the last tweet before they turn off the lights ought to be "The Aristocrats"

But as much as I've been enjoying the black humor, I keep thinking about Twitter's archive as a resource for future historians, sociologists, linguists & etymologists, etcetera. It just seems so wrong that a single man could pull the plug and wipe it all out so easily.
posted by cheshyre at 7:34 PM on November 10, 2022 [12 favorites]

I know it's really the tiniest bit of this rolling dumpster fire, but the fact that Elon's making everyone come back to the office is just such a screamingly loud sign that he's a bad manager. And I know that Wall Street isn't really reacting to that sort of signal yet, partly because a lot of the older people who run the banks and so on also still kind of feel like people should be in an office.

But, "you have to be in the office to work!" is just such a blaring klaxon that you have no idea what your people do, you don't know how to measure it, and you don't know how to tell when it's done well. This should be a signal that must not only doesn't know what he's doing, but doesn't know what anyone under him does, doesn't trust them to do it, and doesn't know how to tell if they're doing it well. He only knows how to tell if work is getting done if he can watch someone sit in a chair for 40 hours a week. It's a sign he doesn't have the vaguest idea of how to manage people.

And I mean, right now, among knowledge workers whose work can be done remote, being allowed to be remote just feels like table stakes. Whoever the best engineer left is that he hasn't already fired is already interviewing for fully remote jobs at other companies who aren't going to make him go sit at a desk for 40 hours a week because they don't know what his code is for.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:52 PM on November 10, 2022 [16 favorites]

Looking in on the chaos, the comment made by a number of people that Musk has substitute teacher energy right now rings true.

(That applies to the site, not the company.)

As for the company:

Eyebrows McGee: if he can watch someone sit in a chair for 40 hours a week.

...I get the very strong impression that a mere 40 hours a week is not what he's looking for.
posted by clawsoon at 7:59 PM on November 10, 2022 [5 favorites]

Has he even admitted he's fucked this all up? Still feels like he's doubling down.
posted by ryanrs at 8:07 PM on November 10, 2022

Wow, Yoel Roth resigning is pretty shocking. Up until the very end he was trying to communicate to the world that there were still employees at Twitter trying to make things better. He was the last public facing "adult in the room"
posted by gwint at 8:17 PM on November 10, 2022 [3 favorites]

just for context about the FTC consent order, because I doubt many people remember why it exists...a bunch of accounts were hacked in like 2009-2010, most importantly being Barack Obama's. Twitter was investigated and given the consent order as a part of that. It's not hard to imagine why: imagine someone hacked the president's account and said "we are going to war with China" or even just "Taiwan is a country independent of China and we will go to war to protect Taiwan" and so on. when I was at twitter the company took security extremely seriously. of course, all those people are now gone, fired, or quit. hmm!

just thought people would enjoy a little context

also I just have to speak up for twitter's trust and safety team...twitter moderation had a lot of issues to be sure, but I knew a bunch of people on the team and nobody cared about twitter's users more. seriously. there are of course inherent contradictions to such a large social media site, and perhaps they made decisions we didn't like...but they spent an inordinate amount of time trying to do best by the users. I'd say 95% of the problems twitter moderation had boiled down to a lack of resources. the company simply refused to hire the number of people necessary to do effective moderation at scale...which led to a lot of cases getting sent to processing centers with employees who were poorly trained, didn't have sufficient fluency in the necessary languages, etc. either that or simply getting overridden by top management. but the people I met in trust and safety were some of the best people I've met in my career. I also learned about the wonderful movie D.E.B.S. from the once head of trust and safety...
posted by wooh at 8:18 PM on November 10, 2022 [12 favorites]

He only knows how to tell if work is getting done if he can watch someone sit in a chair for 40 hours a week.

How else can you tell if someone is working or just wasting time on Twitter?
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:22 PM on November 10, 2022 [5 favorites]

> Tumblr is now offering double blue checkmarks for $7.99 one-time payment.


caprisuns✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️✅️:

guy.s

i saw a post that said it maxed out at 24. so i just. kept buying em. thinking eventually i would get a little message saying i had the max amoutn. but. guys. it didnt. it did nt

posted by sebastienbailard at 8:28 PM on November 10, 2022 [8 favorites]

Best summary I’ve seen:

Okay, imagine all this, except you’re on Mars and there’s a limited amount of oxygen.
posted by inflatablekiwi at 9:03 PM on November 10, 2022 [18 favorites]

Musk has substitute teacher energy right now

Elon Musk [@clarabellum]: "this feels like in high school when they introduce a new hastily-written rule about where you’re allowed to put your backpack and everyone loses their minds and backpacks end up hanging from the ceiling and someone comes to school dressed in a big backpack"

This really is the best Twitter has ever been since David Cameron shagged that pig.
posted by Buntix at 4:08 AM on November 11, 2022

Lol just to update everyone: Twitter Blue is no longer available in US markets (seeing it from numerous sources, like this one). Probably had something to do with that Eli Lilly prank.

ETA: fyeah I'm the 888th comment - very lucky!
posted by cendawanita at 4:59 AM on November 11, 2022 [6 favorites]

Twitter Note: New Twitter accounts created on or after November 9, 2022 will not be able to sign up for Twitter Blue at this time.

So theres the original Twitter blue, the New Twitter blue which is only for old accounts, and presumably there will be a New New Twitter blue, perhaps they should call it Pepsi Blue to avoid confusion?
posted by Lanark at 5:20 AM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

A collection of brands that have been trolled
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 5:45 AM on November 11, 2022 [4 favorites]

Elon Musk: hardcore like Murphy's Law.
posted by mcgordonliddy at 5:51 AM on November 11, 2022 [2 favorites]

Waiting for the press release that Ted McGinley has joined Twitter's Board of Directors. Any time now.
posted by delfin at 7:24 AM on November 11, 2022

Two Weeks of Chaos: Inside Elon Musk’s Takeover of Twitter. A detailed summary with some new information and confirmation of a few unrealized rumors, like the original plan was to cheat employees out of their Nov 1 bonuses.
posted by Nelson at 7:25 AM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

Did the "delete fake accounts" team at Twitter get sacked? It feels like they're letting basically everything stay online today.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 8:03 AM on November 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

It looks like they have suspended Twitter Blue, at least temporarily. No idea what's going on, just relaying tweets from a journalist about internal Slack messages leaked to her.
posted by Nelson at 8:34 AM on November 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

In that public call with advertisers a couple of days ago, Musk said the $8 fee would take care of all fake accounts. Someone may pay for one month's worth, he claimed, but they would never pay for more than that! Brands are safe in his care. So his plan obviously didn't take into consideration how much damage can be done in a single month. Or that someone may pay for, I don't know, infinite months worth of scam accounts if the return on investment is good.
posted by UN at 8:34 AM on November 11, 2022 [2 favorites]

Inside the Twitter meltdown, Platformer's summary of the past day or two. They have the best access to leaks of internal info. archive link.
posted by Nelson at 8:38 AM on November 11, 2022 [4 favorites]

As to Twitthing disappearing… Given that a recent high public official used it for almost everything while in office, shouldn’t the National Archives be barking at someone’s door regarding the preservation of official government documents?
posted by njohnson23 at 8:44 AM on November 11, 2022

i work in pr/marketing, and the fact that so many agencies are all basically saying "ease up on buy ads on twitter, avoid talking about anything but your specific field/product, and start planning for an exit strategy from the platform" to concerned clients really underscores how musk's conference calls aren't doing shit for market confidence.
posted by i used to be someone else at 8:45 AM on November 11, 2022 [8 favorites]

Did the "delete fake accounts" team at Twitter get sacked? It feels like they're letting basically everything stay online today.

Those responsible for sacking the people who have just been sacked, have been sacked.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 8:50 AM on November 11, 2022 [15 favorites]

Here's the gift link of "Two Weeks of Chaos ...," the New York Times story that Nelson just posted.
posted by virago at 8:51 AM on November 11, 2022 [6 favorites]

"From an information standpoint, not a huge difference between, say, just sending a direct message and sending a payment"

Hey someone should ask Elon if he's ever heard of PayPal.
posted by loquacious at 9:10 AM on November 11, 2022 [8 favorites]

Meeting transcript Musky bits -

“ Look, my kids were basically educated by Reddit and YouTube, which, like, uh-oh.”

Pity the children…

“ I’d love to see ads for gizmos. If I saw ads for gizmos, I love gizmos, of course, I’d buy them all in a click. Even if they’re not that great, I’ll still buy gizmos. I love technology. I’ll see content for gizmos but not an ad or an ability to actually buy the gizmo. So then I have to send it to my assistant like, “Please buy this gizmo.” That’s how it goes generally. But I’d be happy to just click on it and buy it.”

I’m reading this great book - Crap by Wendy A. Woloson - about the American love for cheap junk. In her chapter on gadgets, gizmo in Muskese, she points out that most of these products were a scam, cheap garbage more or less. These products were the birth of infomercials, in the late 40’s. So, this cutting edge technocrat likes gadgets? Does he have a Pocket Fisherman? Maybe that’s spray on hair on the top of his head? I guess he envisions Twitturd as a soapbox for the likes of Ron Popiel and other snake oil salesmen.
posted by njohnson23 at 9:16 AM on November 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

shouldn’t the National Archives be barking at someone’s door regarding the preservation of official government documents?

Given that all that data would probably be of most use to national intelligence agencies or PMC/Private law enforcement to get all the DMs of dissidents, politicians, journalists, and people trying to arrange an out-of-state abortion then I rather hope someone like that steps in and nukes all the DMs (guessing the NSA probably already have a copy) while preserving the public data.
posted by Buntix at 9:19 AM on November 11, 2022

Side note from the Times article - He named his kid X Æ A-12? What nonexistent respect I had for this guy just decreased further in to trans finite realms.
posted by njohnson23 at 9:35 AM on November 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

That's what I got from the article too - the kid's unfortunate name. Elon Musk and Grimes reveal how to pronounce baby’s name – but they disagree
posted by achrise at 9:38 AM on November 11, 2022

Let’s face it the kid is gonna have a different name when they live their life in hiding from their dickhead father.
posted by Artw at 9:52 AM on November 11, 2022 [13 favorites]

I think that what they failed to take into account is than in some countries (Europe and probably others), you can get a 'no questions asked refund' in the app store for 14 days.
So people were buying Twitter Blue for a prank and cancelling it a few days later to get a refund.
posted by Lanark at 10:16 AM on November 11, 2022 [9 favorites]

eli lilly might be quite peeved at musk and twitter blue, given how their stock had a sharp drop and apparently took sanofi and novo nordisk (two other major insulin manufacturers) with it

which, you know. could be used to short stocks by bad actors

the wildest thing to me is how many people of a certain demographic (the kind who generally think anyone who doesn't look like them is of a "political" identity) are absolutely convinced that this is some sort of 11-dimensional chess

it's like they think hanlon's razor doesn't apply if the incompetence is coming from someone with billions
posted by i used to be someone else at 11:05 AM on November 11, 2022 [7 favorites]

I'm having a schadenfreude overdose attack pleas halp
posted by Pyrogenesis at 11:12 AM on November 11, 2022 [14 favorites]

it's like they think hanlon's razor doesn't apply if the incompetence is coming from someone with billions

Wealth is a sign of God's grace genius.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 11:13 AM on November 11, 2022

"In Bluebird, Twitter’s consumer division, dozens of product managers were laid off, leaving just over a dozen of them. The new ratio of engineers to managers was 70 to 1, according to one estimate."

Hahahahahahahahahaha NO.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 11:14 AM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

Just AGILE it. It’ll be fine.
posted by Artw at 11:20 AM on November 11, 2022 [2 favorites]

If the SEC did exist then it seems to me like this sort of thing might be the sort of thing to interest them.
posted by Artw at 11:26 AM on November 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

Meanwhile...
posted by Pyrogenesis at 11:31 AM on November 11, 2022

According to random TikTok dev it looks like Twitter pushed its dev code straight to prod.
posted by interogative mood at 12:03 PM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

continuing the incompetence-that-is-actually-11-d-chess:

Twitter sent an HR email to every laid off employee acknowledging it's late getting people their separation agreements and release of claims. But the company messed up the BCC and it has become a reply-all catastrophe.

(source)
posted by i used to be someone else at 12:07 PM on November 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

He named his kid X Æ A-12?

Adding to the indignity, he named the kid after his old company, X.com, that got folded into PayPal.
posted by aneel at 12:11 PM on November 11, 2022

Technically this is a contract that sells your kids soul to Peter Theil for 1000 years.
posted by Artw at 12:15 PM on November 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

Musk's personal lawyer (you know, the guy who said that the FTC doesn't scare his boss) is now telling employees that they won't be legally liable for signing the FTC certifications:

After losing thousands of employees and top compliance officials at Twitter Inc., Elon Musk’s deputies are racing to contain heightened concerns that staff will be held liable for security lapses.

Musk’s lawyer Alex Spiro, who is guiding the legal team following the billionaire’s acquisition, sought to reassure employees that they would not go to jail if the company is found in violation of a Federal Trade Commission consent decree, according to a message viewed by Bloomberg.

You don't need to be Mon Calimari to realize how much of a trap this is.
posted by NoxAeternum at 12:48 PM on November 11, 2022 [10 favorites]

But hey, the blue checks are actually blue on the mobile dark theme now! Talk about progress!

(It actually looks like dogshit, but that's obviously the least of Twitter's worries at the moment)
posted by wierdo at 1:13 PM on November 11, 2022

The Verge: Scoop from ⁦@MiaRSato:⁩ Omnicom - one of the largest ad agencies in the world - is recommending clients pause Twitter spending https://t.co/nlQH4fBp6W

"The risk to our clients' brand safety has risen sharply to a level most would find unacceptable," the memo reads. "We recommend pausing activity on Twitter in the short term until the platform can prove it has reintroducted safeguards to an acceptable level and has regained control of its environment."
posted by delfin at 1:42 PM on November 11, 2022 [2 favorites]

Musk's personal lawyer (you know, the guy who said that the FTC doesn't scare his boss) is now telling employees that they won't be legally liable for signing the FTC certifications:

Musk’s lawyer is not your lawyer, etc.
posted by nubs at 1:42 PM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

It should be noted that they also laid off staff in Japan (the country with the second highest number of twitter users after the US) and

the Japanese employment system does not allow a company to fire an employee without a legitimate reason. Takeshi Okano, head of Atom law office, who has apparently been consulted by Twitter employees on legal matters, said, "Simply saying 'because the owner has been replaced' or 'because the company is in the red' is not a legitimate reason for layoffs."

Okano added, "Since the employees have only received the notice, they will now likely negotiate whether to stay with the company or seek retirement by mutual agreement under better conditions."
posted by LostInUbe at 1:58 PM on November 11, 2022 [4 favorites]

Spiro's actually right about this: “It is the company’s obligation. It is the company’s burden. It is the company’s liability.”

If I as a lowly software engineer try to promise the FTC that my employer is in compliance with their consent decree, FTC isn't interested in punishing me, they aren't interested in me at all. They'd ask how I got in the room and tell my employer to bring somebody real.

Now, if Spiro offers you a battlefield promotion to Director of Compliance, that's a trap.
posted by away for regrooving at 2:09 PM on November 11, 2022 [5 favorites]

Not sure if this has been posted yet, but apparently the paid $8 verification has been dropped.
posted by loquacious at 2:15 PM on November 11, 2022

The move to scrap the six-person information security team

hoo boy that's a "holy shit" coming and going

Only 6? Now 0? For the team that among other duties

also monitored Twitter’s sharing of user data with dozens of commercial partners and research organizations, some of whom have access to a programming interface that can be used to view sensitive non-public information about Twitter users, such as location data, IP addresses and unique device identification codes, the people said.

“The people at Twitter doing the checks on that access are simply not there anymore,” one of the people said, adding that the privacy and security of user data has been put at risk as a result.

posted by away for regrooving at 2:19 PM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

Not sure if this has been posted yet, but apparently the paid $8 verification has been dropped.

“Basically, tricking people is not OK,” Musk tweeted

lol, roflmao. has there ever been a worse takeover of a company, a worse product rollout, a stupider person in charge of billions of dollars
posted by dis_integration at 2:25 PM on November 11, 2022 [15 favorites]

Twitter has given a blue check verified mark to @Jesus
The account has been around for 14 years but some are questioning whether he truly is the messiah?
posted by Lanark at 2:36 PM on November 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

In answer to the above questions, I would say no. Guinness Book of Records level of incompetence.
posted by njohnson23 at 2:36 PM on November 11, 2022

Is there a Guinness record for most amount of money lost in a business ever? Asking for an enemy.
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:39 PM on November 11, 2022 [7 favorites]

“I’d love to see ads for gizmos. If I saw ads for gizmos, I love gizmos, of course, I’d buy them all in a click. Even if they’re not that great, I’ll still buy gizmos. I love technology. I’ll see content for gizmos but not an ad or an ability to actually buy the gizmo. So then I have to send it to my assistant like, “Please buy this gizmo.” That’s how it goes generally. But I’d be happy to just click on it and buy it.”

This tickles me; the "I love gizmos" thing is clearly him trying to be relatable -- "hey, I'm just like you, we're all geeks, right?" -- but what actually comes across is "I'm so rich that I employ someone to make my impulse purchases for me."
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 2:45 PM on November 11, 2022 [8 favorites]

The account has been around for 14 years but some are questioning whether he truly is the messiah?

No, he's a very naughty boy!
posted by Greg_Ace at 2:54 PM on November 11, 2022 [13 favorites]

The account has been around for 14 years but some are questioning whether he truly is the messiah?


Guess we'll find out in 19 more years?
posted by a non mouse, a cow herd at 2:58 PM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

i used to be someone else: eli lilly might be quite peeved at musk and twitter blue, given how their stock had a sharp drop and apparently took sanofi and novo nordisk (two other major insulin manufacturers) with it

Let's see... about $16 billion drop in valuation for Eli Lilly, $11 billion for Novo Nordisk, $8 billion for Sanofi, all three showing a similar drop starting around 3pm EST on Thursday.

All three saw a bigger drop near the beginning of August, so it's hard to tell whether this tweet is actually related to the drop in valuation or just a coincidence, but it makes my week more amusing to believe it does, so let's go with that.
posted by clawsoon at 3:19 PM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

Troll mastery:

christmas ✅ @DojaCat
i don't wanna be christmas forever @elonmusk please help i've made a mistake

Elon Musk ✅ @elonmusk
You should be able to change your name now

Elon Musk ✅ @DojaCat
thank u
posted by clawsoon at 3:31 PM on November 11, 2022 [32 favorites]

This tickles me; the "I love gizmos" thing is clearly him trying to be relatable -- "hey, I'm just like you, we're all geeks, right?" -- but what actually comes across is "I'm so rich that I employ someone to make my impulse purchases for me."

You misspelled “how do you do, fellow kids?”
posted by fedward at 3:32 PM on November 11, 2022 [4 favorites]

It's amazing how much Elon is using the Trump playbook. Come from a position of power but play the victim. Fire people just because. Be an agent of chaos because its easier than the kind of consensus that makes things better in the long term. And the only thing that matters in the end is you're the Main Character every day.
posted by gwint at 3:57 PM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

Elon thinking he's doing a solid for glam photoshoot Doja Cat when he's actually getting Bitch I'm A Cow Doja Cat
posted by cortex at 4:28 PM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

This is just to tweet

I have ruined
the site
where you spent
your days

And which
you were planning
to use
forever

Forgive me
I was
So rich
and so stupid
posted by umber vowel at 4:31 PM on November 11, 2022 [21 favorites]

The SF paper apparently staked out the Twitter building to report no actual influx of employees reporting to work.
Also:
"There had also been speculation on Twitter that remote employees would use the company’s unlimited PTO policy in lieu of returning to the office Friday."
posted by gingerbeer at 6:18 PM on November 11, 2022 [9 favorites]

In answer to the above questions, I would say no. Guinness Book of Records level of incompetence.

But how do we know that you are the real Guinness Book of Records and not just some scammer who's going to be adding records like "most inflatable Pokémon fucked in an hour" or "Highest rate of calzones launched into the space, eyyyy! Over a 24 hour time period"?
posted by Buntix at 6:21 PM on November 11, 2022 [1 favorite]

I feel like we're going to need a new thread on this, stuff keeps happening and it's taking a long time to load?
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:23 PM on November 11, 2022 [4 favorites]

I feel like we're going to need a new thread on this

That'll be $8.

Same as in twown.
posted by Buntix at 6:40 PM on November 11, 2022 [13 favorites]

$20 $8 $0, SAIT
posted by fedward at 6:51 PM on November 11, 2022

Elon Musk ✅ @DojaCat
thank u

HOLY SHIT HAHAHAHAHAHA
posted by loquacious at 6:59 PM on November 11, 2022 [4 favorites]

The instant shopping feature is already available on TikTok and Facebook. Twitter is just playing catch-up there.
posted by interogative mood at 7:51 PM on November 11, 2022

I'm now wondering about comparably bad fiascos

AOL/Time Warner comes to mind (look it up if you don't remember or don't know the details, it's rather incredible)

But other than that? This is definitely one for the history books
posted by wooh at 7:51 PM on November 11, 2022 [4 favorites]

“It is a Mathematical Certainty” – Lawyers, Guns & Money

When you say things like this, a lot of people—including front-pagers and commenters on this site—will respond with something along the lines of “good riddance”, and expound airily on twitter’s toxicity and uselessness. And frankly, I find that smug and not a little bit stupid. In the current state of the internet, with RSS effectively dead and Facebook a walled garden, there is no other platform for discoverability that isn’t ultimately about lifestyle, that allows people to just talk and share their experience and expertise. Even if you’re not on twitter, you’ve benefited from it. Every time you’ve been exposed to a new perspective, from activists, scientists, artists, or critics. Every time a self-satisfied pundit has found themselves getting cut down to size by people who actually know what they’re talking about. Every time a video or a photograph that the news wasn’t going to air has gone viral. And that’s just among people like us. In other parts of the world, or among marginalized communities, twitter has been an invaluable tool for connection and organization, for promulgating information and new ideas. There is nothing else that fulfills that need, and it will be a profound loss when it is gone.

posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:58 PM on November 11, 2022 [20 favorites]

Holy shit ahaha the verified fake tweets are so good more please. (Not safe work work, life, taste or sanity or Ted Cruz.)

https://i.imgur.com/Yg1hkTw.jpeg
posted by loquacious at 8:03 PM on November 11, 2022 [3 favorites]

Musk should have learned twitter's lore and wisdom:

maple cocaine @maplecocaine

Each day on twitter there is one main character. The goal is to never be it

7:20 PM-2 Jan 2019

posted by sebastienbailard at 8:12 PM on November 11, 2022 [6 favorites]

We should have a way for the Federal government to step in a put a stop to these kind of toxic buyouts that saddle some company with an impossible to pay back debt load and end up destroying thousands of jobs. The law should require these kind of leveraged buy outs get subjected to a review and if they can’t pass some basic common sense there is no deal.
posted by interogative mood at 8:29 PM on November 11, 2022 [2 favorites]

We should have a way for the Federal government to limit the size that a company can be and still be privately owned, or owned by private shareholders. If a company wants to grow past a certain size, it should be required to become a democratically-controlled employee/customer cooperative. So (a) some billionaire can't swoop in and destroy peoples' livelihoods and the tools they depend on, and (b) there aren't pathways for sociopathic idiots to become billionaires by extracting wealth from the labor of others' through financial instruments that let them exert autocratic control over them.
posted by biogeo at 8:43 PM on November 11, 2022 [10 favorites]

" The law should require these kind of leveraged buy outs get subjected to a review and if they can’t pass some basic common sense there is no deal."

Someone will know the name of this, but utilities in a couple of states are subject to a rule where they're forbidden from paying out dividends to investors if rates have increased unreasonably fast OR quality is falling. I think I read that this is also the law in German venture-capital-type buyouts? Basically the venture capital group must present a plan for sustaining or improving the company's operations in the regulatory filings they have to do, and then they're forbidden from paying out dividends to investors if the company fails to get reasonably close to the plan they lay out.

Anyway, there's a name for this but I don't remember what it is.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 9:28 PM on November 11, 2022 [4 favorites]

Twitter can now be turned off, this tweet cannot be improved upon:

Twitter Community: Knock Knock
Elon: Who's there?
Twitter Community: Parody
Elon: Parody who?
Twitter Community: Pairodeez Nuts

posted by Eyebrows McGee at 9:37 PM on November 11, 2022 [25 favorites]

Basically the venture capital group must present a plan for sustaining or improving the company's operations in the regulatory filings they have to do, and then they're forbidden from paying out dividends to investors if the company fails to get reasonably close to the plan they lay out.

Anyway, there's a name for this but I don't remember what it is.

"Proper government regulation"?
posted by Greg_Ace at 10:30 PM on November 11, 2022 [9 favorites]

The other bit from that Lawyers, Guns, and Money thing that I think is really important is..

We should talk more about the fact that fiduciary responsibility running only towards the shareholders makes induced collapses like Twitter’s inevitable, and what can be done to prevent that.

Because yeah, this *was* all predictable, and yet, they could not have refused because it *was* such a stupidly good deal, even though it violated every principle and will result in the company eventually not existing.
posted by corb at 10:49 PM on November 11, 2022 [13 favorites]

it's like they think hanlon's razor doesn't apply if the incompetence is coming from someone with billions

If you have enough money that you can own the entire working lives of tens of thousands of extremely smart experts you don't get to attribute anything to merely being stupid.
posted by srboisvert at 4:00 AM on November 12, 2022

LGM: In other parts of the world, or among marginalized communities, twitter has been an invaluable tool for connection and organization, for promulgating information and new ideas. There is nothing else that fulfills that need, and it will be a profound loss when it is gone.

Related to this point, Brian Hioe (Taiwanese journalist), writes: Twitter is A Transnational Company

Though I often disparage Twitter as a hell site—seeing as I spend most of my time on there fighting with tankies, right-wingers, and other awful people—I don’t deny having had powerful experiences there. I’ve connected with many, many other activists around the world, for example, sometimes with dramatic results.

In one case, an international Milk Tea Alliance network tried to crowdsource the geolocation of an activist threatening suicide while trying to talk that person out of jumping off a building, then immediately scrubbed all evidence of the event once they were safe.

But it’s the same bad cycle over and over with platforms, it seems: building rich vibrant communities, and then having them taken away or rendered useless by our capitalist overlords. Facebook, Tumblr, Instagram, whatever.

It should go without saying that sensitive communication should be taking place on apps with end-to-end encryption, and never on Facebook, Twitter, or other large social media platforms.

Anyone who says that this is not an issue with Mastodon, since you can just switch to an encrypted platform, is either lying or stupid. Mastodon does not have end-to-end encryption; the owners of any Mastodon instance have access to its users’ DMs, and it’s altogether too easy to add people to conversations by mistake. You’d be surprised at the communications among high-profile activists and journalists take place over unencrypted DM. I’ve seen this myself even among, uh, household names in more than one country. Inevitably, people get sloppy.

And I do think about this. As lax as Twitter can be, when they wanted to they at least had the resources to mount an initial legal response. Private mods may not be able to do so even when they want to. At least a culturally influential subset of fandom clubbed together to form a nonprofit that drives AO3 for that purpose. I suppose this should go into the Mastodon thread but it's telling that every response I've seen logged in defense of Mastodon as a possible social space option has barely 1% of that activist energy to come together in response to the actual social stressors identified to date. Telling of what, I don't know.

Anyway, Brianna Wu reporting: 1/ Just want to put this news in plain language for people.

Senior people at Twitter have resigned in the last 48 hours. We now now why. They said in private Slack channels that @elonmusk is so desperate to recoup his money, he’s taking crazy risks with YOUR privacy and safety.

Capping off with Chris Ògúnmọ́dẹdé: Related to my previous tweet saying that talk of the Great Twitter Exodus is mostly a "Global North" phenomenon is the idea that this place is basically the only real avenue for many in the West to come across people and perspectives from the "Global South" they may never have.

Twitter is where you can get perspectives on events and issues in African countries without the filters and gatekeeping lenses of Western media or academia. Its potency on the continent isn't so much in the number of its users, but its ability to reverberate across ecosystems.

I've often said that #EndSARS wouldn't have materialized in Nigeria the way it did but for Twitter. Nigerian media mostly blanked it initially and international press didn't even know it was happening. They were *forced* to cover it because of Nigerians' collective activism.

More in his thread.
posted by cendawanita at 5:54 AM on November 12, 2022 [10 favorites]

This tickles me; the "I love gizmos" thing is clearly him trying to be relatable -- "hey, I'm just like you, we're all geeks, right?" -- but what actually comes across is "I'm so rich that I employ someone to make my impulse purchases for me."

"I mean, it's one iPhone, Michael. What could it cost? 44 billion dollars?"
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 8:04 AM on November 12, 2022 [4 favorites]

But why is sharing such viewpoints engendering guilt?
posted by cendawanita at 8:38 AM on November 12, 2022

Twitter is gone. To whatever extent it was fit for purpose it no longer is, and never will be again even if Elon steps away. We can mourn it but we can’t pretend it still exists as a useful entity.
posted by Artw at 8:40 AM on November 12, 2022 [3 favorites]

We can mourn it but we can’t pretend it still exists as a useful entity.

The problem is that there has been a glut of takes like this one about how social media was Bad and Wrong and we should be glad that a channel that has given many marginalized people a voice is collapsing. These takes come from a position of privilege that a) ignores all the good that social media has done and b) avoids the discussion that perhaps the problem is more about cultural mores among the people running these services. Which is why it's important to point out who is getting hurt over all this.
posted by NoxAeternum at 9:07 AM on November 12, 2022 [8 favorites]

I think there’s got to be room for all of “Twitter’s death is at this point inevitable,” “Twitter has produced some bad outcomes that are regrettable and is poised to produce more before it dies,” and “Twitter has allowed for some good outcomes we don’t currently have another easy path to achieve.”
posted by eirias at 9:24 AM on November 12, 2022 [3 favorites]

We don’t have another easy path to achieve the good outcomes Twitter had. Ok, what are some of the hard paths then? How can we make those hard paths easier (while trying to prevent the bad things Twitter also achieved)?
posted by nat at 9:30 AM on November 12, 2022 [3 favorites]

The harm is real, but I can remember a time when Twitter and Facebook were considered very much a phenomenon of the Global North. It seems like that changed, rather abruptly, at some point in the 2010s. I wonder if anyone has any good historical reading on the subject?

On the one hand, it seems like there might be a positive lesson here -- origin is not destiny, and even systems dreamed up by and for the most privileged members of the most privileged societies can be put to good work by working people worldwide. If that happened for the likes of Twitter and Facebook, it could surely happen for the fediverse as well.

On the other, perhaps the lesson is pessimistic -- if the penetration of corporate social media is mostly due to subsidization of feature phones and the like (i.e. wealth transfer from VCs to the global working class), a decentralized non-corporate network is unlikely to ever be able to replicate that.

I have no actual thoughts at this time, but would be interested in learning more about the underlying causes here.
posted by Not A Thing at 9:31 AM on November 12, 2022

I keep bringing up fandom culture as a comparison not only because literally 70% of my tabs is an AO3 page. Fandom is also not a monolith just as much as the Fediverse. Even while AO3 is trundling along, other fandom cliques spend as much energy advocating *against* it. But that nonprofit I mentioned, OTW, also started AO3 using open source code and actual server hardware (just like many instances) and crucially, advocacy and legal service planks in order to respond to the fraught legal environment such creative works operate in. Eventually that work wasn't just for the American properties with pretty men in them: even here on Mefi there was coverage when China basically declared non-state fannish culture to be politically subversive and shut down their local sites, and many (using VPNs) then migrated into these more Western spaces. There was a phase of getting used to each other's norms and I don't think we're all there yet, but it's there. They could've certainly started their own web hosting except for all the political factors briefly outlined. And China isn't the only country that's identified fandom as politically subversive. (I mentioned before mine bans FF.net)

Not speaking for other people, but I'm patently uninterested in making people feel bad with my shares. If being challenging is causing guilt, I don't know what am I supposed to do with that, but that does articulate one facet of the notion I see where other substitutes to twitter now is described as so 'nice' and 'chill'. I am interested to see if there'll be an Organization for Transformative Works or at least a consortium of instances that can commit resources or something towards not losing the public discursive space that has been useful to people. I am curious why fannish ladies could see the legal pressures and techbro free speech advocates can't.

And even in Hioe's piece, he says: Taiwan’s embrace of Twitter in past years grew, in part, out of concerns about the safety of Facebook. Mark Zuckerberg has a real hunger for the Chinese market. Amazingly, he actually asked Xi if he would give his unborn child a Chinese name in 2015, explicitly denying his wife’s parents an honor traditionally bestowed on grandparents in Chinese society. And then, the apparent algorithmic censorship of pro-Taiwan commentary on Facebook led to Taiwan’s Facebook users jumping onto Twitter en masse.

Apart from the threat of disinformation regarding geopolitical flashpoints like Taiwan and Ukraine, anyone who wound up on Twitter because of potential censorship concerns now needs to worry about their information being handed over to governments that would put them in jail or worse. This is true from Singapore to Myanmar, to Hong Kong, and elsewhere, I’m sure.

Those who I see who are posting more challenging sentiments aren't foolish either. They're usually the ones who live more directly under harm. It's a useful exercise to think about why they're more cynical about the digital flight.
posted by cendawanita at 9:32 AM on November 12, 2022 [10 favorites]

I suspect we’re still going to get Brexits and Trumps and other bad things social media has made possible, I hope we keep the good stuff as well.
posted by Artw at 9:45 AM on November 12, 2022 [1 favorite]

In a thread crossover, Twitter's ability to quickly amplify media and local interpretations has been crucial for keeping Western support for Ukraine. It's aided by Ukrainians' good language skills, but Twitter was key to making it the first social media war as well as crowdfunding for both weapons and humanitarian aid.

I wouldn't have connected to her usually, bit I send occasional money to a woman in Kyiv who distributes funds to organisations that aid Ukrainian animals - because Twitter lets her spread the word as well as forge social bonds of trust by sharing her daily life, her seven cats and news of blackouts and everyday life. This, magnified by thousands, is how Ukrainians use Twitter to keep their cause alive.
posted by I claim sanctuary at 10:47 AM on November 12, 2022 [12 favorites]

Elon James: I was part of the folks who were on the ground back in #Ferguson in 2014. Twitter didn’t spawn that movement. It was the people on the ground that used Twitter to start that movement. We literally changed who voices that were trusted. All of a sudden news accounts became noise. It was that person who you saw live-streaming from the protest that you trusted. We literally shifted power w/ no check marks. I think that can happen anywhere. Including #Mastodon.

2014 Twitter was less driven algorithmic boosting, but still a Twitter with its culture of virality. It’s going to be interesting to see how Mastodon, which is socially and technically built on a pattern of NOT encouraging virality, does. My hunch is it’s the Brexit/Trump style crap that was benefiting from that the most and the rest does better organically, but I absolutely don’t know for sure.
posted by Artw at 11:28 AM on November 12, 2022 [3 favorites]

Twitter is gone. To whatever extent it was fit for purpose it no longer is, and never will be again

Eh, I don't know about all that. The verification is a nice thing, but I don't think it's strictly neccessary. You just can't take anything at face value right away. I follow some people I trust, they recommend others. In some cases I follow several that seem to be "in the know" of the thing I'm interested in. Say, the Jan 6 thing, vote counting, whatever it happens to be. I take everything with a grain of salt, and unfollow people who turn out to be full of shit. Over time, you build up your own "provisionally verified" network.

And I'm pretty confident Elon is going to reinvent content moderation from scratch in rapid time. Where "reinvent" = get right back to where all the professionals were before he even started, but think it was his idea. Twitter just needs to hang on a bit for that.

But it's probably financially doomed before we find out.
posted by ctmf at 11:30 AM on November 12, 2022

The financial time bomb is the one reason I’m not wild upset at the thought of it continuing in its present high risk state. If it somehow does pull through, and people start treating it as having “gone back to normal” it’s going to be an active menace.
posted by Artw at 11:42 AM on November 12, 2022 [1 favorite]

There’s also this issue to come:

I’m thinking about the many, many amazing talks and case studies Twitter engineering published over the last decade about how insane was it to keep the site up during World Cups.

Well, guess what starts in about a week?"

(Tweet from Phil Calçado)
posted by scorbet at 12:16 PM on November 12, 2022 [12 favorites]

Think about Cricket, if it lasts that long.

They just fired most of everyone from the Cricket heavy countries so they probably aren’t thinking about it.

Oh and this guy sounds super pleasant to work with.
posted by Artw at 12:18 PM on November 12, 2022 [4 favorites]

But he’s an absolute gentleman!
posted by fedward at 6:14 PM on November 12, 2022 [3 favorites]

> Oh and this guy sounds super pleasant to work with.

Luke Simon aka Luke Evans Simon: he's taken his Twitter private, with the bio "An absolute gentleman." William Pietri, former Twitter manager, digs *in* on this post, in an informative way.
posted by Pronoiac at 6:19 PM on November 12, 2022 [11 favorites]

Man, that guy is SO going to regret his words. I mean, it was entirely trivial to find most of his online life in about five minutes.

...talk about fucking up his operational security. Like, jesus christ dude, have you never in your life had to worry about your words being taken against you?

...and the answer of course is no, obviously not. Fucking idiot. This is why criminal conspiracies implode, by the way, there's always someone stupid enough to fuck the whole thing up. People like this guy. Wow.
posted by aramaic at 6:46 PM on November 12, 2022 [4 favorites]

“Elon Musk right now is like if Elmer Fudd bought a website of Bugs Bunnies”
posted by larrybob at 6:46 PM on November 12, 2022 [6 favorites]

When someone explains how Mastodon works
posted by Winnie the Proust at 7:12 PM on November 12, 2022 [5 favorites]

When someone explains how Mastodon works

Seems like they're reinventing the wheel here. Why not simply use a base-plate of prefamulated amulite, surmounted by a malleable logarithmic casing?
posted by aubilenon at 8:35 PM on November 12, 2022 [12 favorites]

Pffft. That would just put your two sperving bearings in a direct line with the pan metric fam.
posted by migurski at 8:58 PM on November 12, 2022 [11 favorites]

Assuming this is a screencap because he deleted it, EM apparently tweeted that Twitter drives 'a massive number of clicks to other websites' only to have the tweet get a reader-submitted context flag that the claim is untrue.

The tweet that I'm linking above summed it thus: He might own the app, but the app keeps owning him lol
posted by cendawanita at 7:12 AM on November 13, 2022 [7 favorites]

It's a real tweet and it's still online: people screencap Musk either to not give him the traffic or because he has a habit of deleting tweets. FWIW he is wrong of course; this Birdwatch factcheck puts Twitter's share at 7%. Which is higher than I would have guessed! But, um, Facebook is 70%+.

The most hilarious thing about Musk not understanding Internet referral traffic is the involvement of Jason Calacanis in Musk's Twitter. Back in 2007 Calacanis founded Mahalo, a spammy content farm whose business model was writing shitty pages that were just keyword loaded enough that Google was tricked into sending a bunch of referrals to them. Mahalo showed a bunch of ads, making them money from their spam. This lasted until 2011 when Google radically changed its algorithms and stopped sending much traffic to content farms like Mahalo and the business died. Calacanis should have a real intimate understanding of Internet search referrals from his failure.

(Sadly, this same Google update is what drove a lot of traffic away from Metafilter and led to a significant reduction in revenue here. Eleven years later and Metafilter's still around but the finances are dire.)
posted by Nelson at 7:20 AM on November 13, 2022 [15 favorites]

(if the reference to mahalo.com sounds familiar, previously, to show you the quality of content)
posted by i used to be someone else at 8:34 AM on November 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

Good freaking grief. (And I would suggest Ed Markey is not someone Musk really wants to be fucking around with.)
posted by Kat Allison at 9:29 AM on November 13, 2022 [7 favorites]

Mocking a Senator, what could possibly go wrong.
posted by Mitheral at 9:38 AM on November 13, 2022 [4 favorites]

inspired by real events please enjoy this one page RPG called "I do not want a mastodon" in which you are given a mastodon you do not want by well meaning people who do not understand that you do not want a mastodon
posted by MrBadExample at 9:43 AM on November 13, 2022 [7 favorites]

Mocking a Senator, what could possibly go wrong.

Markey's reply: "One of your companies is under an FTC consent decree. Auto safety watchdog NHTSA is investigating another for killing people. And you’re spending your time picking fights online. Fix your companies. Or Congress will."
posted by gwint at 9:49 AM on November 13, 2022 [23 favorites]

You know, as a manager I believe that legal and HR departments are my advisors, not my boss, and I don't really have to listen to them. I ALSO believe that if that's not a very very rare event where I know I'm taking a risk to gain something else more important, I'm an idiot. I don't think Musk gets the second part.
posted by ctmf at 10:11 AM on November 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

To that list I would add "communications director" if that applied to me.
posted by ctmf at 10:31 AM on November 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

Whoever actually runs Space X is going to have a fun time pretending to agree with Elon that antagonizing the US government while living off NASA subsidies is a good idea.
posted by Artw at 10:34 AM on November 13, 2022 [4 favorites]

Musk is now in the process of cutting contractors (don't they typically go first?), with, of course, zero notification.

Many found out they weren’t working for the company anymore after they abruptly lost access to Twitter’s internal systems. “One of my contractors just got deactivated without notice in the middle of making critical changes to our child safety workflows,” one manager posted.

posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 11:11 AM on November 13, 2022 [4 favorites]

It's literally Bob the Angry Flower: Atlas Shrugged 2 in real life.
posted by Horkus at 11:26 AM on November 13, 2022 [10 favorites]

Musk is now in the process of cutting contractors

Also worth noting that apparently a huge/most amount of their content moderation was done via subcontracting (as apparently is that of FB et. al. Possibly so they can avoid having to pay for MH counselling for those doing it).

So next week will be Twitter, unmoderated.

Last week was the best, funniest. Now comes the fall.
posted by Buntix at 11:26 AM on November 13, 2022

Après moi...
posted by gwint at 12:20 PM on November 13, 2022

"Also, I might not want to navigate the legal and ethical red tape of starting a bank if my chief privacy officer, chief information security officer, and chief compliance officer had all just resigned."
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:22 PM on November 13, 2022 [3 favorites]

So next week will be Twitter, unmoderated.

And the week after, Twitter unplugged.
posted by SPrintF at 1:22 PM on November 13, 2022

I predict Musk will put someone in as CEO in the next week and announce he’s taking a break from tweeting to focus on strategy.
posted by interogative mood at 1:42 PM on November 13, 2022

lol tweeting was his strategy
posted by ryanrs at 2:01 PM on November 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

Next week is also when the EU starts getting involved. There'll be a meeting some time in the earlier part of the week with the Irish Data Protection Commission about the lack of Data Protection Officer, whether Dublin is actually still the main Twitter establishment for GDPR purposes, among other things.

(Ireland supervises at the moment, because Twitter has its main EU establishment in Dublin. However, this has now lost a considerable amount of staff. If it no longer is considered the main establishment, then instead of having Ireland's DPC being the main point of contact, any of the 27 EU countries may go after Twitter, for a breach of GDPR, or other EU laws.)
posted by scorbet at 2:03 PM on November 13, 2022 [10 favorites]

The World Cup Finals are in 5 weeks, he should be in electrical-fire-in-hair genius mode if he truly has one (NARRATOR: [fill in your own prediction here]).
posted by rhizome at 3:25 PM on November 13, 2022 [1 favorite]

"Next week is also when the EU starts getting involved. "

My GDPR compliance team basically spent all week speculating and marveling and making memes about how catastrophic this is going to be for Twitter. Like, even the interns cannot get over it.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 3:44 PM on November 13, 2022 [10 favorites]

Over on Tumblr I'm seeing reports that popular blogs are getting an increase of at least double the normal number of new users over the last week.
posted by Lanark at 4:17 PM on November 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

So next week will be Twitter, unmoderated.

A suggestion regarding that:

Katie Anderson: Musk fired most of the contractors responsible for content moderation and that means they'll be relying more on automated moderation, so I think it's time to reinstate my policy of flagging all ads as containing graphic nudity before blocking the advertiser.
posted by Artw at 5:37 PM on November 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

Musk, probably: Like, what if we were a small startup, just a handful of passionate people who pull all-nighters? But with the app already built and running, and a user-base already there?

Advisors: well we would still have to--

Musk: We're moving into a crappy office in SoMa with a brick wall!
posted by ctmf at 6:13 PM on November 13, 2022

I wouldn't have connected to her usually, bit I send occasional money to a woman in Kyiv who distributes funds to organisations that aid Ukrainian animals - because Twitter lets her spread the word as well as forge social bonds of trust by sharing her daily life, her seven cats and news of blackouts and everyday life. This, magnified by thousands, is how Ukrainians use Twitter to keep their cause alive.

Interestingly, reddit's /r/ukraine subreddit has a bunch of people like this for you to choose from. So I suspect it will get even more popular now that Twitter is in the Shitter
posted by some loser at 6:29 PM on November 13, 2022

And in a rob Peter to pay Paul move, SpaceX has just so happened to "buy" advertising on Twitter.
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:06 PM on November 13, 2022 [2 favorites]

really quite selfishly, i just need twitter to limp along until this Sunday, once my general elections is quite finished, though apparently a number of functions are clearly eroding. For myself in the last week I'm getting added to more and more spam chats.
posted by cendawanita at 8:16 PM on November 13, 2022 [1 favorite]

More on the SpaceX ad buy - apparently, it's ostensibly to advertise Starlink in Spain and Australia. (Of course, we all know the real reason for the buy.)
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:19 PM on November 13, 2022

I thought this was a thoughtful chost on how people feel about twitter dying: No-one likes to hear "first time?" when their online social life collapses

people have hashed various angles of this in this thread so I don't know that it's totally original, but it vibes with how I feel. I've gone through this before, but it still sucks. Twitter had a lot of bad things going for it, but it also was my "city," for better or for worse. I'm better positioned than many to "move" digitally, as it were, (artists are really going to struggle to rebuild their followings) but the sort of existential loneliness one can feel while sort of building up these new platforms is tough! I'm simultaneously loving cohost, but also missing all of my twitter mutuals.
posted by wooh at 10:00 PM on November 13, 2022 [5 favorites]

I lost my online communities due to social media, which is why I'm here.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:28 PM on November 13, 2022 [14 favorites]

It feels a bit like when we mourned all the independent bookstores getting crowded out by giant book chains, and then the chain bookstores all got killed by online retail.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 12:57 AM on November 14, 2022 [7 favorites]

And in a rob Peter to pay Paul move, SpaceX has just so happened to "buy" advertising on Twitter.

Tesla and SpaceX are paying engineers to work at twitter. Now they're buying ads while many other corporations are running away from the company. Does that not make Tesla/SpaceX investors a little bit...annoyed? I mean, if Musk's support for terrorism against politicians isn't enough...
posted by UN at 3:02 AM on November 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

The idea of flagging all ads as graphic nudity makes me wonder: is this something an advertiser can sue a user over?
posted by eirias at 5:45 AM on November 14, 2022

They are showing their ass though?
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:01 AM on November 14, 2022

well, at least twitter got to keep the $8!

A fake tweet sparked panic at Eli Lilly and may have cost Twitter millions (Washington Post, Archive Link)

Company officials scrambled to contact Twitter representatives and demanded they kill the viral spoof, worried it could undermine their brand’s reputation or push false claims about people’s medicine. Twitter, its staffing cut in half, didn’t react for hours.

...

By Friday morning, Eli Lilly executives had ordered a halt to all Twitter ad campaigns — a potentially serious blow, given that the $330 billion company controls the kind of massive advertising budget that Musk says the company needs to avoid bankruptcy. They also paused their Twitter publishing plan for all corporate accounts around the world.

yet another note that twitter isn't responding to requests for comment:

Twitter’s communications team also did not respond; many of its employees were fired in the massive layoff that Musk imposed on Nov. 4

posted by i used to be someone else at 6:38 AM on November 14, 2022 [5 favorites]

So, uh, who's still excited to trust their life to a self-driving car developed under and approved by the same management team?
posted by biogeo at 6:55 AM on November 14, 2022 [16 favorites]

So there's now a mastodon instance for ex-Twitter employees, and browsing the timeline I saw a claim that Twitter's main git repo and all its branches have been made read-only.

A git repo (repository) is where the code is kept, so what that means (if true) is that no one writing code at Twitter can actually do anything with it, even deploy it to a test server or integrate it with the code everyone else is writing.

It might not be true or it might be a brief outage, but that's potentially a big problem if it lasts.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 6:58 AM on November 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

well, at least twitter got to keep the $8!

Not even that. If the "fake" account was purchased through a credit card, the user can cancel the payment because the service (the Twitter account) has been terminated.
posted by SPrintF at 7:38 AM on November 14, 2022

Ask A Manager: I work at Twitter, what do I do?
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:16 AM on November 14, 2022 [5 favorites]

trust their life to a self-driving car developed under and approved by the same management team

Thing is, hurtling down the highway in a car being driven by someone else doesn't feel especially unsafe. Hurtling down the driveway in a Tesla being driven by code held together by AI baling wire and hubris feels... pretty much the same.

It shouldn't. It really shouldn't.

At least most other auto makers are taking things a little bit slower.
posted by tigrrrlily at 8:20 AM on November 14, 2022

Thing is, hurtling down the highway in a car being driven by someone else doesn't feel especially unsafe. Hurtling down the driveway in a Tesla being driven by code held together by AI baling wire and hubris feels... pretty much the same.

I just rented a Model Y, and I can tell you that no, they don't. Especially when you are behind the wheel.
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:26 AM on November 14, 2022

The Model Y is having a bad moment in China.

Today, according to Tweets, Musk is busy changing Twitter's architecture to eliminate specific product features as an optimization. When he's not busy firing individual employees for writing mean tweets. So I guess he's not thinking about cars today (the ones under criminal investigation for their full self driving claims). Nor about spaceships; the person who actually runs SpaceX just took over the troubled Starship development. One wonders how Musk has time at all to dig tunnels or implant electrodes in monkey brains.
posted by Nelson at 9:07 AM on November 14, 2022 [6 favorites]

Science Twitter is valuable, but Twitter is going through an uncertain phase at the moment. Let's archive the Science Twitter follow graph using scientists' ORCIDs just in case. We built a tool for this.

Via Carl T. Bergstrom.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 9:42 AM on November 14, 2022 [6 favorites]

A bunch of people are reporting their followers disappearing, and not just from the general exodus, I wonder if that is linked to the Github lockdown?
posted by Lanark at 10:00 AM on November 14, 2022

The disappearances may be down to this earlier from Musk: "Part of today will be turning off the 'microservices' bloatware. Less than 20% are actually needed for Twitter to work!" (via)

Locking the github branches so no changes can be pushed and rolled out when nuking 80% of the background services running the place seems an odd choice.

It's kinda: "Let's drive this car into a wall, but first, off with the seatbelts!"
posted by Buntix at 10:37 AM on November 14, 2022 [7 favorites]

this is truly incredible content
posted by ryanrs at 10:42 AM on November 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

Musk was boasting about how productive his team at Tesla of 150 engineers working on self driving features were compared to the thousands of engineers working at other companies. I have a 2020 Subaru Forester as my normal vehicle. I drive a couple times a week and use the lane following, collision avoidance and adaptive cruise control all the time. I recently got to drive a Tesla model Y for a week. The experience of the Tesla feature was awful. During the first drive some road spray got on the drivers side camera and the system just shut off and threw a warning that I had to pull off to be able to read. Once I got it working the lane following kept randomly shutting off it I touched the steering wheel, while on the Subaru is happily just resumes after you swerve around an obstacle or change lanes.

The UI was a horror show that is completely unintuitive and makes simple tasks like adjusting temperature something you’ll have to pull off to do.

So IMO his 150 person team hasn’t produced anywhere near the capabilities of Subaru.
posted by interogative mood at 10:53 AM on November 14, 2022 [21 favorites]

After Musk tweeted that Twitter was slow because "[the] App is doing >1000 poorly batched RPCs", at least two software engineers called him on it publicly. At least one got fired.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 11:01 AM on November 14, 2022 [13 favorites]

Twitter comment from one of the linked threads: He is years' worth of xkcd punchlines.
posted by clawsoon at 11:09 AM on November 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

At least one got fired

Well, I mean, they were baited into it by a pretty irresistable and personal attack. But contradicting your boss in front of a world-wide audience is not considered a wise career move in any company. Unless you are sure you meet the criteria of "protected disclosure" in whistleblower protection law.
posted by ctmf at 11:22 AM on November 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

It appears that one of the microservices may be the one that sends out confirmation codes to allow people to download their data archive.

Example error message here

Possibly this would also be the same service that does the 2FA for logins.
posted by Buntix at 11:37 AM on November 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

Triggered by the ask a manager post: do you still have COBRA coverage if a company can no longer pay severence. IE is there COBRA insurance like there is bank account insurance?
posted by Mitheral at 11:49 AM on November 14, 2022

The narrative right now is that Musk’s egomania drove him to buy and inevitably ruin Twitter because he hoped to transform it into X, his totalitarian “everything app” WeChat clone he wanted to send us to space with. But there is another, simpler narrative here. A man who grew up in apartheid South Africa, whose family owned a diamond mine, who made his name helping cyberlibertarians bypass banking laws, manipulating the US tax system to build faulty self-driving cars, and shooting rockets into space in the hopes of establishing debt slavery on Mars, bought an app built by activists and Black Americans, and that is relied on by the Global South as a valuable democratic tool, and is used by journalists around the world as a free and open source of information, and tried to turn it into his personal country club. This is just the mundane nightmare of watching a wealthy man wreck his new plaything — an imperfect, but vital communication system for some of the most vulnerable and marginalized communities in the world. This is a colonialist doing what colonialists do. And I hope that when this embarrassing circus is over, we can figure out how to build something back that someone like Musk can’t turn into his new diamond mine. From Ryan Broderick in Garbage Day.
posted by Bella Donna at 11:54 AM on November 14, 2022 [13 favorites]

Unless you are sure you meet the criteria of "protected disclosure" in whistleblower protection law.

Plus if you win a lawsuit against Twitter or Musk and they end up owing you money: your call will be answered in the order we received it. Please hold.
posted by ctmf at 12:03 PM on November 14, 2022 [4 favorites]

From the link I posted above:
the fact is that Twitter is breaking and, as someone who has spent the last two weeks outside of the US, it is breaking down in different ways depending on how and where you access it — I’ve seen upside down threads, disappearing tweets, my spam filters are broken, and I’ve seen links being incorrectly blocked for malicious content. But it’s not just falling apart on a structural level, it’s also creating a cascade of bizarre sociopolitical effects across the world.

Broderick goes on to list and link to several examples, including:
In Japan, the lack of curated news topics has turned the site into 4chan. There are reportedly about a dozen people left working for Twitter in India, where the company is still actively suing the country’s right-wing government over content removal. Twitter Mexico is shut down completely...

Garbage Day is totally worth reading today. However bad Twitter seems in the US, it is even more of a shit show outside of it.
posted by Bella Donna at 12:38 PM on November 14, 2022 [6 favorites]

But contradicting your boss in front of a world-wide audience is not considered a wise career move in any company. Unless you are sure you meet the criteria of "protected disclosure" in whistleblower protection law.

Making a name for yourself as a competent engineer who knows what they're talking about and is unafraid to speak up about it to management is honestly pretty savvy. Especially since the guy who got fired tweeted a whole thread's worth of lucid diagnosis and recommendations to Musk before he got fired.

An engineer at Reddit publicly invited that guy to apply for work at Reddit in the mentions, so this feels like maybe a get for both that specific engineer and for Reddit's development team. And a slap in the face for noted Redditor Elon Musk, while we're here.

(I'm a senior developer at my company, and my kneejerk instinct upon reading that guy's tweets was "Boy, I'd hire him in a heartbeat.")
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 1:45 PM on November 14, 2022 [18 favorites]

An engineer at Reddit publicly invited that guy to apply for work at Reddit in the mentions

I think I also saw an invitation from Square.
posted by clawsoon at 1:53 PM on November 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

So IMO his 150 person team hasn’t produced anywhere near the capabilities of Subaru.

It's worse than that - he's comparing them to the teams at Cruise and Waymo working on robotaxis. Tesla is years behind those teams. They recently had a new FSD Beta release that dramatically improved performance - apparently they achieved that by implementing an approach (occupancy networks) that was first published years ago. I don't think Tesla has published anything particularly novel with regards to autonomous driving. The fact that their big public change is an old, well understood technique leads me to believe they don't actually have anything.

They don't publish statistics, but even the new vastly improved AI seems to have a disengagement every 100 or so miles. That's several orders of magnitude behind the state of the art. I think the Tesla AI team is good at stoking Musk's ego and making themselves look good, which is how they've been able to spend half a decade working on their senior thesis self-driving car project. I think Autopilot will work well as a driver-assistance technology, but I don't believe it'll ever be at a point where Teslas can operate without a driver on public roads.
posted by heathkit at 2:08 PM on November 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

I think at some fundamental level, both Musk and Putin are suffering dramatic consequences for surrounding themselves with yes-men.
posted by ryanrs at 2:13 PM on November 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

Hoping for more dramatic suffering ensuing TBH.
posted by Artw at 2:23 PM on November 14, 2022 [7 favorites]

Musk really on the RW conspiracy Flavor Aid.

@jasonselvig: "The owner of Twitter is hanging out in the comments of murderer Kyle Rittenhouse."

[Tweet contains a screenshot of Rittenhouse complaining about the "haters" coming out. Someone replying notes that all the "haters" are unverified and that the verified comments are positive, therefore Musk's new verification is working. Musk replied: "Interesting"]

@josh_emerson: "Exactly like the Paul Pelosi post. He’s such a moron."

[Musk responding to a post about a theory that FTX was laundering money for the Democratic party].
posted by Buntix at 2:29 PM on November 14, 2022 [4 favorites]

> CheeseDigestsAll: "After Musk tweeted that Twitter was slow because "[the] App is doing >1000 poorly batched RPCs", at least two software engineers called him on it publicly. At least one got fired."

> Buntix: "The disappearances may be down to this earlier from Musk: "Part of today will be turning off the 'microservices' bloatware. Less than 20% are actually needed for Twitter to work!" (via)"

Lol, called it. There is no gotdang way I'm gonna believe that Elon (or any of the Tesla people he dragged along with him) understands the architecture of Twitter enough to be making these kinds of judgement calls.
posted by mhum at 2:31 PM on November 14, 2022 [5 favorites]

Jenn Takahashi (of @BestOfNextdoor fame) has created @BestOfDyingTwit for your schadenfreude needs.
posted by JoeZydeco at 2:55 PM on November 14, 2022 [7 favorites]

Oh and don't log out if you have 2FA because that's apparently one of the microservices that just got killed.
posted by JoeZydeco at 2:56 PM on November 14, 2022

Oh and don't log out if you have 2FA because that's apparently one of the microservices that just got killed.

Either it’s back, or it wasn’t down everywhere, because curiosity made me try about 3 hours ago, and just now, and both times I got an SMS code (I’m in Germany, though). But it might still be a good reminder that you can get backup codes for your 2FA, that at least shouldn’t rely on SMS codes or emails working.
posted by scorbet at 3:06 PM on November 14, 2022

So what I'm getting is that Musk is Henry Ford, and Twitter is a combination of The Dearborn Independent and Fordlandia.
posted by clawsoon at 3:18 PM on November 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

Is someone going to tell him?

@engineers_feed Nov 13
Harvard study found that hiring one highly productive ‘toxic worker’ does more damage to a company’s bottom line than employing several less productive, but more cooperative, workers.

@elonmusk Nov 13
Output of any company is the vector sum of people within it. Someone may be a strong vector, but negatively affect those around them to such a degree that they are a net negative.
posted by Lanark at 3:27 PM on November 14, 2022 [4 favorites]

the man is deluded enough to be handing out management tips even as he is hounded by failure every waking hour
posted by ryanrs at 3:35 PM on November 14, 2022 [6 favorites]

He’s excited that twitter’s daily active users are up, even though it is just people tuning in to watch it burn to the ground. Also more users with fewer advertisers means a faster burn rate.
posted by interogative mood at 4:12 PM on November 14, 2022

But if the burn rate is faster doesn't that mean a higher isp so they can loft bigger payloads?
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 4:26 PM on November 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

This thing with the engineers, I can't help but be reminded of the space shuttle Challenger disaster when the engineers working on the solid rocket booster systems recommended against launch, and got overruled by the company's upper management (the show must go on!). But maybe that's a bit of a far-fetched analogy, not like Elon does rocket launches or anything like... oh.
posted by hangashore at 4:30 PM on November 14, 2022 [11 favorites]

He makes any kind of product that can spontaneously blow up.
posted by Artw at 4:37 PM on November 14, 2022 [5 favorites]

Given the reports above about Twatter dropping out here and there around the world, does anyone know of an online real-time graph charting the life signs of the company that we can watch while munching popcorn?
posted by njohnson23 at 4:43 PM on November 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

Secrets of history revealed: Odysseus paid $8 to get the Trojan Horse verified.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 4:48 PM on November 14, 2022 [2 favorites]

There go the contractors.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:49 PM on November 14, 2022

Gwynne Shotwell has basically made SpaceX into a successful company despite Elon Musk.
posted by interogative mood at 4:49 PM on November 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

Fingers crossed for them getting a chance to see how well they can do that without government money.
posted by Artw at 4:58 PM on November 14, 2022

Hoo boy today's Platformer is full of amazing new scoops. It's some paywall newsletter thing so best I can do is link the author's tweet. Summary:

1. Twitter's internal teams summarized all the risks of the new not-verified blue checkmarks. Musk and Esther Crawford ignored them, they launched, then they all came true.
2. The contractor purge was without warning. Employees refer to Elon's Tesla and SpaceX minions as "goons". And "the company’s Slack channels over the weekend told a story of already-low morale finding a new basement."
3. There is a full lockdown on writing code at Twitter. Not just a code freeze for production; the source code is locked down entirely. No one quite knows why but it may be paranoia about sabotage. "On Monday morning, at around 1:45 AM, Twitter engineers were called into an emergency meeting"...
4. The advertiser exodus is growing.

posted by Nelson at 5:34 PM on November 14, 2022 [6 favorites]

Twitter Engineer Fired On Twitter Calls Musk’s Team “A Bunch Of Cowards”
posted by Artw at 5:50 PM on November 14, 2022 [6 favorites]

There is a full lockdown on writing code...it may be paranoia about sabotage

The one astute concern he's had this entire time.
posted by Greg_Ace at 5:52 PM on November 14, 2022 [5 favorites]

I was able to read today's Platformer by clicking "let me read it first" in the popup, FWIW.

On Monday morning, at around 1:45 AM, Twitter engineers were called into an emergency meeting. A new order had just come down from Musk: freeze all production changes on Twitter systems, effective immediately.

This was more than just a run-of-the-mill code freeze, during which engineers can commit code but not deploy it. Those are fairly common, and Twitter has been under one for most of the time since Musk took over. Such freezes are generally intended to reduce the chances that a bug disrupts Twitter’s systems.

This time, however, engineers were told they couldn’t even write any code — “until further notice,” according to an internal email obtained by Platformer. Exceptions will be granted if there is an “urgent change that is needed to resolve an issue with a production service, including any changes reflecting hard promised deadlines for clients,” the email said, and employees get “approval from VP level and Elon explicitly stating that the change needs to be made.”

On Slack, even engineers who attended the late-night meeting were confused. “Is there a ticket I can reference?” asked an engineer who was being tasked with implementing the freeze. “I don’t see any context.” “We don’t have much context as of now,” a colleague responded. “But this is coming from Elon’s team.”

In the meantime, we’re told engineers are writing code locally, on their laptops, and waiting for the freeze to end.

posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 6:12 PM on November 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

In the meantime, we’re told engineers are writing code locally, on their laptops

So, uh, not to be That Guy, but this is how you tell which engineers are wannabe-stooges. The non-stooge would go "OK, guess I'm reading/writing docs until they unfreeze. Nifty."
posted by aramaic at 6:22 PM on November 14, 2022 [5 favorites]

we’re told engineers are writing code locally, on their laptops

It doesn't say it's Twitter code.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 6:53 PM on November 14, 2022 [7 favorites]

So, putting all these stories together -- (1) they fired a lot of people in an unkind way, (2) they hired some of them back before anyone's hurt feelings had time to wane, (3) one of the senior engineers got exposed for maligning those returnees and declaring intent to fire them again as soon as practical, and (4) now there's a code freeze -- I'm wondering if someone finally realized they're sitting on a sabotage risk here.
posted by eirias at 7:50 PM on November 14, 2022

why would you even need to sabotage it further?

it is sabotaged enough, just get popcorn.
posted by ryanrs at 8:53 PM on November 14, 2022 [3 favorites]

I just keep thinking of a meme I have that says, "People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget that you pushed to prod on Friday."

This whole debacle has major "pushed to prod on Friday" vibes.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 9:11 PM on November 14, 2022 [10 favorites]

it'll be interesting to see what comes out about the code freeze, but I think there are some pretty simple reasons...namely, the site is already starting to go down. it's an extremely complicated beast, they fired everyone, and now are probably scrambling to understand wtf is happening. so it's like...quit changing anything, let's figure out what the heck is going on. on top of that, twitter uses a bespoke version of git that it built to serve its gigantic monorepo. they've gotten it to a ~good place, but it was a gigantic clusterfuck for a long time. it is not in any way a normal git repo, there's a bunch of twitter-specific tooling to service twitter's particular codebase (including a version of git that they implemented themselves). I wouldn't be suprised if the tooling around all of this is underwater, given all of the firings. "Why do we need 50 people working on dev tooling??" I can't confirm what the firings look like in that space or how those services or doing, it's just some plausible speculation (I know some people who worked on all this stuff and even very briefly worked on it myself, but I haven't seen them talking about this area in particular)

My guess though is that it is mainly nobody knowing how the heck to manage twitter giving the firings and the random shutting down of services lol
posted by wooh at 9:38 PM on November 14, 2022 [10 favorites]

Yeah, it sounds like what my first reaction would be to inheriting this mess too. Nobody touch anything unless it's an emergency repair, come make your case to me (mostly so I know wtf is going on and why, I'll probably approve it). Since I know nothing of this industry and this would be my first naive reaction, I assume it's probably not that simple.
posted by ctmf at 9:46 PM on November 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

Since I know nothing of this industry and this would be my first naive reaction, I assume it's probably not that simple.

on the other hand: Elon Musk has proven time and time again that he is a complete idiot

unrelated, but something about his exchange with the android engineer that I found hilarious is that in the DMs with jack and parag that came out during the law suits, he kept talking about how he just wants to talk to engineers, he's a hardcore engineer, talk to engineers!! so here is an engineer giving him way more good faith than he deserves and talking to him like one engineer would talk to another, and he absolutely cannot handle it lol. I mean we all knew the emperor had no clothes, but it's pretty amazing
posted by wooh at 9:55 PM on November 14, 2022 [24 favorites]

Tesla cars seem to continue to have really basic quality control issues as this Youtube video demonstrates.
posted by interogative mood at 10:03 PM on November 14, 2022 [1 favorite]

"People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget that you pushed to prod on Friday."

If you write everything directly to prod in real time then you don't have to worry about that!!

Given that references to development servers are turning up on the live website my guess is that Elon's team are writing directly to prod bypassing all the version control systems, and the code freeze is so that those code hacks/edits don't get overwritten.
posted by Lanark at 1:42 AM on November 15, 2022 [4 favorites]

the code freeze is so that those code hacks/edits don't get overwritten.

And the longer it's frozen, the more code that's going to be piling up in local repos needing to be merged into main.

And if they just shove that straight out of the door because they no longer have the staff to do proper testing...

Hoo boy.
posted by Buntix at 1:50 AM on November 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

and how will they merge all the changes made to prod back into the repo? do they even know whats been changed?
posted by Lanark at 1:58 AM on November 15, 2022

And I hope that when this embarrassing circus is over, we can figure out how to build something back that someone like Musk can’t turn into his new diamond mine.

You say the party's over but our love shines like a diamond mine. - Blue Rodeo.

It just took about 30 years for these lyrics to really make sense to me.
posted by srboisvert at 3:05 AM on November 15, 2022

and how will they merge all the changes made to prod back into the repo? do they even know whats been changed?

Most source control systems like git are distributed so you have a copy of the repository locally to make changes to and can push them later. This is great when the network is down or you have a pointed headed boss.
posted by beowulf573 at 5:40 AM on November 15, 2022

I have been at a company of around a dozen people where this would happen and it was HORRIBLE. My contribution to this mess was to get hired, make a fuss about trying to get sone kind of source control process in place and get fired a week later, which honestly I am grateful for as I’d clearly made a huge mistake.

What that would be like at a company with the size and complexity of Twitter with actual real CI pipelines in place already I can’t imagine…
posted by Artw at 5:43 AM on November 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

with actual real CI pipelines in place

@allpointsnorth: "If someone told me that Elon was wandering the corridors of Twitter HQ asking anyone if they’d seen Jenkins, as he’s responsible for all the builds and he couldn’t find him anywhere I’d sort of believe it at this point."
posted by Buntix at 5:57 AM on November 15, 2022 [15 favorites]

The tweet where Elon fired Eric Frohnhoefer has been deleted. I think he is still fired, but with Elon anything is possible, he is probably trying to convince HR that Eric quit.
posted by Lanark at 6:18 AM on November 15, 2022 [4 favorites]

Surprised nobody has shared https://twitterisgoinggreat.com - similar to Molly White's web3 site with the same name but less optimized for mobile.
posted by thebotanyofsouls at 6:28 AM on November 15, 2022

There's (now?) a Mastodon instance for ex-Twitter employees

edit: ignore this, I missed the earlier link, sorry
posted by sarble at 6:51 AM on November 15, 2022

@allpointsnorth: "If someone told me that Elon was wandering the corridors of Twitter HQ asking anyone if they’d seen Jenkins, as he’s responsible for all the builds and he couldn’t find him anywhere I’d sort of believe it at this point."

Jenkins? The vibe I'm getting is more Leroy Jenkins...
posted by clawsoon at 6:55 AM on November 15, 2022 [5 favorites]

Pushing something untested directly to prod is definitely a Leeroy Jenkins sort of move.
posted by fedward at 7:13 AM on November 15, 2022

Jenkins? The vibe I'm getting is more Leroy Jenkins...

Jenkins is an industry standard build management tool - at my workplace, we use it to generate deployment artifacts from git repositories which are then used by other tools to deploy to live environments.

That said, it's not exactly uncommon for the Jenkins server to be named Leeroy...
posted by NoxAeternum at 7:13 AM on November 15, 2022 [8 favorites]

Disappointed to say I've just been let go from Twitter. I was in charge of making sure no cursed videos ever played onscreen that would kill the user in seven days. Hoping the team can continue my work. Upwards and onwards
7:38 PM · Nov 14, 2022
@rajandelman
posted by umber vowel at 8:29 AM on November 15, 2022 [11 favorites]

> Lanark: "If you write everything directly to prod in real time then you don't have to worry about that!!"

Over the weekend, I made a crack about that whole deal:

Twitter engineers: are you sure you want us to deploy the dev build to prod?

Elon: yeah sure why not we do it at Tesla all the time

The engineers who drove their Teslas to the office that day: uhhh...

posted by mhum at 10:31 AM on November 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

At my last job I knew a guy who often wore a T-shirt something like this:

I don't usually test my code but when I do, I test it in production.

posted by kingless at 11:13 AM on November 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

@GergelyOrosz

Scoop: another ~10 Twitter employees who made sassy or critical remarks about Twitter's current leadership on a Twitter internal Slack channel have been terminated overnight.

Several were respected sw engineers. One person was told they are let go "for recent behaviour".

This follows of letting go of four software engineers the past day who have publicly corrected or criticized Elon Musk.

People I'm talking with are surprised that as little as supporting their peer seemed to warrant termination.

The comments were made on internally public watercooler channels, where people joke around or let out the steam.

As a current software engineer at Twitter told me how they feel: "nobody is safe, it seems."

I have not heard such draconian culture in a tech company: till now.

[continues...]

TBF I suspect a lot of tech companies would fire people for fomenting insurrection.

But, as a rule, that doesn't happen because the bosses aren't generally so assinanely naive as to try and make their entire social existence an extended stand-up routine riffing on how dumb, and shit, and lazy, and Soros-paid, and woke, and fuck-knows-what-else the people that do the work to make them the monies are.

Hope someone has https://blog.twitter.com/engineering/en_us and https://blog.twitter.com/ backed up as an elegy.

They really knew their anions.
posted by Buntix at 11:36 AM on November 15, 2022

And he's mocking a former employee alongside a bigoted domestic terrorist.

Just sickening.
posted by NoxAeternum at 12:40 PM on November 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

Searching ad inventory brings back some interesting anecdata.
posted by Artw at 12:41 PM on November 15, 2022

If I am reading this correctly, all the equity compensation both vested and unvested converted to cash at $54.20 per share when the company went private. The document notes that this is approximately a 38-to-54% premium over the price when Musk began making moves to acquire the company.

So possibly his liabilities for this equity compensation is also a big part of why is is firing as many people as he can and intentionally creating a hostile workplace for the rest?
posted by rustcrumb at 12:48 PM on November 15, 2022 [3 favorites]

Searching ad inventory brings back some interesting anecdata.

Ooooh, that's why all my ads are just tweets from weird randos who paid for the privilege now.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 12:51 PM on November 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

And he's mocking a former employee alongside a bigoted domestic terrorist.

Jesus.
posted by fedward at 12:53 PM on November 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

LA Times: Is the world’s richest person the world’s worst boss? What it’s like working for Elon Musk

Because Musk makes new employees sign tough nondisclosure agreements, and because he’s developed a reputation for exacting retribution on those who cross him, we’ll never know all the stories.
But there’s plenty in the public record. Personal attacks. Union busting. A casual attitude toward factory floor injuries and other health concerns. A dismissive approach to workplace racism. And an allegation involving a horse and sexual favors.

Another whistleblower, Martin Tripp, moved to Hungary to escape the wrath of Musk after the news site Insider ran a story about excessive scrap waste at Tesla’s battery factory in 2018. Private investigators hired by Musk to identify the source named Tripp, a factory employee.
Tripp was fired. Tesla said he stole company data. Musk later called a reporter to say he’d heard Tripp was on his way to the factory with a gun. The local sheriff’s department later said, no, he was miles away in Reno, with no gun and no evidence he had one.

One way Tesla lowered its injury numbers, according to “Reveal,” was by denying ambulance service to some injured factory workers who requested it. Medical staff were told not to call 911 without management permission.
“The electric car maker’s contract doctors rarely grant it, instead often insisting that seriously injured workers — including one who severed the top of a finger — be sent to the emergency room in a Lyft,” “Reveal” said, quoting five former medical clinic employees at Tesla’s Fremont auto assembly plant.

Black workers complained that managers called them monkeys and other racial slurs, including routine use of the N-word. Some alleged the Black workers were given the worst jobs, no matter their qualifications. When they complained to human resources, several said, it made matters worse, and some were fired.
Tesla disputed the workers’ accounts at the time, saying, “Tesla prohibits discrimination in any form.”
Musk was not implicated directly in any of the complaints. Nor did he show any sign of taking them more seriously than he has taken past allegations of bias in his company’s workplaces or criticisms of his own deportment. His response: an email to workers advising victims of racism to get a “thick skin.”
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:32 PM on November 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

> NoxAeternum: "And he's mocking a former employee alongside a bigoted domestic terrorist."

Yeah, while it's been fun dunking on Elon's endless fumbling, it's actually very concerning how he's pretty much a full-on red-pilled, alt-right guy. I mean, he's not just replying to the stochastic terrorist at Libs of TikTok but also shit-heels like Ian Miles Cheong. It's pretty bad.
posted by mhum at 1:52 PM on November 15, 2022 [8 favorites]

There’s a reason he’s got so many weird cultists, and it’s not his “engineering” “skill”.
posted by Artw at 2:00 PM on November 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

I read through the responses to one of his asshole-y "you're fired" tweets, and he was getting a *lot* of validation. Lots of people are fans of "strong" bosses who don't tolerate "disrespect" or a "negative" working environment.

The idea that it was his employees creating a negative working environment...
posted by clawsoon at 2:34 PM on November 15, 2022 [7 favorites]

10x bootlickers only need apply.
posted by Artw at 2:48 PM on November 15, 2022 [3 favorites]

As usual, The Onion nails it when describing Musk's visit to Twitter's datacenter, Elon Musk Demands Twitter Servers Explain What All These Wires For.

It concludes with the article by saying, "At press time, sources confirmed Musk had publicly fired a prominent CPU for loudly humming in a way that he said constituted insubordination."
posted by vac2003 at 2:53 PM on November 15, 2022 [9 favorites]

He celebrated it in the traditional way, by tweeting an image of a Nazi soldier in a meme about birds.

Somewhere in the myriad Musk threads of the last month there was some benefit of the doubt extended that Musk didn't know the soldier was a Nazi which, OK, that is a mistake I could see myself making. But I'm starting to doubt Musk's ignorance in those sort of matters. He seems to be at minimum sitting at tables with a lot of Nazis.
posted by Mitheral at 3:16 PM on November 15, 2022 [6 favorites]

On the topic of Musk stooges understanding software engineering: a new recall in Australia apparently due to a software bug.
posted by aramaic at 5:53 PM on November 15, 2022

can't wait for elon to run for president (and win)
posted by wooh at 7:40 PM on November 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

Which, because of the natural-born citizen requirement, unless the Republicans just say fuck it and rip up the Constitution... could totally happen, I guess.
posted by hangashore at 7:57 PM on November 15, 2022

also just some color on the engineers they fired...I don't know all of them, but I know multiple of them. these were some of the best, most respected engineers at twitter. huge leverage in the company, in that they knew their domains in and out and could help instrument huge improvements to the service and infrastructure. also just very nice people, the kind that any self-respecting engineer would love to work with. brilliant but humble. generous but direct. they have all made boatloads of money in their tenures are twitter and could easily get an extremely high paying job at pretty much any tech company just by answering any of the emails they get every day from recruiters. the reason people like that don't leave, in my experience, is generally because having been at twitter for so long, they have a strong platform for impact that is hard to develop at a new company. most of them seem to feel sort of a mix of...relief? like "it's over."

regardless, it's a gigantic self-own on musk's part, and is a loss for twitter and its users. there of course were already too many amazing engineers let go to count, but this would be like the bulls firing michael jordan at his prime or something. these sorts of employees are pretty much impossible to hire...hiring them is extremely difficult and extremely expensive, even for the biggest, wealthiest companies. you basically can't hire them, unless you put together a huge package and then are lucky to find one. usually you just get lucky by investing in your employees over time and hoping that engineers like this emerge, with a sense of investment in your company since that's where they built their skills and careers. it's just a sign of how fucked twitter is.
posted by wooh at 8:45 PM on November 15, 2022 [22 favorites]

This fiasco has its first casualty. RIP Jimmy Fallon Hashtag #RIPJimmyFallon trending even though he isn’t dead because someone created a fake account.
posted by interogative mood at 8:45 PM on November 15, 2022 [1 favorite]

stochastic terrorist at Libs of TikTok but also shit-heels like Ian Miles Cheong

I kept seeing his name and tweets on some of the things being linked to here--is Cheong supposed to be someone or is he just a garden-variety musk fellater?
posted by kitten kaboodle at 9:27 PM on November 15, 2022

Cheong was a rabble rouser for GamerGate. He has been a garbage human for a long, long time.
posted by FallibleHuman at 10:16 PM on November 15, 2022 [9 favorites]

He's such an embarrassment for Malaysia, and we already such an array of jackasses to choose from. This is what domestic ethnofascist poisoning does to you, kids, as a fairly privileged by colonialism minority class. (hey, just like Elon!)
posted by cendawanita at 11:59 PM on November 15, 2022 [8 favorites]

Ah, okay—thank you. This is a universe I try hard to never know about.

Toadies are one of those things that I have such a hard time wrapping my mind around. I remember being in driver’s ed when I was a kid and there was a guy in our course who had a group of sycophants who were always bothering the other students. And I was very shy and scared all the time because I was actually the youngest person in the class, but I sort of lost my shit when one of the toadies started bitching at me about how Gene Gray needed a pencil and I had to give him my pencil because Gene Gray wanted the pencil right then, like somehow I was obligated to be a sycophant too. It was one of the first times I ever stood up for myself and I remember asking the guy what it was like to not have any shame or sense of pride. I was pretty sure I was going to get the crap beaten out of me but I think the guy was just so stunned that anybody spoke up against the great Gene Gray and his little toadies that he didn’t know what to say.

I always think of that now, what it’s like to go around obsequiously prostrating yourself for someone and kissing their ass. Like just…what do you get out of it? That guy obviously thinks he’s so cool and connected and instead he’s just a laughable tool. It gives me such secondhand embarrassment.
posted by kitten kaboodle at 1:22 AM on November 16, 2022 [5 favorites]

Apparently you can now lay yourself off at Twitter by not replying to Elon's desperate email. Also they'd need to set the subscription price to $44 per month to make up for lost advertising revenue which, good luck.
posted by I claim sanctuary at 1:33 AM on November 16, 2022 [9 favorites]

I claim sanctuary that's wild - I wonder what the headcount will be like by the end of the week? If that Ask A Manager question is anything to go by, there's a certain number of staff that want out but need severance to do so.
posted by sarble at 1:47 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

Anyone with any sense is going to take the 3 months of severance and run. This isn’t a startup where there is some huge reward for that kind of “hardcore” commitment.
posted by interogative mood at 2:31 AM on November 16, 2022 [10 favorites]

twitter never had a lot of rock star engineers. we selected out for that. what twitter did have was a metric fuck ton of dolly partons who knew what they were doing, did the work, included others in the success, and lifted others up.

they are being systemically fired.
(source)
posted by sarble at 3:41 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

kitten kaboodle: Toadies are one of those things that I have such a hard time wrapping my mind around. I remember being in driver’s ed when I was a kid and there was a guy in our course who had a group of sycophants who were always bothering the other students. And I was very shy and scared all the time because I was actually the youngest person in the class, but I sort of lost my shit when one of the toadies started bitching at me about how Gene Gray needed a pencil and I had to give him my pencil because Gene Gray wanted the pencil right then, like somehow I was obligated to be a sycophant too.

What's going on with Twitter seems like it would make for a great anthropological case study. On the one side there's the drive to cut down someone who seems to be getting too powerful, using the kind of ridicule and undermining that's commonly seen in egalitarian societies. If someone is rising up you cut them down to size, because the consequence of not doing that is that a dictatorial psychopath takes over.

On the other side, there are the people who are aiming to get themselves a privileged position if/when the dictatorial psychopath does take over. They kiss ass up and kick down. They hope to be in the inner circle because they were there first, they were the most loyal. They want to become the imperial guard, with all the perks and power that go with that.

Both of these sides are fully present and battling it out on Twitter. It's unlikely that either side will have much material effect on Musk's power, since our financial and legal systems are designed to protect dictatorial psychopaths in business from egalitarian threats, but it's interesting to watch both sides going into full gear anyway.
posted by clawsoon at 3:43 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

Meanwhile, those who subscribed to Blue Verified were often accounts promoting right-wing politics, cryptocurrency speculation and users hawking adult content such as pornography, a review of Twitter data compiled by a software developer showed.

About 150,000 users were subscribed to Twitter Blue — which encompasses Blue Verified — at the time of the pause

posted by trig at 3:55 AM on November 16, 2022

@GergelyOrosz
Scoop: another ~10 Twitter employees who made sassy or critical remarks about Twitter's current leadership on a Twitter internal Slack channel have been terminated overnight.

More comment/confirmation from @CaseyNewton:

Employees who have criticized Elon Musk in Twitter’s Slack channels were fired overnight over email.

“We regret to inform you that your employment is terminated immediately,” they’re being told over email. “Your recent behavior has violated company policy.” ...

It’s important to note that Twitter has long cultivated a culture of internal dissent: “Communicate fearlessly to build trust.”

No internal codes of conduct have changed since Elon took over. So this is all out of the blue.

"Communicate fearlessly to build trust" sounds like something Elon Musk would've said he supported. Followed by completely contradicting that with his actions.
posted by clawsoon at 4:34 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

I claim sanctuary: Apparently you can now lay yourself off at Twitter by not replying to Elon's desperate email. Also they'd need to set the subscription price to $44 per month to make up for lost advertising revenue which, good luck.

Let's see... uh...

Musk issues ultimatum to staff: Commit to ‘hardcore’ Twitter or take severance...

In the midnight email, which was shared with The Washington Post, Musk said Twitter “will need to be extremely hardcore” going forward. “This will mean working long hours at high intensity,” he said. “Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.”

So I guess we've got clarification on exactly what "hardcore" means. No skateboarding or fingerless gloves, unfortunately. Instead, you'll be consuming your life so that a man who has wealth worth hundreds of billions of dollars doesn't lose tens of billions of dollars.
posted by clawsoon at 5:45 AM on November 16, 2022 [12 favorites]

Melon Husk's performance is definitely exceptional but I'm not sure it merits a passing grade
posted by polytope subirb enby-of-piano-dice at 5:55 AM on November 16, 2022

Not a firing offense: breaking TFA.
posted by Artw at 6:20 AM on November 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

Here's a copy of the Twitter 2.0 letter where Elon demands "long hours at high intensity". Hopefully a retyped version of it, since apparently Musk likes lowtech watermarking.

The WashPo article covering this also has in it a lot of excellent data about the new not-verified blue checks during their brief launch (which is now delayed to Nov 29). The data comes from Travis Brown, someone who's been using the Twitter API to collect a list of nuBlue checks. WashPo's summary includes

That subscriber figure would bring in only $14.4 million annually in revenue — while threatening the ad revenue generated from super users who pay for Twitter Blue who will see fewer advertisements ...

A large portion of the most-followed accounts that got “verified” via Twitter Blue, according to the data reviewed by The Post, are from a few specific subcommunities on Twitter: pornography, cryptocurrency advocates and overseas accounts, particularly from the Middle East. ...

posted by Nelson at 6:40 AM on November 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

Travis Brown is great. He has also done a lot of work to make visible nazis in tech. They despise and fear him.
posted by wooh at 6:53 AM on November 16, 2022 [4 favorites]

I really want a screenshot of this stupid form.
posted by Artw at 6:58 AM on November 16, 2022

So possibly his liabilities for this equity compensation is also a big part of why is is firing as many people as he can and intentionally creating a hostile workplace for the rest?

I suspect papers for a class action suit are being drawn up now.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 7:00 AM on November 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

The way Musk is handling dissent from his staff puts all past praise of him in a new light. There are videos of Musk subordinates, experts in engineering themselves, effusively praising his ability to get into the fine details of aerospace, automotive, or electrical engineering. Now that we have seen how he responds to even minor correction, or less than total obedience to his demands, whether in public or even internally at his companies, I think all we can take away from those videos is that those people praising him want to keep their jobs and don't want Musk directing his large twitter following to harass them.

Musk has become obsessed with the idea that his employees might sabotage the site, they said, leading to near-total freeze on writing and shipping code and firings of anyone suspected of being disloyal.

- Casey Newton

This is a new allegation from yesterday, that Musk is not just trying to drive his shrinking staff to quickly change Twitter's financial trajectory, but that he is worried about actual sabotage.
posted by rustcrumb at 7:12 AM on November 16, 2022 [8 favorites]

Gotta find out who was behind all the advertisers leaving, increased fraud and site stability going down!
posted by Artw at 7:15 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

Musk has become obsessed with the idea that his employees might sabotage the site

It's like he's on the verge of self-awareness.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:29 AM on November 16, 2022 [8 favorites]

I wonder what will come first: corporate bankruptcy, or a long-term service outage? For a while it looked like financial collapse would be the next big turning point, coming within a matter of months. But now it feels like the service could go dark at any moment, and there wouldn't be sufficient staff with the right expertise to get it restarted for a long time.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 7:46 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

rustcrumb: There are videos of Musk subordinates, experts in engineering themselves, effusively praising his ability to get into the fine details of aerospace, automotive, or electrical engineering. Now that we have seen how he responds to even minor correction, or less than total obedience to his demands, whether in public or even internally at his companies, I think all we can take away from those videos is that those people praising him want to keep their jobs and don't want Musk directing his large twitter following to harass them.

So the Musk as Kim Jong-Un meme is real?

Somebody posted this old Crooked Timber post about libertarianism and the workplace, and - despite the horrible mess somebody made of UTF-8 conversion (took me about an hour to finally hexdump the page and figure out what was going on) - it's relevant. There's a "patriarchal freedom" mindset out there, where people are free but the only real people are the patriarchal heads of households or their company owner equivalents, and everybody else is just an extension of those free people.

I suspect Musk would feel comfortable - enthusiastic, even! - about 1888 in Canada, as described in Ian McKay's Reasoning Otherwise:

Other workers were beaten over the head if they were not sufficiently diligent in their labour... Some reported that they felt the effects of being hit on the head through much of the rest of the day...

Within the four walls of his factory, according to many turn of the century liberal minds, an employer could do pretty much what he wanted to do. Fortier was within his rights to discipline his workplace family, just as a Victorian patriarch was perfectly justified to inflict corporal punishment on his children.

posted by clawsoon at 7:47 AM on November 16, 2022 [9 favorites]

but that he is worried about actual sabotage.

Why would they bother, what could they do that would be worse than what he's doing?
posted by Buntix at 7:53 AM on November 16, 2022 [11 favorites]

Artw: I really want a screenshot of this stupid form.

This might be it?

Subject: A Fork in the Road

Date: Nov. 16, 2022 [time stamp removed]

Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore. This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.

Twitter will also be much more engineering-driven. Design and product management will still be very important and report to me, but those writing great code will constitute the majority of our team and have the greatest sway.

At its heart, Twitter is a software and servers company, so l think this makes sense.

If you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click yes on the link below:

[Link removed]

Anyone who has not done so by 5pm ET tomorrow (Thursday) will receive three months of severance.

Whatever decision you make, thank you for your efforts to make Twitter successful.

Elon

"At its heart, Twitter is a software and servers company."

Everybody else is saying that Twitter is an advertising company, or a communications company, or a community-forming company, or a content moderation company. Elon doesn't buy any of that.
posted by clawsoon at 8:02 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

How hard would it be for former Twitter employees to build a competitor without being sued into oblivion?
posted by clawsoon at 8:07 AM on November 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

Most of the good ones seem to be hanging out on Mastodon and some are contributing to code.
posted by Artw at 8:09 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

I’m waiting for the bit where Elon prepares three envelopes.
posted by notoriety public at 8:10 AM on November 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

Some inspiration for Musk from a previous Great Man who loved to abuse workers:

Come let us all here join in one,
And thank him for all favours done;
Let's thank him for all favours still
Which he hath done besides the mill.
Modestly drink liquor about,
And see whose health you can find out;
This will I choose before the rest
Sir Richard Arkwright is the best.
A few more words I have to say,
Success to Cromford's market day.

posted by clawsoon at 8:18 AM on November 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

So anyway, unions.
posted by Artw at 8:36 AM on November 16, 2022 [7 favorites]

oh wow, he's pulling a 37signals, except his employees really hate him and the whole company is on fire

a daring strategy!
posted by ryanrs at 9:24 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

Re the toadies and sycophants braying in support of elon's capricious firings: for many, power is its own justification. And yes, that is also a core value of fascism.
posted by wemayfreeze at 9:51 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

Trial is going well…
posted by Artw at 9:58 AM on November 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

And yes, that is also a core value of fascism

And for those wondering, yes, “libertarianism” is just a synonym for that.
posted by Artw at 9:59 AM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

This small bit from the WaPo article linked above jumped out at me (emph. added):

A week ago, Twitter debuted the product, which gives users a blue check-mark icon next to their name for a fee of $7.99 a month, and promises to reduce the number of ads they see by half as well as giving their posts additional visibility. By Friday, the option disappeared amid fake accounts impersonating people such as President Biden and basketball star LeBron James.

Sign-ups were paused Thursday night, and Musk announced via a tweet late Tuesday that the service wouldn’t “relaunch” until Nov. 29 “to make sure that it is rock solid.”

But inside Twitter, staff are using the additional two weeks to conduct a postmortem on the launch, trying to understand why the impersonations spiraled out of control, according to a person with knowledge of the internal discussions who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.

"Trying to understand why impersonations spiraled out of control"? Seriously? What's to fucking understand here? Is this their first day on the internet?

It's only been a few days, but it's still very amusing to me that the entire world told Elon that this is what would happen and then exactly the thing the entire world said would happen actually did happen. And now they're somehow doing a post-mortem of how they didn't see this coming? C'mon, man.
posted by mhum at 10:11 AM on November 16, 2022 [18 favorites]

Trial is going well…

So the Tesla engineers who came over to evaluate Twitter were doing it "a voluntary basis, after hours"? Huh.

Also, Twitter's '“fundamental organizational restructuring” will be completed by the end of next week.'
posted by clawsoon at 10:12 AM on November 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

What kind of hardcore Tesla engineer has any "after hours"?
posted by Nelson at 10:53 AM on November 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

Probably true as they'll only have a couple sub contract janitorial staff left in the building.

Is this their first day on the internet?

"First Time" O Brother Where art Thou meme. "On the internet no one knows your a dog" meme.

Trial is going well…

Musk:

because there had been no successful car company since Chrysler in the 20s

Except for those lost to history companies like Pontiac, MG, Mercedes-Benz, Volvo, Divco, DeSoto, Plymouth, Fargo, BMW, Ferrari, Cord, Datsun, Gaz, Simica, Auto Union, Reliant, Jensen, Toyota, Volkswagon, Ural (trucks), Peterbilt (trucks), Healey, Kaiser-Frazer/Kaiser-Willys/Kaiser Jeep, Cooper, AMC, Honda, Jaguar, SEAT, BMC, British Leyland, Lotus, Trabant, Lada, Dacia, and Tata. And that only brands I recognized that produced cars for longer than Tesla has and only up to 1969 taken from this list.

Off the top of my head you can also add Smart, AM General, Saturn, Porsche, Lamborghini, Mitsubishi, Subaru, Daihatsu, Isuzu, Hyundai, Kia, Saab, technically Rolls-Royce and dozens/hundreds of Chinese manufacturers.

Jimny this man is ignorant.
posted by Mitheral at 10:57 AM on November 16, 2022 [5 favorites]

If you’re a Tesla engineer in good standing with Elon torturing other engineers probably counts as recreation/hobby.
posted by Artw at 10:58 AM on November 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

Musk has become obsessed with the idea that his employees might sabotage the site, they said, leading to near-total freeze on writing and shipping code and firings of anyone suspected of being disloyal.

this is some Caine Mutiny shit
posted by Countess Elena at 11:07 AM on November 16, 2022 [7 favorites]

Funny how much authoritarians and industrialists borrow from and inspire each other. Countdown to when Elon starts musing about how the Nazis really could have gotten a lot of good things done if they hadn't gotten bogged down by invading the USSR. And his fanboys going giddy with glee ("sayin' what we've always been thinkin'!").
posted by hangashore at 11:17 AM on November 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

More from the trial link:

Elon: "The consent decree was made under duress. An agreement made under duress, is not valid, as a foundation of law."

"Are you trained as a lawyer?"

"I have some familiarity with the legal system. If you're in enough law suits, you pick up a few things along the way."

First off LOL on the first part. Second off I'm not saying Musk has Engineers disease and not only because he doesn't have an engineering degree; but if one wanted to argue he does that second clause would be all the proof you need.
posted by Mitheral at 11:22 AM on November 16, 2022 [12 favorites]

Elon: "The consent decree was made under duress. An agreement made under duress, is not valid, as a foundation of law."

So, the "work hardcore or else" agreement he's sent out...duress?
posted by nubs at 11:39 AM on November 16, 2022 [14 favorites]

Ah, I see we're in the sovereign citizen / Admiralty Law phase of Elon's tenure slightly earlier than predicted.
posted by tonycpsu at 11:43 AM on November 16, 2022 [19 favorites]

What happens if he loses the lawsuit? I keep seeing $56 billion thrown around and hoping that's how much he'll have to pay up, but...
posted by clawsoon at 12:06 PM on November 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

Second off I'm not saying Musk has Engineers disease and not only because he doesn't have an engineering degree; but if one wanted to argue he does that second clause would be all the proof you need.

even those of us with "engineer(ing)" in our job titles or diplomas are a bit dumbfounded by all this tbh
posted by Chef Flamboyardee at 1:09 PM on November 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

If Musk wanted to practice Moon Law so much, why didn't he make that SpaceX's goal instead of Mars?
posted by biogeo at 1:12 PM on November 16, 2022

The "click here or take severance" email feels to me much more of a loyalty test than it is a second round of soft self-selected layoffs, but the rational choice for engs who were on the fence about resigning -- or going out in a blaze of fuck-you-fire-me glory -- is to leave it unclicked and collect severance. It'll be interesting to see what leaks we get about the takeup rate on Thursday and Friday after the deadline passes.

At its heart, Twitter is a software and servers company

That stood out to me too because, no, it's not. Twitter's core business is -- or at least was before Musk started torpedoing it -- selling ads on its platform; everything else it does is in service to that business.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 1:45 PM on November 16, 2022 [6 favorites]

I'm dying to know how many people quit/get severance after that. I hope the OP on the Ask A Manager question does that. Literally, will they have more than a handful of employees left after this week? Because running yourself ragged to be "hardcore" for this arse isn't worth it.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:57 PM on November 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

@realGeorgeHotz: "I’ll put my money where my mouth is. I’m down for a 12 week internship at Twitter for cost of living in SF. It’s not about accumulating capital in a dead world, it’s about making the world alive."

Looks like he's... let's see... founder of a vehicle automation machine learning company.

Musk responded, "Sure, let's talk."

Hardcore confirmed. Or he wants Musk to buy him out. Or something.
posted by clawsoon at 2:10 PM on November 16, 2022 [3 favorites]

I mean, Geohot has also been pretty far down the Peter Thiel, Mencius Moldbug, Bronze Age Mindset pipeline for a while. When you get to "We need the strong men that are built by weak societies" (direct quote) over cloth masks, it's not that much of a leap for him to start seeing Musk as that hopeful strongman who will execute the people he calls to have executed for weakening society.
posted by CrystalDave at 2:20 PM on November 16, 2022 [7 favorites]

Yeah, that dude is Slashdot-vintage kookery.

If you're in enough law suits, you pick up a few things along the way."

"This looks invalid. I can tell by some of the boilerplate and from seeing quite a few invalid agreements in my time."
posted by rhizome at 2:28 PM on November 16, 2022 [10 favorites]

@elonmusk [responding to nice things Paul Graham said about him]: "People have no idea how fast Twitter will evolve"

If Twitter won't be Twitter anymore, I wonder if that'll leave even more space for an old-Twitter clone.
posted by clawsoon at 3:32 PM on November 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

Ship of Twitterous paradox - if everybody leaves is it still going to the same place?
posted by njohnson23 at 3:44 PM on November 16, 2022 [1 favorite]

Shitposters Lament.
posted by Artw at 6:13 PM on November 16, 2022

it would be amazing drama if there are so few Yes-clickers that Musk panics and tries to walk it back, possibly blaming the online form/email outage or similar, ha ha
posted by ryanrs at 6:33 PM on November 16, 2022 [4 favorites]

Honestly if they lose so much technical capacity they are no longer able to run Twitter as is snd Twitter 2.0 returns as a gab-style mastodon instance with all Elons favorite users ported over I would not be surprised.
posted by Artw at 6:51 PM on November 16, 2022 [2 favorites]

"Trying to understand why impersonations spiraled out of control"? Seriously? What's to fucking understand here?

Ohhh there is a viciously dry postmortem to be written here. I would love to write it -- except for the "being at Twitter rn" price of entry -- and I would love to read it. Mic drop on that postmortem is the best way to get fired.

The What Went Poorly section will be epic deadpan side-eye. Reference to pre-launch red team assessment for known risks not addressed, point after point. Root cause to lapse in internal process controls.

cc: [e-mail]
posted by away for regrooving at 7:17 PM on November 16, 2022 [11 favorites]

I cannot stop writing this postmortem.

Usually 1) the idea is that your peers pulled the bad trigger, and the questions are what set them up, not to blame individuals, and 2) the causal chain terminates within the corporation rather than implicating, like, Milton fuckin Friedman and his fuckin stockholders.

This, though, is a postmortem-rich opportunity. Why did every responsible compliance adult step out? Next level: why did they face personal liability? Next level: why did ownership create this exposure? Next level: why is the corporation owned by by an irrelevant billionaire chaos goblin? Next level: why does capitalism create this ownership?
posted by away for regrooving at 11:49 PM on November 16, 2022 [10 favorites]

[responding to nice things Paul Graham said about him]

Paul Graham sold a mediocre piece of technology to Yahoo back when buttons were still a hot new HTML feature, and parlayed that into a career in which he gave a bunch of other tech people money, some of those tech people went on to have a successful businesses, and in exchange he gets to issue endless declarations about how the pathetic white men who remind him of the kids he used to hang out with back in the "bullies took his lunch money" days are actually geniuses who are to be respected.

Again, he never built a successful business himself, he just made some thing that Yahoo bought. You know, Yahoo? That company that's famous for making great purchases?

He's a smarmy piece of shit who pioneered the tech trend of posting blog posts with a really short sentences and calling yourself a brilliant essayist for having figured out that people online like reading short things. He will never suffer a single consequence for anything, because he's frankly too mediocre to warrant karmic justice, but if I had access to whatever secret Russian laboratory invented Havana syndrome, I would invent a special radiowave that gives him constant ingrown toenails. thank you for coming to my TED Talk
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 1:20 AM on November 17, 2022 [13 favorites]

I wholeheartedly agree about Paul Graham. Nobody better represents the scammer class that runs so much of SV.
posted by wooh at 1:38 AM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

This, though, is a postmortem-rich opportunity. Why did every responsible compliance adult step out? Next level: why did they face personal liability? Next level: why did ownership create this exposure? Next level: why is the corporation owned by by an irrelevant billionaire chaos goblin? Next level: why does capitalism create this ownership

Excellent use of 5 Whys. Any incident report can be a call to overthrow capitalism if you try hard enough!
posted by Artw at 5:46 AM on November 17, 2022 [8 favorites]

On the "what went wrong with blue not-verified checks" a bit of a postmortem was written even before launch, as the Platformer reported a few days ago.

Days before the Nov. 9 launch, the company’s trust and safety team had prepared a seven-page list of recommendations intended to help Musk avoid the most obvious and damaging consequences of his plans for Blue. The document, which was obtained by Platformer, predicts with eerie accuracy some of the events that follow. ... Despite the warnings, the launch proceeded as planned. A few hours later, with the predictions of the trust and safety team largely realized, Musk belatedly stopped the rollout.

Musk's Twitter knew that the impersonations would happen and chose to launch anyway. And what a fucking disaster of a launch; pulled in what, less than a day? Meanwhile there's still Nazis newly back on Twitter with blue check marks.
posted by Nelson at 6:32 AM on November 17, 2022 [6 favorites]

Literally how is he this dumb. How.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 6:50 AM on November 17, 2022 [8 favorites]

Entirely consequence free life.
posted by Artw at 6:53 AM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

How is he this dumb? Read some of the replies to Lisa Bloom pointing out the illegality of Musk's actions. Even mild criticism of this man can end up with you being run off of social media. This is not an environment that encourages personal growth.
posted by tigrrrlily at 8:38 AM on November 17, 2022 [7 favorites]

nd what a fucking disaster of a launch; pulled in what, less than a day?

I would love to know how much it cost them; how many companies cancelled ad buys for what value vs. what the $8 check marks brought in?
posted by nubs at 9:01 AM on November 17, 2022

Can’t have a post mortem that might find fault with a decision if you make anyone who might have independent thought or know anything about anything leave by 5pm today.
posted by Artw at 9:08 AM on November 17, 2022

The WashPo yesterday gets a little in to how much they're losing per-user. They promised people who pay $8/mo see half the ads, but "Twitter would need to charge $44 a month each to recoup the advertising value". And that's not counting all the reputation risk and lost advertisers because they no longer have meaningfully verified users.

The endgame Musk seems to be aiming at is an idea that only $8/mo users should be able to have their speech heard on Twitter. Ironically, he calls this "free speech". That's not entirely a crazy idea; a lot of products have proposed making people pay as a signal that their speech is valuable, not just spam. (Metafilter itself a little bit, with the $5 signup fee.) But it sure looks like a whole lot of good people are not going to pay any $$ to have their tweets seen. And a lot of bad people will have no problem. I doubt the IRA is concerned about the dent in their Twitter propaganda budget, for instance.
posted by Nelson at 9:11 AM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

Am I doing Twitter wrong? I literally do not ever see ads. I see suggested posts from other Twitter users, but actual ads? Nope.

Unlike IG which is nothing but ads on my feed.
posted by archimago at 9:28 AM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

By mid-Wednesday, members of Twitter’s Trust and Safety team — who are responsible for keeping hate speech and misinformation off the site — were discussing a mass resignation, according to three current employees who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution.

So ... the more-hardcore push is going well then?
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 9:29 AM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

Am I doing Twitter wrong? I literally do not ever see ads.

I've always found it a little weird; I only see them on my mobile devices as I use adblock on computer browsers. But the ads are very sporadic - I will go for week without seeing any, and then get a bunch in my timeline for one day. I immediately block every account that does ads, so I figure that has something to do with it, and for the past week or so the ads are getting really weird & obscure.
posted by nubs at 9:40 AM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

The endgame Musk seems to be aiming at is an idea that only $8/mo users should be able to have their speech heard on Twitter.

I think that's just a step along the way to fully paywalling access.

I feel Musk doesn't like, or understand, advertising as a business model. He's bought into the whole "advertisers are swayed by woke activists" grievance, yes. But also he doesn't like having to court advertisers; too demeaning when you're more accustomed to adulation. Thus the stories of him blowing up meetings with advertisers.

A problem when you've bought an advertising business! So I think what he really wants -- and is trying to do in a blundering way -- is to pivot Twitter away from advertising revenue and towards subscription revenue. I don't think it's going to work; most casual users will be more like "yeah, nah, bye" than "sure, here's $8/month"; but I think he thinks it will.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 9:51 AM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

But the ads are very sporadic - I will go for week without seeing any, and then get a bunch in my timeline for one day.

I think of these as extinction bursts.

I'm seeing a lot of the in-the-replies-to-a-tweet ads, though; and a lot of those are sleazy-looking crypto ads. Somewhat curious if this is the bottom of the barrel or if there's another layer of sludge underneath; guess if I block enough of them I'll find out.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 10:04 AM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

I feel Musk doesn't like, or understand, advertising as a business model.

I mean I guess I'm with him at least that far.
posted by biogeo at 10:34 AM on November 17, 2022 [5 favorites]

I see that, but it's like buying a chain of movie theatres and announcing you're doing away with the concessions counters to focus on just showing movies, not realizing that you make most of your money from selling huge 'value-sized' drinks and bags of popcorn.
posted by hangashore at 10:57 AM on November 17, 2022 [9 favorites]

The math for a subscription only Twitter doesn’t work. They would need to charge $44/month per user to replace ad revenue.
posted by chrchr at 11:00 AM on November 17, 2022

Emptying the Twitter business of trust prior to switching to a subscription model is a whole new low in that vile man's business conduct.

After the way he's treated Twitter's employees, content-providers, and readers, I decline to do any sort of business with any company associated him, of any kind. (I was a very active Twitter user for the past 13 years or so. I have not cancelled my account yet, but there's nothing left for me there in terms of community or reliable information. So what's the point?)

Generating this level of ill will in potential customers implies that the energy in the business (employees, content-providers, readers, advertisers) is taken for granted. None of them is in fact granted, though.
posted by Shunra at 11:07 AM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

1) They promised people who pay $8/mo see half the ads, but "Twitter would need to charge $44 a month each to recoup the advertising value"

2) They would need to charge $44/month per user to replace ad revenue.

Wanted to note down that both of these citations are a bit misleading here. I don't know what the actual average amount brought in per user is, but there's no way it's 44 per month (let alone 88!). Rather, the article says:

Twitter would need to charge $44 a month each to recoup the advertising value generated by the top segment of its heaviest U.S. users if it relied only on subscriptions, according to an internal document reviewed by The Post

posted by nobody at 11:12 AM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

Just skimming the latest headlines for Elon Musk, I see:

• former SpaceX employees filed unfair labor practice charges with the NLRB; they were fired in June after criticizing Elon Musk
• a proposed class-action suit complaining that abolishing remote work constituted discrimination against employees with disabilities, filed by a (disabled former)employee who was fired for refusing to return to the office
• at least two more class action suits related to the recent Twitter layoffs: one on behalf of the employees, one for the contractors

And no word yet how many people are being let go for failing to click the link in his spear-phishing email.
posted by cheshyre at 11:30 AM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

I wasn’t sure how to read the Post’s claim. It seems a little vague to me. How does the set of top users intersect with the set of people they think will sign up for Blue? Does Twitter make the same amount for each ad impression for a given ad or does it depend on who views it? Maybe this is obvious to someone who works in internet advertising.
posted by eirias at 11:31 AM on November 17, 2022

Oh, also an interesting article on Slate: How I Got Inside Elon Musk’s Head.
The author created a burner Twitter account that follows the same people Musk does, providing some insight into what Musk is seeing and responding to.
posted by cheshyre at 11:35 AM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

Poll: When Do You Think Twitter Will Go Down? Let's place our bets.
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:35 AM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

Twitter would need to charge $44 a month each to recoup the advertising value generated by the top segment of its heaviest U.S. users if it relied only on subscriptions, according to an internal document reviewed by The Post

I think they might be assuming that all content produced by Twitter Blue users would be free of advertising rather than what is actually promised: Twitter Blue users will see less advertising themselves.

Twitter could give their top users free verification and ad-free browsing and still make money advertising to their followers.
posted by Lanark at 11:42 AM on November 17, 2022

I thought Twitter defined "heavy users" as those tweeting 2-3 times a week.
posted by ryanrs at 12:04 PM on November 17, 2022

Yeah, I almost certainly used to be one of their top contributors. Which feels stupid now.

I’d also say that, even if it wasn’t now the plaything of a vile idiot who I despise, while I’ve paid for ad free versions of things I really don’t think I’d pay for a “less ads” version - what does that even mean? Less ads than what? How would I know?
posted by Artw at 12:07 PM on November 17, 2022 [7 favorites]

Yeah, "remember how you said you'd show me fewer ads? I don't mean to complain, but I'm still seeing quite a few ads, and I was just wondering, are you sure you've reduced my ads like you promised you would" is a *great* subscription perk.
posted by tigrrrlily at 12:11 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

Severance FAQ document came out.
posted by jenfullmoon at 12:11 PM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

Severance FAQ document came out

"Employees with precarious immigration status will likely need to stay at Twitter or quickly find a new job in order to remain in the country."

I mean, I'm being a little hyperbolic, but isn't that like labor trafficking?
posted by Gorgik at 12:16 PM on November 17, 2022 [5 favorites]

Labor trafficking mob style, with a nod and a wink. I don't think you're being hyperbolic in the least.
posted by Horkus at 12:19 PM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

It’s kind of how work visas have always worked out, but it’s rarely so explicitly cruel.
posted by Artw at 12:24 PM on November 17, 2022 [14 favorites]

“‘This is not a phishing attempt,’ the FAQ begins.” An auspicious start!
posted by eirias at 12:32 PM on November 17, 2022 [10 favorites]

Everything about this just feels hinky as hell. The cruelty. The weird passive "will treat as a resignation" bit; does this prevent leavers from claiming unemployment? The business of dangling the undisclosed separation agreement over leavers' heads.

(It's gonna be a bunch of non-disclosure and non-disparagement stuff though, right?)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 12:32 PM on November 17, 2022

better get all your disparaging done in the coming weeks, before they can get that agreement drafted, lmao
posted by ryanrs at 12:41 PM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

I feel Musk doesn't like, or understand, advertising as a business model.

I mean I guess I'm with him at least that far.

Advertising's one of those things that's less bullshitty than its harshest critics make it out to be, and way bullshittier than its truest disciples would claim. (Though a lot of people in advertising are, on the whole, a lot more skeptical of it than people who aren't in advertising—and more are sincerely concerned about the possibility that it makes the world suck than you'd think!)

I think the biggest issue with it is that the map and the territory are dangerously interchangeable with each other. Advertising has always relied heavily on data—possibly unreliable data, but in some way, shape, or form, you want to see whether or not some method of "tell someone they might be interested in your product" has resulted in people noticing you, taking interest in you, or giving you something kind of like money. Its problems are a synecdoche of capitalism's problems, and more recently Big Tech's problems: namely, the more you treat it like it's just a game whose variables you toggle with until you get a maximal output, the likelier it is that whatever you're doing with it is sociopathic and actively harmful.

To some extent, there's such a thing as advertising philosophy—the most interesting or memorable advertisers of any era tend to have some thoughts about the ethics of their field. And different approaches to advertising do feel comparatively more or less ethical, to me. One of the tragedies of the modern era of tech, I feel, is that there was a stretch of time during which it felt like advertising might get significantly less shitty, and significantly better at actually doing an ethically-neutral job of "tell people about products that they'd be glad to know about," and then the bottom fell out. (There still are advertisers who do work that I find generally compelling on the front of "ethical approaches to advertising"—Barbarian comes to mind—but the cheaper and more mass-market advertising is, the likelier it is to be grossly exploitative.)

I was a big fan of The Deck, which MetaFilter used to run ads by, but it wound down in 2017. Advertising as an industry is vicious: you're dependent on clients whose ad spends shift violently, so an entire advertising platform (like Twitter) can dry up more-or-less overnight. Which leads to a lot of companies making desperate decisions, many of which involve "screwing the customer over even more."

Elon Musk famously refuses to advertise Tesla. It's one of those things that got him counterculture points way back in the day... but on some level, I suspect he went for it because he does not personally have the temperament to deal with advertisers. It's a highly fickle (and very social) industry, where navigating cultural mores is one of the major concerns. Honestly, it's a big fucking mess for tech to be so wrapped up in advertising as a revenue model: the only companies that ever had a chance of pulling it off at scale, imo, were Google and Facebook. But advertising is hugely appealing to VC-funded companies, which have money to burn for years on end, and know they can acquire users far more rapidly if they're free. Which leaves them, well, strapped for cash eventually.

Most of them just keep looking for funding: Twitter raised $10 billion in funding rounds in 2022 alone, well past its initial IPO. Which lets it keep being on free, and lets it rely on its "advertising model" to make profit, which is code for "it's unprofitable."

This is why the only remotely sane tech buyouts are companies looking to acquire either technology or employees. You don't buy a tech company because you're looking to make money off of it. One of the few exceptions, not-coincidentally, are adtech firms—but a lot of those get bought by companies who still haven't figured out how to make advertising profitable, and they don't actually go on to make those companies any money.

I guess the tl;dr is:

1. Advertising is sometimes good
2. Advertising is rarely profitable for platforms
3. Most tech platforms aren't actually making a profit
4. It's fine, this is totally fine, everything is seriously okay
5. Elon Musk isn't necessarily an idiot for tanking his relationship with advertisers; he's definitelyan idiot for buying Twitter in the first place

posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 12:56 PM on November 17, 2022 [17 favorites]

The weird passive "will treat as a resignation" bit; does this prevent leavers from claiming unemployment?

This is an Employment Law Does Not Work This Way thing, but he's most likely been able to get away with it because getting a lawyer to fight it has been difficult. Musk's problem now is that there are now lawyers who want to take a swing at him on general principle.
posted by NoxAeternum at 1:00 PM on November 17, 2022 [12 favorites]

@GergelyOrosz:

Scoop: I am hearing far fewer than expected devs hit "yes".
Elon sent out an email relaxing remote working from the former draconian policy.
I'm hearing he is having meetings w top engineers to convince them to stay.

[...]

"From my larger group of 50 people, 10 are staying, 40 are taking the severance. Elon set up meetings with a few who plan to quit."

posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 1:20 PM on November 17, 2022 [7 favorites]

Didn’t some people here predict that such a thing would happen? That he would have to roll back his edict in some ways? I was once involved in a successful union organizing effort at a small organization. Last one night, one extremely angry future union member upchucked all over the outside wall of the office belonging to the most annoying manager. There were no office cleaners during the week, so the next morning this manager walked around trying to talk someone else into cleaning up the mess. No one was willing to, so they had to clean it up themselves.

Elon seems to believe that his shit does not stink. He’s wrong about that and pretty soon he may end up on his hands and knees cleaning up something that wouldn’t be there if he hadn’t fucked up. Metaphorically, of course. Our manager was not a billionaire. Of course, at this rate, who knows how much longer this guy will be a billionaire. Too long, for sure.
posted by Bella Donna at 1:28 PM on November 17, 2022 [6 favorites]

Welp, that's certainly a way to lay off 75% without technically laying off 75%.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:51 PM on November 17, 2022

According to Casey Newton, “the Pragmatic Engineer newsletter reported that internal polls show only 25 percent of software engineers at the company intend to stay.”
posted by Winnie the Proust at 1:55 PM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

Scoop: I am hearing far fewer than expected devs hit "yes".

I'm thinking only the people who strongly need the job are saying yes and 90% of the those are desperately looking for other work that provides healthcare or VISA status. Because the smart bet is Twitter is about to crash and burn and it is best to get out while the getting is good rather than be locked out by Sheriffs in a couple months.

Musk's problem now is that there are now lawyers who want to take a swing at him on general principle.

I bet this is going to provide full employment for dozens of law firms across the country for years to come. The first few lawsuits will be tough and then, assuming they win, will just be won in rout fashion by presenting a set of facts that match exactly previous lawsuits and say "Welp the last umpteen times this happened the employee won so don't you think you should rule this way too judge"?

Elon Musk famously refuses to advertise Tesla. It's one of those things that got him counterculture points way back in the day... but on some level, I suspect he went for it because he does not personally have the temperament to deal with advertisers.

That's fine when you are a) selling every automobile you can via pre-order and b) you are essentially the only choice in the market. The first is probably only true because everyone else is selling every car they can produce, especially electric cars. And the second is no longer remotely true. In fact only the Model 3 is still the market leader in it's segment. Plus all their current products are mid cycle at best. Be interested to see what Tesla is going to come out with in future generations. People driving $60K dollar plus car don't want to be driving something dated looking for the most part.
posted by Mitheral at 1:56 PM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

It's so funny how many policy rollbacks this prick has triggered in the last two weeks alone. How many times has he done a thing and immediately had to undo it? 3? 5? I've sincerely lost count.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 1:56 PM on November 17, 2022 [5 favorites]

Didn’t some people here predict that such a thing would happen?

Suspect the only person who didn't predict it was Musk.

There will be some hang on due to things like needing the visa or healthcare, possibly even some that will hang on because they have bonded with the codebase. Oh, and when the panic sets in I guess there may be huge bonuses offered.

But apart from that, I do see it ending up just being True Musk Believers, many of whom will have alt-right APD tendencies, all working towards the Führer. All making it a shitty place for anyone talented to work.

The wound caused by losing people now may not destroy Twitter, but if not the inevitable cultural gangrene will.
posted by Buntix at 1:58 PM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

Imagine what happens if they even want to expand and start hiring people again.
posted by Artw at 2:06 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

From earlier today, @GergelyOrosz:

What I am hearing: Twitter starting to hire externally.

An outreach email had the title “Twitter 2.0 - an Elon company” and mentioned a competitive and meritocratic environment to work at, hinting at good comp.

posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 2:13 PM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

LOL.

Good luck, chudforce, you asked for it.
posted by Artw at 2:15 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

I'm sure there are plenty of toadies who'd love to work for him for many monies but I doubt any of them have the code chops to keep the hellsite from freezing over.
posted by seanmpuckett at 2:16 PM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

Musk Softens Remote-Work Mandate to Retain Twitter Staffers

Musk, who had earlier said he was strictly against remote work, sent a follow-up email Thursday softening his tone. “All that is required for approval is that your manager takes responsibility for ensuring that you are making an excellent contribution,” he wrote, adding that staffers should have in-person meetings with their colleagues not less than once per month...

Musk later sent a follow-up email on remote work, according to a screenshot viewed by Bloomberg. “Any manager who falsely claims that someone reporting to them is doing excellent work or that a given role is essential, whether remote or not, will be exited from the company.”

That sounds like a nightmare for managers. If you don't allow someone to work from home, you're effectively saying that they're not doing excellent work. If Musk arbitrarily decides that someone isn't doing excellent work and you had let them work from home, you get fired.
posted by clawsoon at 2:21 PM on November 17, 2022 [6 favorites]

Imagine what happens if they even want to expand and start hiring people again.

Knew I forgot something, was meaning that the change is mostly going to come when they have to start hiring in a hurry to deal with losing more than they intended (and for future growth). The people rushing to join are going to be guys (probably almost exclusively) like the Geohot character @clawsoon & @CrystalDave mentioned upthread. The McAfee and K.com types who are more cult leaders than project managers. There may be a few that are competent at their jobs, but definitely B-list at best.

Watching the #LoveWhereYouWorked in real-time it does seem like they used to have a very diverse (hence healthy) workforce, who actually seemed to get along.

Everything I've heard about Tesla suggests the opposite is true there.
posted by Buntix at 2:22 PM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

From earlier today, @GergelyOrosz:

A response in the thread points out that the World Cup starts in a couple of days. Any chance that'll be a challenge for an understaffed Twitter, or has that become a background-noise level of traffic for today's Twitter?
posted by clawsoon at 2:26 PM on November 17, 2022

Does anyone here know if Musk’s severance offer is binding? If the “hardcore click rate” is as low as has been reported, wouldn’t the smart move be for him to rescind this edict just as he’s had to walk back several others?

When this announcement came out it seemed like he was doing everyone without visa problems a truly huge favor, because I assume everyone has been nervously eyeing the exits, and so in his shoes I imagine I’d be trying to walk it back if I could. Presumably fewer people would go without the severance.
posted by eirias at 2:29 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

Lul at the initial "three months severance" offer actually meaning "two months severance" and the third month contingent on another legal document - that they don't actually have available yet (and may never).
posted by meowzilla at 2:35 PM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

Lul at the initial "three months severance" offer actually meaning "two months severance" and the third month contingent on another legal document - that they don't actually have available yet (and may never).

Based on the severance document that I'm looking at right now from the company I was laid off from last week, I'm guessing it'll include non-disparagement and general keep-your-mouth-shut clauses.

I think I may have just missed my own deadline to sign it. I'm not too bothered. It wasn't all that much money in the grand scheme of things, and the whole money-for-silence thing gave me the squicks. I get the strong sense that most of the keep-your-mouth legalese in it was originally written on behalf of powerful old men who had recently harassed or abused vulnerable young women.

I don't have anything particularly bad to say about the company as a whole - one of the better places I've worked for, actually - but what they wanted me to sign to get severance just felt kinda gross.
posted by clawsoon at 2:43 PM on November 17, 2022 [6 favorites]

Lul at the initial "three months severance" offer actually meaning "two months severance"

The first two months aren't even real severance; you're still employed on the payroll, just not working. 60 days notice is required under the WARN act for companies with mass layoffs.
posted by Nelson at 2:45 PM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

Wow. Just wow. Even the initial 50% layoff would likely have been devastating for near-term productivity. In a software company of Twitter’s age and size, even the best documentation in the world is no substitute for retaining senior developers who really understand the system and its history. And most of your internal systems are not going to have the best documentation in the world. (All this was certainly true when I worked at Amazon, back when it was somewhat close to the age and size of Twitter today.)

But if he overshoots and ends up losing 80% or more of Twitter’s staff, I would start expecting a serious death spiral. At that point, not only have you lost all that detailed knowledge, you’re also losing the ability to train new people to replace the ones who have left. Heck, just recruiting and hiring software engineers is incredibly labor-intensive. To grow a software team, you need to take some of your experienced people away from development tasks to focus on interviewing and mentoring new hires. How are they supposed to do that when they’re already massively understaffed for their regular work? And how many more will be quitting each month as things get harder and bleaker?

I previously thought the “death spiral” predictions were overblown, but if there’s a way to make them come true, Elon may have found it.
posted by mbrubeck at 3:17 PM on November 17, 2022 [9 favorites]

a competitive and meritocratic environment to work at

The publicly acceptable phrasing of "**list of slurs for racial, gender, sexual minorities and disabled people** need not apply"
posted by tigrrrlily at 3:18 PM on November 17, 2022 [9 favorites]

If you're hired at Twitter, you're thrown into a situation where the few people who know anything are running around putting out fires, you have access to a completely unfamiliar codebase and internal tools, Elon is yelling at you to produce stuff that you know in the back of your head won't work, your direction changes on a random whim, and you're expected to work nights/weekends. Of course, Elon isn't known for paying for top-tier talent and if you fail, you're not getting any kind of help on the way out. Who's going to take that offer?
posted by meowzilla at 3:28 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

If you don't allow someone to work from home, you're effectively saying that they're not doing excellent work. If Musk arbitrarily decides that someone isn't doing excellent work and you had let them work from home, you get fired.

Also one still has to schlep to the office at least one time a month so no actually remote work; you still have to live within a couple hours of the office, maintain transportation, deal with childcare, etc.
posted by Mitheral at 3:30 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

mbrubeck: At that point, not only have you lost all that detailed knowledge, you’re also losing the ability to train new people to replace the ones who have left.

One of the responses I've seen was along the lines of, "Elon, I'd be happy to work at Twitter, hope you give me a chance, I just need some training."

When I got to "need some training" I thought, "mmm, about that..."
posted by clawsoon at 3:32 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

He’ll end up with a company composed almost entirely of toadies, which is how he likes it.
posted by aramaic at 3:33 PM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

On the other hand there’s a fair chance you’ll be asked to commit actual crimes.
posted by Artw at 3:35 PM on November 17, 2022 [8 favorites]

As to the severance package and the missing document… When I got laid off from Apple many years ago, there was THREE months notice, so three more months of pay, and a severance payment of one week pay per year of service. But to get that I had to sign a document that said I would not sue them for age discrimination (I was over 40) but little else. So I signed and got an extra three months pay. I am assuming the Muskhole severance document is along the same lines, probably sign away your right to sue over something.
posted by njohnson23 at 3:57 PM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

Another thing I realised the other evening, is that Twitter is a major OAth provider.

So anyone who has used it as a convenience one-click login may be losing access to those sites if it goes down. Or possibly oversharing access.

On Twitter it's [Settings -> Security and Account Access -> Apps & Sessions -> Connected Apps]

Think the only one I have to worry about is Qwertee.
posted by Buntix at 3:58 PM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

@ivanebernal:

Ah and final score:

added lines: 14429, removed lines: 29163, total lines: -14734

#LoveWhereYouWorked

posted by clawsoon at 4:01 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

@ZoeSchiffer, Platformer News:

Twitter just alerted employees that effective immediately, all office buildings are temporarily closed and badge access is suspended. No details given as to why.

We're hearing this is because Elon Musk and his team are terrified employees are going to sabotage the company. Also, they're still trying to figure out which Twitter workers they need to cut access for.

Offices will reopen on November 21st. In the meantime: "Please continue to comply with company policy by refraining from discussing confidential company information on social media, with the press or elsewhere."

posted by clawsoon at 4:03 PM on November 17, 2022 [6 favorites]

@wyne: "I asked my friend at Twitter how he’s doing. He said he can’t complain."
posted by Buntix at 4:08 PM on November 17, 2022 [14 favorites]

Twitter just alerted employees that effective immediately, all office buildings are temporarily closed and badge access is suspended. No details given as to why.

A lot of office supplies were going missing.
posted by Greg_Ace at 4:09 PM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

"Work ALL the hours! Never remote! *IN* the office! Which you may not enter!"
posted by Shunra at 4:17 PM on November 17, 2022 [8 favorites]

NYT: Resignations Roil Twitter as Elon Musk Tries Persuading Some Workers to Stay (archive):

Mr. Musk’s team also held meetings with undecided employees who are key to Twitter’s operations to try to persuade them to stay, three people said.

In one of those meetings, some employees were summoned to a conference room in the San Francisco office while others called in via videoconference. As the 5 p.m. deadline passed, some who had called in began hanging up, seemingly having decided to leave, even as Mr. Musk continued speaking, two people familiar with the meeting said.

posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 4:18 PM on November 17, 2022 [15 favorites]

some who had called in began hanging up, seemingly having decided to leave, even as Mr. Musk continued speaking

delicious
posted by clawsoon at 4:22 PM on November 17, 2022 [17 favorites]

As the 5 p.m. deadline passed, some who had called in began hanging up

I physically cannot laugh as loudly as this requires. What a fantastic burn on that puerile manbaby.
posted by aramaic at 4:23 PM on November 17, 2022 [13 favorites]

@kyliebytes, tech reporter for Fortune:

What I’m hearing from Twitter employees; It looks like roughly 75% of the remaining 3,700ish Twitter employees have not opted to stay after the “hardcore” email.

As we’re all very aware, folks on visas are stuck, so thats who makes up most of the roughly 25% (or less than 1,000….) expected to stay. The actual impact is not yet known — there have been no internal comms about what comes next. We’re nearly 2 hours post deadline.

Lets put this into perspective — at the beginning of this month, Twitter had 7,400 employees. Barely half way through the month, if 75% do actually stick to their decision today, the company will have shrunk by a whopping ~88%.

Cost savings are ahead of schedule!
posted by clawsoon at 4:36 PM on November 17, 2022 [12 favorites]

From the Washington Post:

Recent departures have left multiple critical systems down to two, one or even zero engineers, according to a former employee who was familiar with the situation and spoke on the condition of anonymity out of fear of retaliation.

“I know of six critical systems (like ‘serving tweets’ levels of critical) which no longer have any engineers," the former employee said. "There is no longer even a skeleton crew manning the system. It will continue to coast until it runs into something, and then it will stop.”

So, uh, get on the lifeboats with all your stuff if you haven't already.
posted by yasaman at 4:42 PM on November 17, 2022 [6 favorites]

So, uh, where do we go to get breaking news about Twitter breaking after Twitter breaks?
posted by clawsoon at 4:47 PM on November 17, 2022 [12 favorites]

My wife asked me the other day to download her archive. The request is still pending. It’s feeling increasingly unlikely that it’ll ever work.
posted by fedward at 4:53 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

With John Ray III busy on the FTX bankruptcy, who's going to handle Twitter after this?
posted by Monday, stony Monday at 4:58 PM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

Do those employee counts include contractors?
posted by cheshyre at 5:20 PM on November 17, 2022

Do those employee counts include contractors?

Depends on how you look at it. I mean, the whole business is contracting pretty fast.
posted by notoriety public at 5:22 PM on November 17, 2022 [10 favorites]

Here's a long thread of Twitter engineers announcing they are leaving.
posted by gwint at 5:40 PM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

Contractors were already cut 82% last week: Twitter cuts a large number of contract workers without giving internal teams a heads up
posted by meowzilla at 6:01 PM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

Not sure if this is true or not, but just saw this tweet thread:

Alex Cohen @anothercohen
I was laid off from Twitter this afternoon. I was in charge of managing badge access to Twitter offices.
Elon just called me and asked if I could come back to help them regain access to HQ as they shut off all badges and accidentally locked themselves out.

Specifically Performing Steiner @TweetOfSteiner
There's like 50 people stuck in a Twitter parking garage in Sunnyvale right now - the barrier arm won't go up because their badges are disabled. Someone in facilities management is supposedly bringing them a sawzall.

posted by cheshyre at 6:07 PM on November 17, 2022 [18 favorites]

It's literally Bob the Angry Flower: Atlas Shrugged 2 in real life.

The real Atlases are shrugging now (75% of them, at least).
posted by trig at 6:08 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

Alex Cohen is a "mostly parody account". (I wish it had been true, though.)
posted by Winnie the Proust at 6:12 PM on November 17, 2022 [8 favorites]

Offices will reopen on November 21st.

FYI, World Cup starts on the 20th.
posted by ryanrs at 6:13 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

this is fine
posted by Glinn at 6:30 PM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

There's a real "last day of school and we're all going our separate ways now, who knows when we'll see each other again" vibe on Twitter right now. You know things are getting dire when dril, the quintessential Weird Twitter account, is posting his linktree.
posted by mhum at 6:42 PM on November 17, 2022 [10 favorites]

@alexeheath: Hundreds upon hundreds of Twitter employees have technically resigned but still have access to Twitter’s internal systems, with some speculating it is because the employees tasked with managing that access also resigned.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 6:50 PM on November 17, 2022 [9 favorites]

the World Cup starts in a couple of days. Any chance that'll be a challenge for an understaffed Twitter

All signs point to Yes

Hundreds upon hundreds of Twitter employees have technically resigned but still have access to Twitter’s internal systems, with some speculating it is because the employees tasked with managing that access also resigned.

A moose once bit my sister...
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 6:58 PM on November 17, 2022 [5 favorites]

When the deal originally went through, I said I expected Twitter to last somewhere between 3 and 6 months. Everybody thought I was crazy pessimistic, but it's looking like I was still bidding far too high.
posted by notoriety public at 6:59 PM on November 17, 2022 [5 favorites]

In history, has there ever been such an immediate collapse of a company? Basically, all due to one person? Who was in charge of the company? When they make the Twittertanic movie, who will play that one person?
posted by njohnson23 at 6:59 PM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

He will insist on playing himself, and the movie will bomb.
posted by fedward at 7:07 PM on November 17, 2022 [6 favorites]

It's pretty obvious that he's already played himself.
posted by notoriety public at 7:10 PM on November 17, 2022 [37 favorites]

The real Atlases are shrugging now (75% of them, at least).

One of the weird ironies of Ayn Rand that gets overlooked, both by her followers (who are dumb) and her critics (who would rather not read her), is that she's pretty clear that most rich people are leeches and hacks, most power is concentrated in the hands of people who exploit their power to get more powerful, and the traits she looks for in people are only sporadically financially beneficial. Her critiques of wealth and power gets overlooked because she intermingles them with her far-more-inane attempts to critique "communism," but they're surprisingly sharp and well-targeted at times.

Atlas Shrugged focuses way more on industry and enterprise, to its detriment, but it's a fantasy of the people who actually get shit done leaving all the assholes who think they're in charge. Like, John Galt isn't a wealthy industrialist, he's literally an engineer who does good work that is financially worthless. And it's not like Ayn Rand ever turned good—she was way too racist and homophobic and borderline-genocidal and traumatized by childhood memories of Russia—but she despised Reagan, and almost certainly would have despised the modern Republican party. I'm half-convinced she'd have wound up being a Bernie Bro, had she not (hilariously) smoked herself to death.

I try not to be a Rand apologist (see "racist/homophobic/genocidal," above), but on some level I feel such schadenfreudes when the shitlords who cosplay Atlas Shrugged run into consequences that literally mirror... the actual things that happen in Atlas Shrugged. It happens a lot to tech bros and Republican congressmen, for some reason. But honestly who can say why ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 7:10 PM on November 17, 2022 [16 favorites]

In other news:

Am hearing that several “critical” infra engineering teams at Twitter have completely resigned. “You cannot run Twitter without this team,” one current engineer tells me of one such group.

posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 7:12 PM on November 17, 2022 [7 favorites]

Useful hashtag: #istwitterdown
posted by sebastienbailard at 7:31 PM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

a competitive and meritocratic environment to work at, hinting at good comp.

= watch your back, this place is a vicious knife fight every minute of your work day, which is unreasonably long because we force people to "compete" and be "meritorious" about everything and you wouldn't want to leave "early" would you? and we pretend the money makes up for that.
posted by ctmf at 7:33 PM on November 17, 2022 [7 favorites]

Serious question: If Twitter goes down hard, where is Mr. Musk going to post? Is there a Tesla blog or something where he sometimes writes stuff?

I hope he is forced to post updates on Twitter's Facebook page like some local band.
posted by ryanrs at 7:56 PM on November 17, 2022 [7 favorites]

Gab is right there.
posted by Artw at 8:05 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

Just scrolled through my timeline, and it’s sad. Everyone is saying goodbye.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 8:11 PM on November 17, 2022 [5 favorites]

@iWriteOK honestly incredible that Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka kept a website running longer than Elon Musk
posted by Artw at 8:16 PM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

@HaysKali:

Sooo I’m told by two people that the entirety of Twitters payroll department has resigned/not elected to sign up for Elons Twitter 2.0

People are genuinely unsure how this company functions come next week. As is, some emergency contractors are going to have to come in asap just to cut checks.

In addition to the payroll team being gone, Twitter's entire US tax team is gone, I'm told, along with its financial reporting team. Not great.

Elon Musk called in his SpaceX CFO for some meetings and calls held today to try and convince people to stay by pitching Musk's vision for Twitter. Didn't work. Some people are still around in accounting though, I'm told.

posted by tonycpsu at 8:31 PM on November 17, 2022 [9 favorites]

I really, really, really want to hear the uncensored opinions of the bankers who have just found themselves stuck with debt they will never sell -- they were apparently offered 60 cents on the dollar last week (ie., an eon ago in Muskworld), and they rejected it. Hahahaha!

...bet now they're wishing they'd taken the money while they still could. I can almost feel the vulture capitalists starting to circle.

(well, I say I want to hear from the bankers, but I would actually prefer to hear from their peers who didn't put the packages together, because omg there have got to be some scathing insults flying down darkened corridors right now in banker-land)
posted by aramaic at 8:55 PM on November 17, 2022 [5 favorites]

I'm singing Schaudenfreude tonight. I feel bad for everyone quitting, but Elon deserves the hell he's brought upon himself (unfortunately, nobody else did).
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:21 PM on November 17, 2022 [2 favorites]

Sooo I’m told by two people that the entirety of Twitters payroll department has resigned

this is how you know that severance offer was really good lmao
posted by ryanrs at 9:28 PM on November 17, 2022 [8 favorites]

"Hundreds upon hundreds of Twitter employees have technically resigned but still have access to Twitter’s internal systems, with some speculating it is because the employees tasked with managing that access also resigned."

Looking forward to the new GDPR regulations that will doubtless shortly be forthcoming, requiring companies to have a documented access succession plan with fail safes for any employee or customer data. I would also expect this to become part of SEC filings. (Documenting access regimes is already annoying, and I can definitely feel much higher levels of annoyance about to land on my desk.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 9:39 PM on November 17, 2022 [5 favorites]

OH GOD THE BUILDING!!!!
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:06 PM on November 17, 2022 [7 favorites]

So now the company's down to... what, 900 people? Out of 7,500? And their contractor count shrunk from 5,500 to 1,100 or so?

13,000 people down to 2,000 in two weeks. Two days before the World Cup.

I don't even have a quip about this one.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 10:20 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

And Twitter's outages are spiking.

Shit.
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 10:23 PM on November 17, 2022

So now the company's down to... what, 900 people? Out of 7,500? And their contractor count shrunk from 5,500 to 1,100 or so?

238 FTEs, apparently.

Yes, Twitter's headcount is now under the 280 character limit.
posted by NoxAeternum at 10:23 PM on November 17, 2022 [16 favorites]

I don't even have a quip about this one.

they're both staffed primarily by foreign guest workers now
posted by ryanrs at 10:25 PM on November 17, 2022 [4 favorites]

IF IT SUCKS… HIT DA BRICKS!!
posted by Artw at 10:56 PM on November 17, 2022 [1 favorite]

And Twitter's outages are spiking. [Downdetector]

Downdetector doesn't actually check if the site is having problems. It's crawling the internet to see if people are claiming that it's down, but it's likely to be confused by people predicting that it will go down soon or any amount of "RIPTwitter" memes. One of its biggest data sources is Twitter itself.

How Downdetector works
posted by meowzilla at 10:56 PM on November 17, 2022 [3 favorites]

It's been mentioned days ago in the context of autonomous driving but now in the midst of this chaos:

Imagine buying an expensive electric vehicle that's highly dependent on software of the highly-networked Internet of Things type and the CEO goes 'hardcore' on the employees. Forget autonomous driving, I'd worry about the door locks glitching up — or worse.
posted by UN at 12:52 AM on November 18, 2022 [3 favorites]

A lot of the people I follow from marginalised identities have been sharing their takes, but to make its own fpp feels too much twitter on the blue, but what do you all think? Or rather I keep being confused which thread should I share those links under?
posted by cendawanita at 1:23 AM on November 18, 2022 [8 favorites]

I feel bad for everyone quitting, but Elon deserves the hell he's brought upon himself (unfortunately, nobody else did).

Every time I see one of Musk's mistakes being documented and dissected on his own platform, I think about this observation from polyhymniaagain, and laugh at him some more:

It boggles my mind that someone paid 44 billion dollars to become the permanent main character of twitter. Say what you will but when William Randolph Hearst owned a newspaper you could not get away with calling him a little bitch in it. You wanted to call William Randolph Hearst a little bitch you had to go to the trouble of making Citizen Kane.
posted by creepygirl at 1:42 AM on November 18, 2022 [24 favorites]

...to make its own fpp feels too much twitter on the blue

We seem to have 3 open Twitter threads:
196970/Dear-Twitter-Advertisers
197158/Twitter-Poisoned
197188/We-knew-this-was-coming-

And 2 open Mastodon threads:
197107/Mastodon-is-having-its-moment-in-the-sun
(Metatalk)26183/Mefi-Mastodon-server

To be honest I don't think we need a new thread, and would just put Twitter content in either the most active or the newest.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 2:37 AM on November 18, 2022 [3 favorites]

Twitter HQ in San Francisco Ticker: Supreme Parasite, petulant pimple, apartheid profiteer, dictator's asskisser, lawless oligarch, insecure coloniser, cruel hoarder, space karen, mediocre manchild, pressurised privilege, petty racist, meglomaniac, worthless billionaire, bankrupcy baby.
posted by Lanark at 2:45 AM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

Elon Musk called in his SpaceX CFO for some meetings and calls held today to try and convince people to stay by pitching Musk's vision for Twitter. Didn't work.

Keep pitching "Musk's vision for Twitter", and keep watching what happens when you do. Maybe it'll be different this time.
posted by clawsoon at 2:53 AM on November 18, 2022

Let's see what's trending this morning...

#RIPTwitter
Trending with #TwitterDown, #GoodByeTwitter

Tumblr
Trending with MySpace

Mastodon

Discord
posted by clawsoon at 3:02 AM on November 18, 2022

Facebook: For people who want to speak to their friends.

Twitter: For people who want to speak to the world.

Weird old text-based sites I'm on: For people who want to speak to a consistent set of random strangers.
posted by clawsoon at 3:28 AM on November 18, 2022 [30 favorites]

From the "Kherson liberated" thread:
The current Twitter meltdown is not good news for following developments in Ukraine, I fear.

So I'm pondering cui bono when Twitter is gone and, well…is there any evidence to suggest Musk's a secret Putin stooge a la Trump?
posted by CheesesOfBrazil at 4:05 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Some journalists have set up presscheck.org for finding verified journalists on Mastodon.
posted by clawsoon at 4:12 AM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

In the middle of the day in Japan, Pokemon was the leading twitter trend. Eventually, Twitter終了 (Twitter shuryo, similar to the RIPTwitter trend) moved up to the top. Mastodon trended for a bit but it seems that Instagram may be where people are headed for next. Another trend is people talking about mixi, which was an early Japanese social network that required a Japanese keitai (cellphone) email address to sign up for. It got overtaken by facebook (myspace was never a thing in Japan) and twitter.
posted by LostInUbe at 4:49 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

I posted this to the Mastodon thread, too, but since that thread seems to be less active I'll copy it here:

History Scholars, Teachers, and Graduate Students on Mastodon

NatSec people on Mastodon

Mastodon users working in infectious diseases (clinicians, researchers, journalists, etc)

Journalists on Mastodon and Fediverse

All from @[e-mail], who is posting lists like this to his timeline.

@[e-mail]: "I haven’t grown 26K fans in a day since the early days of social media! Welcome to all who are now here with me. Let’s make new adventures together."
posted by clawsoon at 4:50 AM on November 18, 2022 [9 favorites]

I really hope someone has been scraping t.co
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:24 AM on November 18, 2022 [3 favorites]

Whelp, back to usenet.
posted by sebastienbailard at 5:35 AM on November 18, 2022 [9 favorites]

It consistently amuses me how close reddit is to usenet, but web-interface and centralized. Which is a big difference, yeah. But here we are almost 30 years after Eternal September and one of the biggest, most important places on all the intarwebz is... a place for threaded text discussion on specific topics as indicated by the name of the subforum.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 6:13 AM on November 18, 2022 [9 favorites]

The current stage is Threads: the Website.

"Okay, we made it through the blast wave. Are we going to make it and be okay now?"

"Just wait."
posted by delfin at 6:22 AM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

Considering that vital public safety messages go out over Twitter every day, I think the service should be nationalized.
posted by ob1quixote at 6:28 AM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

Twitter is currently blocking tweets that include a link to joinmastodon.com. If you try to post a tweet that includes that URL, you get a message saying "Tweet not sent".

Via Dr. Meredith Wills.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 6:32 AM on November 18, 2022 [6 favorites]

To be honest I don't think we need a new thread, and would just put Twitter content in either the most active or the newest.

Just as well, as there's another new twitter-related fpp anyway. I commented when I did in a burst of energy but maybe if the new thread feels general enough I'll scrounge up what I've seen. Likely others have seen them too.
posted by cendawanita at 6:47 AM on November 18, 2022

He thinks he's doing well, doesn't he?
posted by tigrrrlily at 6:58 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

So there is at least one person still left in content moderation.
posted by Mitheral at 7:03 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Elon Musk has lied for 27 years about his credentials. He does not have a BS in Physics, or any technical field. Did not get into a PhD program. Dropped out in 1995 & was illegal. Later, investors quietly arranged a diploma - but not in science.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:28 AM on November 18, 2022 [21 favorites]

The block of joinmastodon.com was legit, the proper url was joinmastodon.org. Further confusing matters I think the mastodon folks now have control of joinmastodon.com so there may not be anything wrong with it anymore.
posted by mscibing at 7:29 AM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

Someone please make me a GIF of the building scroll, there doesn't appear to be one online yet.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:35 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Someone please make me a GIF of the building scroll

Lanark linked a GIF.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:58 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

Schadenfreude doesn't quite cover my pleasure in seeing that parasite fail...
posted by schyler523 at 8:04 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

A long thread of all the things that could go wrong at Twitter now that it's mostly crewless, some of which may lead to people getting killed...

@MosquitoCapital:

I've seen a lot of people asking "why does everyone think Twitter is doomed?"

As an SRE and sysadmin with 10+ years of industry experience, I wanted to write up a few scenarios that are real threats to the integrity of the bird site over the coming weeks.

posted by Buntix at 8:10 AM on November 18, 2022 [15 favorites]

This morning I haven't seen much solid new reporting on exactly what the result of yesterday's debacle was. WashPo takes a swing at some numbers, but it's pretty rough

Workers offered varying estimates of how many people remained employed at Twitter, ranging from 2,000 to 2,500, down from the 3,500 or so believed to have remained after an initial round of layoffs affecting roughly half the staff this month.

Perhaps Twitter's PR department will make an official statemen... ahahahah, sorry.

Anecdotally my understanding is that a larger proportion of engineers chose to be fired than other types of employees. Also that various engineering and ops teams for critical functions are down to 0 or 1 people. It's hard to imagine recovering from that loss of institutional knowledge.
posted by Nelson at 8:12 AM on November 18, 2022 [3 favorites]

Random hard drive fills up. You have no idea how common it is for a single hosed box to cause cascading failures across systems, even well-engineered fault-tolerant ones with active maintenance. Where's the box? What's filling it up? Who will figure that out?

Logs. 9 times out of 10 it’s gonna be logs.
posted by Artw at 8:18 AM on November 18, 2022 [14 favorites]

Logs. 9 times out of 10 it’s gonna be logs.

I'm reminded of when there was an issue with Teslas overlogging and bricking themselves by exceeding the write limits on their SSDs.
posted by NoxAeternum at 8:24 AM on November 18, 2022 [3 favorites]

At Google I saw machines go down when
ls | wc -c
started exceeding available memory, causing the OOM killer to headshot the log-deleting process.
posted by ryanrs at 8:28 AM on November 18, 2022 [8 favorites]

Just a few weeks ago a server powered off as I was working on it. I was deathly afraid I had done something idiotic, specially after it would come up and then immediately power off. Turns out the person who set it up created a dedicated audit log partition and configured it to power off when it filled up. It just happen to fill up as I was on it.

Took over a day of reading logs and searching messages to track that down, there wasn't a "audit log is full, powering off" message.

I think Twitter will coast for a while, until some server fills up it's audit log (metaphorically) or the HVAC system dies in one room and the servers power off and don't come back for some reason. We're in the fog of war right now, I'm guessing it's far worse and far better than rumors are making it out to be. It will be fascinating to see how it plays out. I feel sorry for folks who depend on Twitter for news far more than I do.
posted by beowulf573 at 8:36 AM on November 18, 2022 [7 favorites]

Thought this was a joke when I read the first tweet, but apparently not?

@ZoeSchiffer

NEW: Email from Elon to the engineering team: "Anyone who can actually write software, please report to the 10th floor at 2pm today. Before doing so, please email me a bullet point summary of what your code commits have achieved in the past 6 months" 1/

Elon Musk is also asking for up 10 screenshots of the "most salient lines of code" from Twitter engineers 2/

Again, no context as to what this is about. We know Twitter's engineering teams have been gutted by layoffs and resignations. What's next?

posted by Buntix at 9:02 AM on November 18, 2022 [9 favorites]

Just last week I watched as critical systems at my company collapsed because IT didn't do the proper testing. They were like "It's launching tonight!" and I told them that's ok as long as it's working as intended. I had given them bugs to fix when they first announced it and showed me a beta. They assured me they'd be fixed before launch. And they launched it and guess what? It didn't work. It took a week to get back to a usable condition. And our accounts only number in the thousands. I can't even imagine what would happen when you have millions of accounts.
posted by downtohisturtles at 9:04 AM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

Just endless dick waving firedrills for anyone who can’t escape, for the amusement of Musk and his Tesla toadys.

The people who left absolutely made the best choice.
posted by Artw at 9:06 AM on November 18, 2022 [8 favorites]

"Anyone who can actually write software, please report to the 10th floor at 2pm today.

Isn't the office closed and locked up? Who is even in the office?
posted by mochapickle at 9:08 AM on November 18, 2022 [9 favorites]

Senior-level employees with an (now-completely-valid) expectation of getting laid off are the last ones that you want writing code, and the first ones you want trying to document every corner case and obscure process that only they know.
posted by meowzilla at 9:11 AM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

Surprised there's not smoke coming out of his ears with all the inner justifications he has to develop to put all the blame on other people.
posted by seanmpuckett at 9:11 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

"Is anyone on this plane a doctor? Help, we need a doctor!"
posted by Nelson at 9:20 AM on November 18, 2022 [3 favorites]

"Is anyone on this plane a doctor? Help, we need a doctor!"

But first provide me documentation of your most salient operations.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 9:22 AM on November 18, 2022 [17 favorites]

Musk is getting it from all sides today, and why not? From The Climate Case Against Elon Musk by Emily Atkin (there may be a paywall):

...Tesla is not Elon Musk, and Elon Musk is not Tesla. If you want to honestly evaluate his impact on the planet as a human, then you have to evaluate him the same way you’d evaluate any country or corporation: cumulatively. ... To adequately assess Musk as a climate figure, you have to look at everything he is doing. That includes more than just his companies’ emissions impact; it includes the political and cultural impact he’s having as the world’s wealthiest person, as those things will ultimately determine whether the climate progress of today will survive in the future.

... Research has repeatedly shown that Twitter is an essential tool for studying, fighting, and responding in real-time to climate change. Activists have credited the social media site with allowing them to organize around, and ultimately help pass, critical climate legislation. It’s a popular source for climate news and information. It’s the primary reason this newsletter has readers.

Musk’s recent takeover of Twitter has put this critical climate communication, education and advocacy platform at risk of failure. After mass layoffs and resignations, a former Twitter employee told The Washington Post Thursday that at least six critical systems that keep the site functioning no longer have any engineers. Climate disinformation has also increased on the platform since Musk took over—which makes sense, since Musk fired half of Twitter’s staff including 15 percent of the site’s content moderation team. ...

TL;DR: Musk has fucked up on the environmental front in many ways, and Twitter is part of that but only part.
posted by Bella Donna at 9:28 AM on November 18, 2022 [3 favorites]

via @dmofengineering

Since the Elonstans have shown up in my mentions to tell me about “Twitter’s loses” and “laziness”

I thought they should know something: They are suckers who have been lied to.
In 2021, Twitter made ~500M from operations. And you’re know that if you can read a financial report Now, Twitter’s 2021 Annual report does say they lost 221M, so what am I talking about?

They also settled a very old (circa 2014) lawsuit for 765M. See “Litigation settlement, net”, under “Costs and expenses”
That’s a *one time* cost, irrelevant to the business health.

So, does Elon know this?

The answer must be either Yes, or it’s No.

Both answers are bad.

If it’s Yes, he’s lying to you.
If it’s No, he’s incompetent.

It’s a choose your own adventure, Player!
Read the report for yourself: page 40

2021
Loss from operations was $492.7 million, or 10% of total revenue, in 2021, compared to income from operations of $26.7 million, or 1% of total
revenue, in 2020. Loss from operations in 2021 includes a one-time litigation-related net charge of $765.7 million
Net loss was $221.4 million in 2021

2020
Net loss was $1.14 billion in 2020, which was inclusive of a $1.10 billion provision for income taxes related to the establishment of a valuation allowance against deferred tax assets.

2019 Net income was 1.47 Billion
2018 Net income was 1.21 Billion
posted by Lanark at 9:35 AM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

So my reading of all that is that Elon could have bought Twitter, sat on his hands and changed nothing and would probably be looking at a profit of somewhere around $500m - 1 billion/year.

But of course when you have just taken on $44 billion in debt, that is not enough.
posted by Lanark at 9:38 AM on November 18, 2022 [9 favorites]

endless dick waving firedrills

Yep yep yep; "report to the office -- which by the way is closed and locked today but figure it out -- with your lines-of-code credentials" is yet another "jump when I say" loyalty test.

Also: his bizarre ongoing obsession with code metrics as a method of evaluating engineers.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 9:58 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

I am surprised that no one has bought www.birdsite.com given how many people seem to be calling twitter that online. It's available for under $1000.
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 10:00 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

@kateconger In a follow up email, Musk encouraged people to fly to SF for this.

So this is either an extremely lame “prank” or completely insane.
posted by Artw at 10:03 AM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

no he just doesn't want people to hang up on him mid-call, lol
posted by ryanrs at 10:07 AM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

Could be he’s crazy like a fox and you get massive tax breaks for torturing a huge company to death, but he doesn’t pay taxes so that doesn’t make sense. Maybe it’s a bankruptcy thing.
posted by Artw at 10:10 AM on November 18, 2022

In a follow up email, Musk encouraged people to fly to SF for this.

He should be careful or someone will interpret that as "fly into the 10th floor at 2pm".
posted by clawsoon at 10:12 AM on November 18, 2022

Business Insider has the emails:

Anyone who actually writes software, please report to the 10th floor at 2 pm today.

Before doing so, please email a bullet point summary of what your code commands have achieved in the past ~6 months, along with up to 10 screenshots of the most salient lines of code.

Thanks,
Elon

If you're working remotely, please email the request below nonetheless and I will try to speak you via video. Only those who cannot physically get to Twitter HQ or have a family emergency are excused.

These will be short, technical interviews that allow me to better understand the Twitter tech stack.

Thanks,
Elon

If possible, I would appreciate it if you could fly to SF to be present in person. I will be at Twitter HQ until midnight and then back again tomorrow morning.

posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 10:18 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

Again, HOW ARE THEY SUPPOSED TO GET INTO YOUR STUPID BUILDING?!?!
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:22 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

So it's really "report at 2PM to get into a line that will stretch into the weekend."

(And if he wants to understand the stack he really should also -- first? -- be talking to architects, devops, SREs rather than reviewing individual lines of code.)
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 10:23 AM on November 18, 2022 [12 favorites]

Dude desperately wants to avoid any conversation that might imply some other person knows more than him or allows anyone else even a shred of dignity.
posted by Artw at 10:27 AM on November 18, 2022 [6 favorites]

"These will be short, technical interviews that allow me to better understand the Twitter tech stack."

What the fuck
posted by Horkus at 10:30 AM on November 18, 2022 [13 favorites]

@coopercooperco:

One of the worst things about Musk is evident in this thread: he’s a guy who sends multiple emails after one another when he could’ve just written it all into one coherent email.

posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 10:31 AM on November 18, 2022 [11 favorites]

testValue := (stateQual / exState) + 17;

EM: That’s an assignment statement. Correct?

You: Yes.

EM: So you’re assigning that testValue character to do something?

You: Well, not exactly…

EM: When testValue gets to work, it’s going to do it’s assignment hardcore, right?

You: sigh…
posted by njohnson23 at 10:34 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

so he still thinks this is all a big software problem. ok
posted by ryanrs at 10:38 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

"Code commands"? Does he want to see everyone's ~/.bash_history?
posted by The Lurkers Support Me in Email at 10:38 AM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

> Buntix: "NEW: Email from Elon to the engineering team: "Anyone who can actually write software, please report to the 10th floor at 2pm today. Before doing so, please email me a bullet point summary of what your code commits have achieved in the past 6 months" 1/"

Elon's focus/emphasis on "software" is beginning to seem a tad monomaniacal to me. Like, from what I understand, DevOps and SREs may, when necessary, write software to assist in their jobs but their main job is not writing software. Their main job is to keep the infrastructure running, which requires many skills outside of writing software. Also, asking for the "most salient lines of code" reinforces my impression that this guy has no idea what modern software is like. And another thing, what's with asking for screenshots (up to 10 lol) of code? Does this guy not know about laptops yet? I would bet $100 that this guy is trapped in a 1990s-era software mentality and has never used a modern IDE.

Meanwhile, World Cup starts next week. I'm sure their systems are not at all close to melting down and are gonna hold up just fine with skeleton crew they've got remaining.
posted by mhum at 10:47 AM on November 18, 2022 [6 favorites]

OK, someone help me remember this story:

Some tech manager/director/CEO decided to give all the engineers a programming quiz on C pointer arithmetic or similar, and fire any who failed the test. Including electrical and mechanical engineers.

I'm having trouble googling this, but I don't think I just dreamed it. Who was this / what company did this? Not saying it was Musk, but maybe? Someone please know what I'm talking about.
posted by ryanrs at 10:48 AM on November 18, 2022

BTW, there's another Twitter FPP where more discussion on this is happening, if anyone here still has more popcorn they need to use up.
posted by wesleyac at 10:50 AM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

Dude just reinstated assorted Nazis. Yeah, that’ll fix your problem.
posted by Artw at 10:51 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

"Anyone who actually writes software..."

This reads like Elon still feels like Twitter was 99.99% slackers, that no one who has left was competent, and he feels like he still has not finished finding and firing the incompetent people who are holding Twitter back from ... whatever it it he thinks it should become.

Synthesizing a few observations I have read over the past few weeks - SpaceX and Tesla are or were some of a small number of companies in their domains that are both operating at large scale but also have a big appetite for innovation and risk. It is maybe not surprising that the people working there, are more "mission driven" than Twitter employees, are willing to work for less pay, to put up with more BS, or to just signal alignment with Musk more broadly, than people working at Twitter.

I'm going to guess that surrounded by such people, there's going to be an affirming emotional vibe for Musk, enough to feel like these people are OK, we are on the same team, I can cut them some slack when things are not perfect, etc...

Having acquired Twitter in a very tumultuous process, where he has made many sudden, dramatic moves. He has disparaged the company, its product, and workforce publicly. I think Musk enters that space with a much more hostile vibe. To Musk, these people are incompetents, slackers, activists, etc, who are not at all as good as with "his" rocket scientist programmers from SpaceX or genius self-driving-car AI programmers from Tesla. To the Twitter workforce, Musk has just given them a very generous payout on their stock, but has also been loudly slamming them in public, clearly does not understand social media as a business, nor does he actually understand the technical challenges that they do face (the "thousands of RPC calls" drama from earlier). He has fired half the company on the basis of some very questionable metrics (stack ranking by net lines of code written?!), overturned popular remote-work policies, and demanded teams work overtime to deliver half-baked, poorly thought-out features. So there's mutual hostility.

I think this hostility is new to Musk and it's fueling his paranoia. I don't know if he can fire enough people to fix the paranoia because firing people is not going to reduce that hostility. As he runs out of people who actually know how the site works, or care about Twitter and its users, he is going to become more vulnerable to actual sabotage or espionage from without, whether his purges succeed in fixing any internal weaknesses.
posted by rustcrumb at 10:51 AM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

cendawanita: A lot of the people I follow from marginalised identities have been sharing their takes, but to make its own fpp feels too much twitter on the blue, but what do you all think? Or rather I keep being confused which thread should I share those links under?

I'd be interested in this as an FPP. Maybe in a few days post what you've collected, and an article to tie it all together if you can find one? That feels like a worthwhile post.
posted by clawsoon at 10:57 AM on November 18, 2022 [6 favorites]

posting in a 1400 comment mefi thread to show solidarity with twitter's slow load times
posted by ryanrs at 10:58 AM on November 18, 2022 [12 favorites]

Mefi is doing >1000 poorly batched RPCs just to render a home timeline!
posted by mochapickle at 11:06 AM on November 18, 2022 [20 favorites]

Jessamyn asking top posters to Amtrak out to Vermont with print-outs of their hardest-hitting comments
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 11:09 AM on November 18, 2022 [71 favorites]

Can I submit my FPP about Big Smo that only got 3 favourites but generated 77 comments? I'm perversely proud of that one.
posted by clawsoon at 11:12 AM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

to Amtrak out to Vermont

*snork!*
posted by mochapickle at 11:14 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Not saying it was Musk, but maybe?

IT WAS. In the Twitter thread from an ex-Tesla eng, linked in this 2018 FPP (from Artw, hi!), this tweet:

autopilot had _really_ high turnover at one point before release because some guy from space x came in and gave the entire dept a C pointer/memory test because Elon said they were "late" to ship.

many quit in protest at the test, others didn't pass because they were harness people working in cad programs and not actually programmers.

posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:15 AM on November 18, 2022 [17 favorites]

jesus christ, lol

Anyway, I was thinking about it as I was brainstorming examples of Musk being completely clueless. That's an amazing example, as are all the "print out your code" edicts.

You know, I can understand if he doesn't know version control and git branches or w/e, but if he had any contact with SW development over the last decade, he should at least know it exists. He could get someone to setup GUI tools with pretty maps showing who did what in the repository, total contributions, etc.

But actually Elon is a complete fraud who is all bluster and bullshit (and money, which cures many ills). He has no idea how anything works, even basic day-to-day SW dev, nevermind safety engineering, aerospace, or whatever the hell hyperloop was supposed to be.

The most insane thing to me is that he hasn't backed down / stepped aside yet. He cannot stop fucking this up, or even admit he is completely flailing, even when it's completely obvious to every person on the planet.
posted by ryanrs at 11:24 AM on November 18, 2022 [9 favorites]

You just want to say, "Elon, literally everything you want to do and every gut instinct you have is wrong. Why not try The Opposite?"
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:27 AM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

If anyone has ever been in actual need of a "wellness check", it's Musk.

(I feel like I should specify I don't mean some cop should go and shoot him, but, you know, the way it's *supposed* to work)
posted by tigrrrlily at 11:29 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

I feel like I should specify I don't mean some cop should go and shoot him

Hey now, let's not be hasty
posted by Tom Hanks Cannot Be Trusted at 11:32 AM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

hahaha, am I reading a twitter post of a yospos screenshot?
posted by ryanrs at 11:38 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

> 238 FTEs, apparently.

Much like a majority of Twitter's content, this is plausible, but probably false.
posted by tonycpsu at 11:44 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Again, HOW ARE THEY SUPPOSED TO GET INTO YOUR STUPID BUILDING?!?!

Wait, I thought the locked doors tweet was from a parody account ?
posted by Pendragon at 11:45 AM on November 18, 2022

The doors have been officially locked, that's now public knowledge. The anothercohen account is labeled as "mostly parody" and we should probably assume anything he said on the topic was a joke.
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:46 AM on November 18, 2022

Musk has announced a new content policy. Also that several accounts have been reinstated. Apparently his promise three weeks ago to create a content moderation council no longer holds.

The new policy is as dumb as you might guess. He thinks he's apparently invented shadowbans.

New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach.
Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted & demonetized, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter.
You won’t find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet.

posted by Nelson at 11:54 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

That's an...interesting take, to be sure.

"Kathie Griffin, Jorden Peterson & Babylon Bee have been reinstated. Trump decision has not yet been made." Followed by him deleting his own response tweet.
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:56 AM on November 18, 2022 [3 favorites]

Note that the number on complaint/obsession of Nazis on Twitter is how much they have been unfairly shadow banned and they have been complaining to Musk about it constantly, with him replying and promising to sort it out for them.
posted by Artw at 11:58 AM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

i heard everybody migrated from twitter to grindr b/c it was more financially stable
posted by mittens at 11:58 AM on November 18, 2022

Musk adds: "Note, this applies just to the individual tweet, not the whole account"
posted by clawsoon at 12:00 PM on November 18, 2022

NYT: Elon Musk’s Twitter Teeters on the Edge After Another 1,200 Leave (archive):

One worker who wanted to resign said she had spent two days looking for her manager, whose identity she no longer knew because so many people had quit in the days beforehand. After finally finding her direct supervisor, she tendered her resignation. The next day, her supervisor also quit.

posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 12:10 PM on November 18, 2022 [6 favorites]

More from that article

One team known as Twitter Command Center, a 20-person organization crucial to preventing outages and technology failures during high-traffic events, had multiple people from around the world resign, two former employees said. The “core services” team, which handles computing architecture, was cut to four people from more than 100. Other teams that deal with how media appears in tweets or how profiles show follower counts were down to zero people.

posted by Nelson at 12:11 PM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

I Was the Head of Trust and Safety at Twitter. This Is What Could Become of It. (archive)

Marketers have not shied away from using the power of the purse...

But even if Mr. Musk is able to free Twitter from the influence of powerful advertisers, his path to unfettered speech is still not clear. Twitter remains bound by the laws and regulations of the countries in which it operates...

There is one more source of power on the web — one that most people don’t think much about, but which may be the most significant check on unrestrained speech on the mainstream internet: the app stores operated by Google and Apple...

posted by clawsoon at 12:54 PM on November 18, 2022 [8 favorites]

These will be short, technical interviews that allow me to better understand the Twitter tech stack.

Every time someone says "Musk is playing 4D chess--he can't possibly be that fucking stupid", he goes and proves them wrong.

Also:

Just a few weeks ago a server powered off as I was working on it.

That happened to me once, but it was a hardware thing. This was back in the very early 90s, and the museum I worked in ran its entire admissions and reservations system off a pair of tiny MicroVAX systems in the basement. I forget what exact model they were, but they were basically sort of the pizza-box form factor you saw a lot back then.

They were stacked up under a desk in the computer room with monitors on it. Guess what incredibly crucial switch is right at knee height when you're sitting down with them stacked like that. Yeah.

Fortunately we hadn't opened for the day yet, but still. Heart attack-inducing.
posted by Mr. Bad Example at 12:55 PM on November 18, 2022 [8 favorites]

It's slightly insane that all of this is happening because we moved into a legal regime where maximizing shareholder returns trumps everything else. Musk wanted to get out of buying the company, avoiding all of this happening, but $54.20 per share maximized shareholder returns so that is what happened.
posted by clawsoon at 12:58 PM on November 18, 2022

Ehh. Unproven. He most likely just wanted to pay less.
posted by Artw at 1:00 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Fair point.
posted by clawsoon at 1:03 PM on November 18, 2022

agrawal is such a lucky motherfucker
posted by ryanrs at 1:09 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

> Mr. Bad Example: "These will be short, technical interviews that allow me to better understand the Twitter tech stack."

Why does he need to better understand the Twitter tech stack lol? He's already determined that 80% of their microservices were unnecessary (as well as 80% of the employees). Surely he made that determination after spending his entire three whole weeks since acquiring the company learning about and understanding Twitter's technology architecture and not, say, because he's a total charlatan and poser who's in way, way over his head.
posted by mhum at 1:10 PM on November 18, 2022 [7 favorites]

Maybe it’s so he knows what expertise is required… after he’s let it all go.
posted by Artw at 1:13 PM on November 18, 2022

It's slightly insane that all of this is happening because we moved into a legal regime where maximizing shareholder returns trumps everything else. Musk wanted to get out of buying the company, avoiding all of this happening, but $54.20 per share maximized shareholder returns so that is what happened.

That's not why this is happening. It's happening because the existing legal regime has been fundamentally toothless against people of Musk's level of wealth and power. He's broken securities law, multiple times. For his deceitful taking-Tesla-private tweet he was fined $20 million, which is 0.01% of his wealth, the equivalent of fining a median US household with 6 figure wealth twelve friggin' bucks. He obviously and blatantly broke securities law in buying Twitter, no consequences. His car company has killed 14 people in 'self-driving' accidents, no fines, no jail time; the California DMV still doesn't require Tesla to comply with the law when testing autonomous features. He broke COVID-19 public health orders in his Fremont factory; hundreds of people caught it (back in the very early days when there were no treatments); no consequences. And so on.

If he'd learned that actions can have consequences at any time before this month, we'd all be a lot further ahead.
posted by Superilla at 1:15 PM on November 18, 2022 [22 favorites]

I feel like I have to push back against the idea that Musk "Did not want" to buy Twitter, or was "forced" to acquire it, as though by trickery or chicanery of some sort. It is true that at the time he completed the purchase, he clearly had changed his mind, but the way he ended up here was by giving the current Twitter leadership an extremely generous and binding offer, where he set forth terms of his choosing, including a generous purchase price, foregoing all due diligence, and allowing only a "small" billion-dollar penalty under the narrow circumstances that his financing was not delivered. Clearly when he made such a dramatic offer, he very much wanted to buy Twitter!

If Musk had actually been concerned about the state of Twitter as a business in any way (accuracy of business metrics, percentage of bots, whatever) he could have made his offer conditional on those facts during a due diligence process. He also could have included a voluntary escape clause in the offer for himself, for example "If at any time I change my mind, I can pay Twitter $X and walk away from this deal." Surely the wealthiest man in the world can afford legal advice in such matters!

Given the terms Musk offered, the Twitter board had little choice but to accept - had they not, their shareholders would have sued them into oblivion for mismanagement.

More than being "forced" to buy Twitter, Musk forced the Delaware Court of Chancery to either enforce the contract that he had made to purchase Twitter, or else establish the precedent that contract law doesn't apply to billionaires.
posted by rustcrumb at 1:25 PM on November 18, 2022 [11 favorites]

Oh I was so excited that Yoel had written something for the NYT! It's kind of a bland op/ed sadly. Most of it is him explaining that laws, advertisers, and Apple & Google app store policies will restrain what Twitter can do. Which is true and I'm glad he explained it, but it was not the righteous cleansing fire of an op/ed I was hoping for.

There is a bit of spice towards the end

But even as he criticizes the capriciousness of platform policies, he perpetuates this same lack of legitimacy through his impulsive changes and tweet-length pronouncements about Twitter’s rules. In appointing himself “Chief Twit,” Mr. Musk has made clear that at the end of the day, he’ll be the one calling the shots.

It was for this reason that I ultimately chose to leave the company: A Twitter whose policies are defined by unilateral edict has little need for a trust and safety function dedicated to its principled development.

posted by Nelson at 1:46 PM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

In the New York Times article linked to above, Musk apparently tweeted that all the best people were still there so he wasn’t too worried. But we know that’s not true because Musk is still there. Also, this: “One worker who wanted to resign said she had spent two days looking for her manager, whose identity she no longer knew because so many people had quit in the days beforehand. After finally finding her direct supervisor, she tendered her resignation. The next day, her supervisor also quit.”

There is no HR left. People are logging themselves out of company email systems and Slack. That is crazy pants. Our legal system is incredibly fragile because it’s just not built to respond to people like 45 and this guy who just do what they want in the moment most of the time because, apparently, there is no Delaware court equivalency for labor law emergencies in private companies. I feel badly for users, especially Black Twitter and other marginalized groups that have been important to building community there. But fucking over the workers with such impunity is not new for him but it is wrong, obscene, and should be stopped. It’s not like he’s the only one who fucks over employees but he is the most public one at the moment.
posted by Bella Donna at 1:46 PM on November 18, 2022 [3 favorites]

This is what you get when your political choices are between pro-business party that sucks and pro business party that sucks a bit less but is ineffectual.
posted by Artw at 1:52 PM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

Just a few weeks ago a server powered off as I was working on it.

Fortunately we hadn't opened for the day yet, but still. Heart attack-inducing.

I did tech support in a office where the front half was walk up tech support and the back half housed a dozen servers serving home drives, printing and authentication to a couple thousand users. Went to plug in the PC I was working on one day and just as the plug hit the receptacle the lights went out and I heard all the servers spin down. Took me 20 seconds of PANIC before I figured out power was out in the whole building and my plugging the PC in was just a coincidence.
posted by Mitheral at 1:57 PM on November 18, 2022 [9 favorites]

I suspect even with all the layoffs and resignations Musk will still be able to keep the site up, although there may be some outages and more bugs. Those predicting imminent collapse will be disappointed. I want him to get his ass handed to him, but it’s a pretty robust infrastructure and should keep going for a while.
posted by interogative mood at 2:42 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Just a few weeks ago a server powered off as I was working on it.

Some years ago, I was present when my manager starting swearing and cursing that the goddam server was down again! He pounded on his suddenly inert workstation and scowled.

I looked around and noticed that my manager's service dog (in training) was chewing at the wires under his desk. I pointed this out. The information was not well received.

My point is, there are a million-and-one things that can go wrong in a large enterprise, and you need a lot of people to mind them. Right now, I'm wondering, with Twitter's HR and personnel folk gone, who's preparing the W-2 forms for next year? (Or the equivalent for other countries.)
posted by SPrintF at 3:28 PM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

The biggest problems right now are covert: I am certain that criminal and intelligence actors are taking this opportunity to exfiltrate DMs and private data, and I expect many will succeed. And they can likely hijack accounts that are worth it to exploit.

Twitter's internal controls have been stunningly bad for a big tech company, and now they lost everybody who was working on that. It's a complete hackfest in there starting right about now.

I expect Twitter survives for a while. The thing then is you should treat it as compromised by APT groups forever. Once intruders have pwned all your intruder-detection systems, it is the hardest job to rebuild clean, and Twitter will be hiring a fresh team off the street.

Probably what would take Twitter down is not technical operations but the spiral of having slashed human moderation and algorithmic flagging developers, content becomes a nazi CSAM cesspool, advertisers stay away, no money to build back. If they outlast that, the next hurdle is compliance. The FTC and EU member states (not just Ireland now) are going to be a big, big problem, but it will take months to years for that to land.
posted by away for regrooving at 3:30 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

If we're placing bets, my median expectation is Twitter suffers a multi-hour outage during the World Cup, but comes back.

And that any outage longer than a day will be order of a week, signaling that they failed into a "cold start" dependency cycle that needed new development to get out of.
posted by away for regrooving at 3:35 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Oh and specifically get that app off your phone! Everything it collects with those permissions -- location, contacts -- is at risk.
posted by away for regrooving at 3:44 PM on November 18, 2022 [6 favorites]

I suspect even with all the layoffs and resignations Musk will still be able to keep the site up, although there may be some outages and more bugs. Those predicting imminent collapse will be disappointed.

Is there going to be a digital mushroom cloud that takes the whole site down for more than a matter of hours? ...It's absolutely possible, and in my mind, coin-flip likely. I could also see claims that they're being hacked or sabotaged leading to downtime on their own terms, just so that remaining personnel can figure out what the hell they're dealing with. It's far too valuable an asset to go down and not come back up, PERIOD.

But the heaviest damage is to Twitter as a default It takes years to become sufficiently ubiquitous that you're a global go-to for celebrities, for your grandmother, for restaurants, for businesses, for gimmicks, for news, for breaking news, for commiserating together during times of crisis. It takes a couple of weeks (as we're seeing) for it to degrade to where the niche users remain but the casuals and the celebrities no longer view it as their default messaging destination.

And when that goes, the advertising goes, the draw-in power goes, and suddenly you're MySpace-levels of afterthought. Which isn't terrible unless, let's say, you've spent $44 billion on the platform.
posted by delfin at 3:52 PM on November 18, 2022 [8 favorites]

My expectation is the debt/no income timebomb is what kills it. There is literally nothing that Elon can come up with to defeat that inevitability outside of permanently funding the thing/getting Daddy Thiel to fund it. And at that point it’s not a real business and there’s no incentive to run it like one or invest in it in any way, so it’ll run like crap. Also it’s got solid infra for now but that’s before they start fucking with it, and from microservices saga they’ll want to fuck with it, so there’s a fair chance of a permenant degradation of service coming in that way.
posted by Artw at 4:46 PM on November 18, 2022 [2 favorites]

Platformer

Multiple ex-Twitter sources telling me that Robin Wheeler, the sales leader who Musk begged to stay at the company days ago when she tried to resign, has now been fired

posted by Nelson at 5:22 PM on November 18, 2022 [10 favorites]

Huh, I thought Robin Wheeler was already gone last week? This Daily Beast article seems to suggest it was roughly at the same time that Yoel Roth resigned. In fact, that article sources the info to Casey Newton, the guy who writes Platformer:

Head of client solutions Robin Wheeler, who led a headline-generating Twitter Spaces on Wednesday, was also out, according to Newton, who cited multiple unnamed sources.

I guess maybe Newton's source(s) got it wrong before?
posted by mhum at 5:29 PM on November 18, 2022

The story is she quit, then was convinced to stay (see Newton's update). And now she's fired.

She was the new head of ad sales, briefly.
posted by Nelson at 5:32 PM on November 18, 2022

Ah, that's the part I missed. Which then makes it all the more baffling that Elon fired her after convincing her to stay. Real "stable genius" energy over here.
posted by mhum at 5:37 PM on November 18, 2022

baffling that Elon fired her after convincing her to stay

He had to exorcise the humiliating memory.
posted by tigrrrlily at 5:57 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Personally I think Twitter's tech is collapsing on Sunday when the World Cup starts, but if we're waiting for its legal collapse, it's going to be an EU regulator coming after it for failing to comply with the GDPR. Fines can be 4% of annual revenue, not profit. Twitter had $5 billion in 2021 revenue, which is a $200 million fine.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 6:11 PM on November 18, 2022 [9 favorites]

I feel like I'll be telling the story of this incredibly stupid era to other peoples grandkids when I am really old and in my cups.
posted by srboisvert at 6:15 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

> Eyebrows McGee: "it's going to be an EU regulator coming after it for failing to comply with the GDPR"

Indeed. Between GDPR, the FTC consent decree, probable incoming employment lawsuits (esp. from non-US locations), plus the interest payments, I also feel like the legal/financial maelstrom is only beginning.
posted by mhum at 6:25 PM on November 18, 2022

I feel like I'll be telling the story of this incredibly stupid era to other peoples grandkids when I am really old and in my cups.

Gather round, children, and hear the tale of the return of the fail whale...
posted by nubs at 7:05 PM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

"we used to talk on a blue bird app"

"yes grandpa, time for your nap now"
posted by clawsoon at 7:11 PM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

I never assumed twitter was going to collapse until all the engineers started leaving. What I assumed was that all the shitty people who have been banned for bigotry/inciting violence/harassing people would come back and it would just be so shitty that nobody in their right mind would want to subject themselves to it, particularly as the bigots drove off a lot of creative and funny people in marginalized groups.

Apparently today they're unbanning Jordan Peterson and the Babylon Bee and, per EM, no decision has been made about Trump. That's what I'm really waiting for and I've been expecting it since EM took over. I guess accidentally crashing the company and the infrastructure has kept him too busy to let Trump come in and start stinking the joint up again.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 7:22 PM on November 18, 2022 [4 favorites]

Noted misogynist Andrew Tate, who has been kicked off most mainstream social media platforms, has also been let back on to Twitter.
posted by clawsoon at 7:32 PM on November 18, 2022

Apparently today they're unbanning Jordan Peterson and the Babylon Bee and, per EM, no decision has been made about Trump

Musk has started a Twitter poll about unbanning Trump with the followup "vox populi, vox dei"
posted by nubs at 7:34 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Musk has started a Twitter poll about unbanning Trump

TFG's sad platform will likely outlast Twitter.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:56 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Apparently SpaceX bought a bunch of advertising for Starlink. Tesla’s Solar City will probably be next because apparently Musk can just use these other companies a personal slush funds.
posted by interogative mood at 10:26 PM on November 18, 2022 [1 favorite]

Apparently SpaceX bought a bunch of advertising for Starlink. Tesla’s Solar City will probably be next because apparently Musk can just use these other companies a personal slush funds.

Which is a stupid move given the Tesla compensation lawsuit, as this is literally one of the points that the plaintiffs brought up (that Tesla would be used to prop up his other businesses at the company’s expense.)
posted by NoxAeternum at 10:48 PM on November 18, 2022 [5 favorites]

Fines can be 4% of annual revenue, not profit. Twitter had $5 billion in 2021 revenue, which is a $200 million fine.

See, this is why Musk is a genius, if he reduces revenue to zero, they can't fine him!
posted by the_dreamwriter at 5:09 AM on November 19, 2022 [3 favorites]

This video recap of screenshots covers it all.

I guess he got some photo evidence that coders showed up. All guys, of course.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:50 AM on November 19, 2022 [1 favorite]

in the words of @darth: just the worst fuckin people
posted by Countess Elena at 11:13 AM on November 19, 2022

Apparently SpaceX bought a bunch of advertising for Starlink. Tesla’s Solar City will probably be next because apparently Musk can just use these other companies a personal slush funds.

Which is a stupid move given the Tesla compensation lawsuit, as this is literally one of the points that the plaintiffs brought up (that Tesla would be used to prop up his other businesses at the company’s expense.)

Hilariously, emusk's brilliant twitter leadership is now contaminating the market values of his other companies as investors are reassessing the risks involved in having emusk as their business leader. He is setting his money on fire in multiple places now by destroying what was left of his reputation trolling and drunk driving twitter.

Liz Truss, Elon Musk, Vladimir Putin, bitcoin. Is there some sort era defining thing going on right now? Post-covid stupids? Late stage capitalist derangement? I feel like we are in incredible widening gyre of stupidity.
posted by srboisvert at 11:32 AM on November 19, 2022 [13 favorites]

Is there some sort era defining thing going on right now?

You've hit the Jackpot.
posted by SPrintF at 12:04 PM on November 19, 2022 [2 favorites]

I’m optimistic things will improve as we see the fading impacts of lead paint, leaded gasoline and lead plumbing on the population. So long as micro plastics don’t have similar cognitive effects; then we are just screwed.
posted by interogative mood at 12:29 PM on November 19, 2022 [2 favorites]

Liz Truss, Elon Musk, Vladimir Putin, bitcoin. Is there some sort era defining thing going on right now? Post-covid stupids? Late stage capitalist derangement? I feel like we are in incredible widening gyre of stupidity.

It could also be that we are finally seeing just how stupid some of these people are.

Musk has been dropping hints about his personality for awhile (like calling the cave rescuer who rejected his submarine idea a pedophile), but the twitter meltdown really laid bare just how out of his depth he is.

Being able to see his "management style" in real-time gives a sense of how inherited wealth and reputation can really give momentum to some of these people, and protect them from the consequences of their worst impulses.

Except in the case of twitter, it was too much, too fast and too public.
posted by ishmael at 3:55 PM on November 19, 2022 [5 favorites]

On The Media had an interesting story about this acquisition (https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/episodes/on-the-media-flipping-bird)

Putting on my paranoid conspiracy theory hat, who benefits if Twitter stops working? Those authoritarian countries who want to stifle free speech like KSA, India, and some African countries. Didn’t Elno get money from the Saudis to make this deal? This is the cui bono question - if/when Twitter goes belly up, free speech in many parts of the world will be restricted in ways it isn’t today.

Don’t get me wrong - I don’t think Elno is playing 5th dimensional chess, I think he’s getting played just like Drumpf gets played. When Twitter goes up in flames and takes parts of Tesla/SpaceX (guess who should lose their security clearance?) with it, Musk is going to wear that yoke. There’s going to be an host of others who benefit at his expense and are at sufficient remove as to not care. Narcissism is a hell of a drug.
posted by Farce_First at 4:03 PM on November 19, 2022 [6 favorites]

Narcissism is a hell of a drug.

Given that some people, such as this guy, seem to be on the verge of overdosing on themselves, what is the Narcan for narcissism?
posted by njohnson23 at 4:15 PM on November 19, 2022 [1 favorite]

Putting on my paranoid conspiracy theory hat, who benefits if Twitter stops working? Those authoritarian countries who want to stifle free speech like KSA, India, and some African countries. Didn’t Elno get money from the Saudis to make this deal?

Given how much the Saudis paid Jared Kushner for no immediate financial return, I assumed they bought in to be able to put a finger on the scale of Twitter moderation and fact-checking, aka suppressing information and accounts they don't like. Or, equally likely, that they wanted to make friends with Musk and give him a little money. (Or both! Both is good!) That Twitter is burning down is, I reckon, an unexpected but welcome bonus for them.
posted by gentlyepigrams at 4:39 PM on November 19, 2022 [6 favorites]

Given that some people, such as this guy, seem to be on the verge of overdosing on themselves, what is the Narcan for narcissism?

Shame, empathy, and a 90% marginal tax rate to start.
posted by Farce_First at 4:39 PM on November 19, 2022 [14 favorites]

Musk restores Trump’s Twitter account after online poll

That’s it. I deleted all my tweets and removed all personal identifying info last week, but I hadn’t deleted my account yet. I’m now done.
posted by Devils Rancher at 5:40 PM on November 19, 2022 [7 favorites]

Same, just deleted my account (this time for good)
posted by octothorpe at 6:02 PM on November 19, 2022 [6 favorites]

There goes the neighborhood.
posted by Soliloquy at 6:05 PM on November 19, 2022 [2 favorites]

Another era-defining thing might be the end of low interest rates. Lots of things get harder if you can’t borrow cheaply. And they’ve been low long enough for a lot of successes to be wrongly ascribed to pure smarts.
posted by clew at 6:08 PM on November 19, 2022 [4 favorites]

It'll be a little bit cute watching Twitter's advertisers switch in a heartbeat into penis creams, testosterone boosters, scammers and such.

From a distance.
posted by delfin at 6:09 PM on November 19, 2022

I thought they both hated each other?

Musk is only inviting Trump back in hopes that Trump's fans will like him, too.

It is so needy and pathetic.
posted by ryanrs at 6:58 PM on November 19, 2022 [1 favorite]

Liz Truss, Elon Musk, Vladimir Putin, bitcoin. Is there some sort era defining thing going on right now? Post-covid stupids? Late stage capitalist derangement? I feel like we are in incredible widening gyre of stupidity.

Russia’s latest moves were based, not insignificantly but partly, on wanting control of the energy markets I gather, and of course Britain has a chip in the game, as do the US and Musk with electric too. Kinda wish I was in Daniel Yergin’s brain about this, though in his last book I think he talked about what’s going on in the old Silk Road world.

My $0.02… take or leave them
posted by JoeXIII007 at 7:32 PM on November 19, 2022

So far Trump isn’t back on Twitter because he’s still attempting to prop up his own Truth Social.
posted by interogative mood at 8:08 PM on November 19, 2022

Just deactivated my account. I think TFG will make Twitter sweat but he'll come back in the end because his bullhorn will be that much bigger (than Truth Social).
posted by gentlyepigrams at 8:29 PM on November 19, 2022 [4 favorites]

I'm ready for my check mark, please.
posted by verified account at 8:37 PM on November 19, 2022 [13 favorites]

So far Trump isn’t back on Twitter because he’s still attempting to prop up his own Truth Social.

Or he just figures that Truth Social will still be around come next election.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 8:39 PM on November 19, 2022

"Sorry to see you go. #GoodBye"
posted by Soliloquy at 10:02 PM on November 19, 2022 [1 favorite]

Mods are asleep, post full movies
posted by antinomia at 3:00 AM on November 20, 2022 [2 favorites]

Speaking of pirated movies, one of the "welcome new Mastodon admins" messages I've seen said "Hey, US folks newly running Mastodon instances: do Future You a *huge* favor, mitigate your potential liability, and register with the copyright office and designate an agent to receive DMCA reports *right now*."
posted by clawsoon at 3:48 AM on November 20, 2022 [7 favorites]

Putting on my paranoid conspiracy theory hat, who benefits if Twitter stops working? Those authoritarian countries who want to stifle free speech like KSA, India, and some African countries. Didn’t Elno get money from the Saudis to make this deal? This is the cui bono question - if/when Twitter goes belly up, free speech in many parts of the world will be restricted in ways it isn’t today.

The Saudis might also have a wee interest in undermining the leadership of the manufacturer of the current flagship of the EV transition.
posted by srboisvert at 5:35 AM on November 20, 2022 [4 favorites]

If this all turns out to be a Saudi double-cross on Elon in the interest of oil, I will laugh and laugh.
posted by rhizome at 6:00 PM on November 20, 2022 [3 favorites]

Latest rumor is that Apple App Store and Google play store are attempting to figure out when/if to pull Twitter from their stores. The copyright issues, data privacy and hate speech/pornography /moderation put Twitter in violation of the App Stores TOS.
posted by interogative mood at 12:01 PM on November 21, 2022 [9 favorites]

If they pull Twitter from the App Store, I'll switch to an iPhone.
posted by tigrrrlily at 1:41 PM on November 21, 2022 [4 favorites]

More speculation from MacRumors after the head of Apple’s App Store deleted his account.
posted by interogative mood at 1:48 PM on November 21, 2022 [2 favorites]

The Saudis undermining Tesla would probably backfire. The EV roll out is unstopable now, all killing Tesla would do is puah those sales to other manufacturers. Some of whom would be based in countries not so Saudi friendly as the US.
posted by Mitheral at 1:52 PM on November 21, 2022

The Saudis just want handy access to data so they know who to bonesaw, are probably fine with Elon as long as that data continues to flow.
posted by Artw at 1:56 PM on November 21, 2022 [3 favorites]

this is good for bitcointwitter
posted by tigrrrlily at 2:01 PM on November 21, 2022

(I know that because I read the comments on that MacRumors piece)
posted by tigrrrlily at 2:01 PM on November 21, 2022

one of the "welcome new Mastodon admins" messages I've seen said "Hey, US folks newly running Mastodon instances: do Future You a *huge* favor, mitigate your potential liability, and register with the copyright office and designate an agent to receive DMCA reports *right now*."

That admin (Denise Paolucci, former head of Trust and Safety at LiveJournal) put out a list of the things your Mastodon instance admins better be doing if they are taking things seriously because lives are on the line (cw: abuse, murder):

And a followup thread that I'm doing as a separate thread so people don't have to read the horribleness if they don't feel like they're in a good place for it right now: the bare minimum I look at when evaluating a new service for "do I sign up or not".

1) The Terms of Service, privacy policy, and DMCA policy are publicly available and prominently linked, viewable without a login/registration.

2) The ToS does not contain a binding arbitration clause or a class action preclusion clause, clearly states that posters retain copyright to their content, and the rights grant clause has specific limiters governing what they can use your intellectual property for.

(Rights grant clause: the "you grant us a permanent, irrevocable, worldwide license to display, copy, adapt, etc your content". Some form of this clause is necessary for a site to operate, but the details matter. A well formed RGC limits the purpose of use.)

3) The ownership is clearly and easily identifiable (again, without having to create an account or piece together information). There's more than one owner or team member, and at least one owner who has worked in social media before in *some* fashion.

4) They don't believe that "real name" policies prevent abuse (they don't; they make abuse worse).

5) The team is public about where their early funding came from, what their business plan is, and what form of corporate structure they've chosen and why.

6) If in the US, the site has registered a DMCA designated agent with the copyright office. If in the EU, they've registered a DPO (if the state they're operating in makes DPO registration public) and name the DPO in the privacy policy.

7) The information available pre-signup doesn't indicate that they believe abuse prevention can be achieved with one or two simple tricks that eliminate the need to think further about the issue.

These are the bare minimum requirements I feel are necessary for me to sign up for a new service. Failing on any one of these seven issues is a proxy for governance, knowledge, and judgement issues that in my opinion are highly unlikely to be resolved before someone gets hurt.

And no, "well, they're just starting out" is not a legitimate response to someone pointing out a new site lacks one of those seven things, because see previous thread. This shit is table stakes. If you launch without it, you do not have the judgement you need in this field.

People who let users register on their site without putting down the table stakes are going to slowly, painfully, and bloodily rediscover every single one of the reasons why those seven things are on my list.

posted by NoxAeternum at 2:30 PM on November 21, 2022 [7 favorites]

Latest rumor is that Apple App Store and Google play store are attempting to figure out when/if to pull Twitter from their stores.

No one should be surprised by this. Which is another way of saying that Elon will be shocked and blindsided when it happens. But really, if those app stores blocked the release of Parler until they increased moderation, it's hard to see how they can allow the current version of Twitter.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 2:35 PM on November 21, 2022 [3 favorites]

Musk checking junk drawer, under couch cushions for more employees to fire.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 4:10 PM on November 21, 2022

Elon Musk is laying off even more Twitter workers
Elon Musk says Twitter is done with layoffs and now hiring
Twitter is down to 2,700 employees from 3,700 earlier this month. Not all the sales staff have been deactivated so the number will likely drop more. Over the weekend, the company continued to offer some engineers their jobs back.
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:13 PM on November 21, 2022 [1 favorite]

It's sad that Musk's billions got in the way of his true calling as a shitposter.
posted by clawsoon at 5:15 PM on November 21, 2022 [2 favorites]

Elon Musk says Twitter is done with layoffs and now hiring

The one nice thing about known horrible companies is that they have high turnover and are constantly hiring. If you've gone through a rough patch or just graduated or are new to the country and need some experience on your resume, you can take a job there and have some money coming in while you make connections and look for something better.

And when interviewers ask you why you're looking for a different job they'll be sympathetic to your answer, because they know, too.
posted by clawsoon at 5:23 PM on November 21, 2022 [3 favorites]

That's the thing. Elon's not even a great shitposter. He's at best a mediocre C+. He's still barely above "uncool dad who just discovered 9gag" level of memery. He's just a frickin' poser.
posted by mhum at 5:30 PM on November 21, 2022 [9 favorites]

I recommend linking to tweets using Nitter. This is a free alternative web based client for Twitter. It shows the tweets without any ads or other garbage.
posted by interogative mood at 5:31 PM on November 21, 2022 [3 favorites]

According to The Verge, remaining Twitter employees will be required to email Elon a weekly update including "code samples if relevant or summaries of work for non-technical work, and what they have been trying to accomplish."

[Every time Musk describes Twitter as "hardcore!" I'm reminded of Bubbles from the Powerpuff Girls.]

BTW, with all the talk of updated headcounts, anyone have a clue what's going on with the European staffers who haven't been legally laid-off?
posted by cheshyre at 7:05 PM on November 21, 2022 [2 favorites]

His presence that he’s following the code never gets any less dumber or funnier.
posted by Artw at 7:19 PM on November 21, 2022 [2 favorites]

So 2000+ emails a week every Friday?

Impressive.
posted by clawsoon at 7:23 PM on November 21, 2022 [1 favorite]

Oh, he's not going to read 2000 weekly-status emails; but I bet he's going to have someone run a regular report on who is, and who isn't, jumping through his latest loyalty-test hoop.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 7:33 PM on November 21, 2022 [1 favorite]

I wonder if he'll have to say as much in the course of the Tesla shareholder lawsuit, where he's been claiming he's not just an absentee CEO for Tesla and therefore deserves his insane compensation package. "Yes, I demanded 2000 detailed technical status emails every week from the employees of another company, but I wasn't ever going to read them..."
posted by trig at 8:04 PM on November 21, 2022

> According to The Verge, remaining Twitter employees will be required to email Elon a weekly update including "code samples if relevant or summaries of work for non-technical work, and what they have been trying to accomplish."

usually you want to keep your direct reports to a manageable number, say 10 at max, so you hire trusted managament below you to have about 10 reports and they have management below them with about 10 and so on, the corporate ladder continues on down to the mailroom. But hey, why not have everyone in the company be your direct report? it's called lateral thinking folks.
posted by dis_integration at 8:13 PM on November 21, 2022

Use GPT-3 to write those status reports based on. A training set from big fixes.
posted by interogative mood at 8:16 PM on November 21, 2022 [7 favorites]

Some clever kid is going to shitpost memes in their reports, and Musk is going to promote them to VP.
posted by clawsoon at 8:39 PM on November 21, 2022 [6 favorites]

The article says "every Friday all Twitter employees are required to send an email update on their work", doesn't specifically say they're all spamming Elon. If that's to their team it's not even batshit at all.

(Which means I'm not ruling out that it's all cc:elon, at all.)
posted by away for regrooving at 9:05 PM on November 21, 2022 [1 favorite]

Except… if they’d have been doing proper stand ups and real code reviews the team would all know what each other were up to.
posted by Artw at 9:07 PM on November 21, 2022 [3 favorites]

Eh, I like to do stand-ups only with people that have tight dependencies on each other, not "FYI Circle". While I do appreciate weekly FYI summaries I can scan to keep up on who's in what area and where to route questions.

Also to remember on Monday what I was doing on Friday.
posted by away for regrooving at 9:20 PM on November 21, 2022 [1 favorite]

These are engineers who are supposed to be working on Musk's new company vision on Thursday morning being told there's a new vision that same afternoon. But check your emails! New vision arrives shortly before midnight. Hardcore.

But that's fine and everything. The emails idea is hilarious in the sense that these engineers are writing up their weekly FYIs just in time for them to be unquestionably 100% stale by the time a hypothetical team lead/manager reads them anyway.
posted by UN at 12:07 AM on November 22, 2022

That admin (Denise Paolucci, former head of Trust and Safety at LiveJournal) put out a list of the things your Mastodon instance admins better be doing if they are taking things seriously because lives are on the line (

Is there a direct or nitter link? Threadreader isn't loading where I am, and I'm not sure which Twitter account this is... Is it rahaeli?
posted by cendawanita at 12:23 AM on November 22, 2022

The article says "every Friday all Twitter employees are required to send an email update on their work", doesn't specifically say they're all spamming Elon. If that's to their team it's not even batshit at all.

Musk himself said, "The most entertaining outcome is the most likely," so I'm sticking with all the emails going directly to him.
posted by clawsoon at 4:05 AM on November 22, 2022 [2 favorites]

"usually you want to keep your direct reports to a manageable number, say 10 at max, so you hire trusted managament below you to have about 10 reports and they have management below them with about 10 and so on, the corporate ladder continues on down to the mailroom"

See also: Why the Ukrainian military vastly overperformed Russia: a talented, trained, and trusted junior officer corps. While Russia has micromanaging generals who don't really know what's going on, giving dumb universalized orders that can't adapt to realities on the ground, and the soldiers have to wait for the general to decide what to do whenever anything comes up.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 5:47 AM on November 22, 2022 [4 favorites]

Yes, rahaeli. I believe this was the thread.
posted by Winnie the Proust at 6:26 AM on November 22, 2022 [2 favorites]

NYT: Before Elon Musk bought Twitter last month, the company’s executives had racked up hundreds of thousands of dollars in travel invoices that the social media service planned to pay.
But once Mr. Musk took over the company, he refused to reimburse travel vendors for those bills, current and former Twitter employees said. Mr. Musk’s staff said the services were authorized by the company’s former management and not by him. His staff have since avoided the calls of the travel vendors, the people said.
When Mr. Musk called for Twitter employees to return to the company’s San Francisco offices last week to meet with him, some workers said they were concerned about booking the travel on their personal credit cards and feared not getting reimbursed. Under Mr. Musk’s ownership, Twitter has delayed paying or has denied expense reports that were submitted for approval, four current and former employees said.
The company’s philanthropic division, Twitter for Good, has lost many employees and checks promised to some nonprofit groups have not been received, two people said.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:24 PM on November 22, 2022 [10 favorites]

Billionaires, all as cheap as they are worthless.
posted by Artw at 1:29 PM on November 22, 2022 [14 favorites]

His end result is this twitter logo that sheds a tear every time someone uses the hashtag #RIPTwitter, as they exit.
posted by jenfullmoon at 1:44 PM on November 22, 2022 [3 favorites]

I… also don’t think he can legally do that? Those are liabilities of the company. When you buy a company, you can’t just say “haha I’m taking the assets but the liabilities can go fuck themselves!” It doesn’t work that way!

There might be some arguments to make if the liabilities are obviously fraudulent or corrupt, but that would be a hard case to make, and it would be made against the former management, not the vendors, and it would, uh, also rely on having done due diligence and being lied to about the nature of the travel expense liabilities. Except ol’ Musky waived his diligence.

Now, he might get away with it, but that’s a completely different kind of thing. But I’m thinking that he won’t be getting away with it this time. He’s doing so much blatantly illegal shit, day after day. When he finally gets dragged into court, he’s gonna get slaughtered.

The vendors (and employees, and contractors, and and and) he’s stiffing might not get restitution at the end, of course. Because I’m really starting to wonder if Elon is going to go broke because of this. Seriously, richest man in the world or not, he is fucking this up so bad.
posted by notoriety public at 1:50 PM on November 22, 2022 [10 favorites]

He’s always gotten away with it before, otherwise he wouldn’t be the richest man in the world.
posted by Artw at 2:09 PM on November 22, 2022 [2 favorites]

Here is the thing: That fucking guy (45, not this one) consistently refused to pay vendors what they were owed over years and years and years and got away with it. Musk is also likely to get away with it. If you can afford better attorneys–or any attorneys–and the vendors cannot, well, doesn't matter what the law says. This is just more evidence of what we know already. The laws don't apply equally to all.
posted by Bella Donna at 2:09 PM on November 22, 2022 [6 favorites]

Now, he might get away with it, but that’s a completely different kind of thing.

If nothing else then he's probably going to find it pretty difficult to get any more services from those vendors (or any who have read the news). Especially if you're invoicing something like net 30 you want to be fairly sure the company will still be in a position to pay its bills in 30 days.

Then with the reduced staff and closed remote offices travel may not be something they need much of now.
posted by Buntix at 2:11 PM on November 22, 2022

Elon Musk Reveals His Sneaky Plan for New Twitter Content Moderation Council

In footage of a company Zoom call on Saturday obtained by TMZ, Musk revealed that while the council indeed will be formed, it will be completely powerless and the crucial decision-making power will ultimately lie solely with him.

“We are going to do a content council, but it’s an advisory council,” Musk said in the call. “It’s not a… They’re not the ones who actually… At the end of the day it will be me deciding, and like any pretense to the contrary is simply not true. Because obviously I could choose who’s on that content council and I don’t need to listen to what they say.”

No surprise there.

Musk has steadfastly refused to reinstate the account of conspiracy theorist Alex Jones despite clamor from his supporters. On Sunday, Musk said his decision was informed by the experience of losing his own firstborn son to sudden infant death syndrome. “I have no mercy for anyone who would use the deaths of children for gain, politics, or fame,” Musk added.

So the only reason for Musk to ban someone is if they're associated with something bad that has happened to him? I guess that means the path to better Twitter moderation is for a whole bunch of bad things to happen to him.
posted by clawsoon at 2:22 PM on November 22, 2022 [17 favorites]

My bet on the Alex Jones thing would he one of the Nazi grifters advising him has a rival brain pill company and doesn’t want competition.
posted by Artw at 2:38 PM on November 22, 2022 [3 favorites]

And in true Musk fashion, he's defending his rubber stamp by blaming activists for his rightward turn.
posted by NoxAeternum at 4:05 PM on November 22, 2022 [7 favorites]

The number of brainworm-induced beliefs espoused in the conversation NoxAeternum posted is kind of astounding. It's worse than you think. He seems to see the Associated Press as a "far left" news organization "spouting utter lies"?? (Here's a nitter.net alt link.)
posted by nobody at 4:35 PM on November 22, 2022 [4 favorites]

NoxAeternum: And in true Musk fashion, he's defending his rubber stamp by blaming activists for his rightward turn.

Yesterday he posted a cryptic "The Tactics of Mistake". Turns out it's a science fiction novel. So far as I can tell from the summary, the "tactics" involve appearing to make a bunch of mistakes so that your enemies will get overconfident and overreach when they try to attack you, and that's when you counterattack and brilliantly take them down.

I wonder if he thinks that's what he's doing here. He's not actually incompetent, see, he's actually successfully goading the "far left" into showing its hypocrisy and then vanquishing them with an "aha!"
posted by clawsoon at 4:59 PM on November 22, 2022 [3 favorites]

> notoriety public: "When you buy a company, you can’t just say “haha I’m taking the assets but the liabilities can go fuck themselves!” It doesn’t work that way!"

Incidentally, this appears to be exactly Disney's current stance vis-a-vis Alan Dean Foster's royalties.
posted by mhum at 5:01 PM on November 22, 2022 [6 favorites]

Re: how Space x works, this seems about right.
posted by Artw at 7:37 PM on November 22, 2022 [7 favorites]

Re: how Space x works, this seems about right.

Hard to know if that penis cake story is true - or if anyone else who worked there would be willing to confirm it - but one wants it to be true.
posted by clawsoon at 8:32 PM on November 22, 2022 [2 favorites]

If you can afford better attorneys–or any attorneys–and the vendors cannot, well, doesn't matter what the law says

Did the NYT story say who the vendors are? If it's like, United Airlines or a private jet company or something, I bet they have lawyers. It's looking more lately like the strategy is, get in line at bankruptcy court and good luck, because I'm flying this thing right into the ground at full power.
posted by ctmf at 11:15 PM on November 22, 2022 [3 favorites]

Just learned about that fucking Ferguson tweet of his this morning. Reminded so much of JK Rowling here: a billionaire who has some stupid ideas and an absolute horror of pushback, a once passably human person who gets lovebombed by some of the worst people on earth and ends up becoming one of them because the folks who objected were mean to them. The difference is that Rowling was actually pretty good at what she did, once upon a time. Elon's talent is ... was ... I guess convincing people that you're Tony Stark in waiting is a talent.

Re: how Space x works, this seems about right.

I came here to share this. I know very well that "you shouldn't believe everything you think" and that just because something seems deliciously real doesn't mean that it is. But it would explain the stark contrast of competence we're seeing here. Now I'm remembering how delighted I was by the car he launched into space, the use of LUDICROUS SPEED and DON'T PANIC, the whimsy of it all. I didn't stop to ask myself why the grownups weren't in charge in that room.
posted by Countess Elena at 9:58 AM on November 23, 2022 [5 favorites]

It's going to get a lot worse fast: another stupid poll https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1595473875847942146

Should Twitter offer a general amnesty to suspended accounts, provided that they have not broken the law or engaged in egregious spam?

Currently running 75% yes / 25% no. Replies are full of fash and Musk reply-guys.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 10:26 AM on November 23, 2022 [3 favorites]

Like the previous poll, this is not a meaningful vote in any sense. It's Musk posturing and egging on his crowd of bully friends. Presumably he's gotten bored of individually reinstating the accounts of particular Nazi and Nazi-adjacent accounts and so just wants a general reset so he can then have the pleasure of shutting down accounts he doesn't like.

If you have a strong stomach you can watch a video of Musk explaining that his content moderation council was a sham all along.
posted by Nelson at 10:34 AM on November 23, 2022 [2 favorites]

He’s been working his way through a whos who of suspended fash accounts anyway so I guess that’s coming.
posted by Artw at 10:34 AM on November 23, 2022 [1 favorite]

Is there any reliable information on how Twitter is holding up under the strain of World Cup traffic - particularly since two powerhouse teams suffered surprise losses in the past day or two?
posted by Epixonti at 11:05 AM on November 23, 2022

Another thing about the online far right on Twitter - a lot of them cycle through accounts regularly, starting an account, connecting with their fash buddies through a few stable accounts, pushing limits until they get banned then starting the process all over again. Some of them doing that on a near weekly basis. So this could be reactivating dozens or hundreds of accounts for some people. God knows if they’d still have means to gain access but they aren’t going to be using them for anything good.
posted by Artw at 12:29 PM on November 23, 2022

Twitter Blue is delayed again.

"Didn’t expect it to be so hard, but the difficulty is obvious in retrospect" - Elon

Why Twitter Didn’t Go Down: From a Real Twitter SRE
posted by meowzilla at 3:17 PM on November 23, 2022 [4 favorites]

Geohot, one of Musk's adoring fans (who built a competitor to autopilot, then freaked out when the US Govt. asked him to describe how it works; was an early cracker of iPhones and Playstations), did actually start "interning" at Twitter.

He just posted publicly on Twitter for someone to do his work, in the most arrogant way:

This is the interview.
Build this feature. You don't get source access. Link the GitHub and license it MIT.
Looking for a one liner I paste in my JavaScript console to enable good "from:"

posted by meowzilla at 4:04 PM on November 23, 2022 [1 favorite]

Twitter faces serious legal threat from ex-employees, experts say
posted by jenfullmoon at 4:36 PM on November 23, 2022 [2 favorites]

Am not entirely convinced that not surfacing the semi-secret search keywords isn’t a deliberate decision and throwing an auto complete on them seems of questionable value, not convinced this counts as “fixing” search. Interesting hack day feature perhaps.
posted by Artw at 4:38 PM on November 23, 2022 [1 favorite]

in the most arrogant way

Christ, what an asshole.
posted by fedward at 5:11 PM on November 23, 2022 [2 favorites]

Absolute and complete asshole.
posted by Artw at 6:39 AM on November 24, 2022 [2 favorites]

Thanksgiving firings and giving those people less than if they'd bailed last week.

Dear God, please send Elon three ghosts for Christmas. Thank you.
posted by jenfullmoon at 9:26 AM on November 24, 2022 [6 favorites]

It’s probably disproportionately H1-Bs, based on who would be left, for extra points.

Fucker delights in ruining peoples lives.
posted by Artw at 10:15 AM on November 24, 2022 [5 favorites]

It’s probably disproportionately H1-Bs, based on who would be left, for extra points.

At least one is for sure,

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/yiwei-zhuang-ray_opentowork-layoffs-activity-7001454482190462976-TdI4/

My employment is terminated immediately with no reason today by Elon's Twitter 2.0 team before Thanksgiving. Many employees are fired today as well including those who are on parental leave.
...
I am on an H1B visa and have only 60 days to start a new job. I am looking for a Software/Machine Learning Engineer role immediately.

Musk's also posted a graph claiming to show a reduction in hate-speech on the site. Guessing that may be due to transphobia possibly not being classed as such now. Though I've also noticed that none of the reports I've made in the last few days have any follow up*, so if the stats he's using are based on confirmed cases it may just be that they're down because there's an increasingly large backlog and not enough people to process them.

* I did get an update notification for one, but clicking it didn't bring up any details and then it disappeared...
posted by Buntix at 11:33 AM on November 24, 2022 [1 favorite]

External reporting has very much shown the opposite.
posted by Artw at 12:13 PM on November 24, 2022 [3 favorites]

Reporting, always dodgy, basically stopped operating soon after the initial purchase attempt as far as I could tell. Pretty sure if you make a report now it just puts you on a list of troublemakers.

Per the EU Twitter and other sites has be been slipping throughout 2022.
posted by Artw at 12:17 PM on November 24, 2022 [2 favorites]

Thanksgiving firings and giving those people less than if they'd bailed last week.

Would these people be consider as part of the mass layoff? Seems like being able to just fire thousands of people as long as you don't do it on the same day would be a bit of a loophole.
posted by Mitheral at 1:09 PM on November 24, 2022

I’m sure the bullshit form is just enough cover it’ll never get to court/will drag out for long enough not to make it worthwhile.
posted by Artw at 1:31 PM on November 24, 2022

So not only is the reporting feature now not working, but it's being broken retroactively for all successfully reported accounts.

Opening the gates of hell’: Musk says he will revive banned accounts [WaPo]

Elon Musk plans to reinstate nearly all previously banned Twitter accounts — to the alarm of activists and online trust and safety experts.

After posting a Twitter poll asking, “Should Twitter offer a general amnesty to suspended accounts, provided that they have not broken the law or engaged in egregious spam?” in which 72.4 percent of the respondents voted yes, Musk declared, “Amnesty begins next week.”
...
Many predicted reinstating banned accounts would have very bad outcomes and help bring on the “free-for-all hellscape” that Musk had promised advertisers would not come to pass in a letter posted to Twitter on the day he took possession of the platform.

“This would be a major disaster especially in Africa where State sponsored Ghost accounts were suspended for endangering human rights activists & journalists,” Hopewell Chin’ono, a journalist in Africa tweeted. “You would have allowed vile people to put our lives in danger as journalists! You will have blood on your hands @elonmusk.”

posted by Buntix at 1:35 PM on November 24, 2022 [6 favorites]

I heard that Twitter is also holding back people’s severance because of the class action lawsuits that have been filed.
posted by interogative mood at 4:29 PM on November 24, 2022 [1 favorite]

Dear God, please send Elon three ghosts for Christmas. Thank you.

Uh, God? On second thought, better make it four.
posted by mochapickle at 5:12 PM on November 24, 2022 [1 favorite]

Four ghosts and a Grinch, surely?
posted by SPrintF at 5:32 PM on November 24, 2022 [2 favorites]

The Grinch position is currently filled.
posted by mochapickle at 5:37 PM on November 24, 2022

The Grinch position is currently filled.

Let's hope his heart grows three sizes.

Preferably, Dilated cardiomyopathy.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:33 PM on November 24, 2022 [2 favorites]

He canned people for Thanksgiving. I'd make a joke about "what's he going to do for Christmas, kill puppies?" except frankly, he might very well kill puppies.
posted by jenfullmoon at 8:59 PM on November 24, 2022

i'm not really well-versed in comic book super-villianry, but to those who are, is there a comic-book super-villain template or archetype that this person is drawing from or can be compared to? in my mind i guess i would say his defining characteristics are being painfully uncool, not talented in any way except bullheadedness, bullshit and bluster, yet so rich no one can touch him (maybe his "super power" is uncanny luck)?

like, in what form and/or when can we expect he just starts trying to kill us all? if there's an applicable super-villian already written perhaps my psyche could be soothed by skipping ahead a few chapters, so to speak.
posted by glonous keming at 9:30 PM on November 24, 2022

I think (hope!) that you're giving a little bit too much credit to the head twit.
posted by porpoise at 9:49 PM on November 24, 2022

canned people

Definitely less tasty than pumpkin.
posted by Greg_Ace at 10:02 PM on November 24, 2022 [2 favorites]

Seen on Mastodon, "Nobody has spent more on a dead bird this Thanksgiving than Elon Musk."
posted by vac2003 at 10:57 PM on November 24, 2022 [10 favorites]

Absolute and complete asshole

And such cringing adulation of 'code', Elon hoping that saying "code" a lot can make tech seriousness attach to him. Pathetic and deeply unserious. Your technical zipper is down, Elon, and your technical manhood is on display for all to snigger at.

For anyone not in the business: this "code snippet" stuff is an abject confession of ignorance. The most junior developer's job is to write code to a specification; without reading that document you know nothing besides, like, their choice of how to spell function names. But anybody Twitter particularly cares whether they retain is more senior than that, and what you need to see is how they participated in determining what code was useful to write.

ZoeSchiffer quotes it: “as a result of the recent code review exercise, it has been determined that your code is not satisfactory, and we regret to inform you that your employment with Twitter is terminated effective immediately.”
posted by away for regrooving at 11:49 PM on November 24, 2022 [7 favorites]

There are now reports that clips from the Christchurch massacre of muslims are now being openly shared on Twitter. This is .... heartbreaking beyond words for us here in Aotearoa. I realise this is a "gatekeeper" comment, but if you are still on that platform, please think hard about why you are.
posted by vac2003 at 12:13 AM on November 25, 2022 [2 favorites]

i'm not really well-versed in comic book super-villianry, but to those who are, is there a comic-book super-villain template or archetype that this person is drawing from or can be compared to?

Musk can easily be compared to the MCU version of Justin Hammer (Iron Man 2). In the film, Hammer clearly wants to be viewed as Tony's equal, but his attempts to do so fall short. (He tries to be cool, but isn't. His HammerTech is expensive and flashy, but fails next to Iron Man and War Machine.)
posted by SPrintF at 3:58 AM on November 25, 2022 [2 favorites]

ZoeSchiffer quotes it: “as a result of the recent code review exercise, it has been determined that your code is not satisfactory, and we regret to inform you that your employment with Twitter is terminated effective immediately.”

I do wonder though whether it's the "code" that was unsatisfactory or the extent to which the employee conveyed enthusiasm or adulation or fit the imaginary brofile of "hardcore" that Musk wants to surround himself with, the better to get high on his own supply.
posted by trig at 5:24 AM on November 25, 2022

but if you are still on that platform, please think hard about why you are.

I'm still there primarily because it's still the best place to keep track of all the bad shit that's happening there.

Well, that and while realistically I've been fairly confident that the place was headed for the shambles since Musk bought it, I still kinda hope that perhaps he'll get bored and fuck off into obscurity and it can recover.

Especially since, looking at my stats: 22.5k tweets (admittedly probably mostly retweets as I tend to be more a signal booster in that context) over 16 years, it appears I've foolishly invested quite a lot of myself into the place.

Still, probably should at the very least be nuking all those tweets as it seems the uptight-whitey-righties may be doing deep dives on left-wing accounts, primarily to mass-report and get them banned*, but it probably is at the point where it's not safe to have a history there.

* There's a pastebin list here of accounts that are allegedly being targetted.
posted by Buntix at 5:29 AM on November 25, 2022

Increasingly reaching a tipping point where I go from “yeah, that’s reasonable” to “Nazi clown house is on fire, get the fuck out now, whatever you think of as worthwhile about it can be got elsewhere get the fuck out now”.

Mostly I am not judgmental as I think the thing will inevitably collapse without anyone doing anything, but if it doesn’t I’m going to be disappointed in everyone who continues to GNG out there as if it’s fine.
posted by Artw at 6:05 AM on November 25, 2022 [6 favorites]

Twitter has lost 50 of its top 100 advertisers since Elon Musk took over, report says
posted by Artw at 7:56 AM on November 25, 2022 [3 favorites]

Is GNG an autocorrect (for "hang" maybe?) or am I about to learn a new acronym
posted by cortex at 8:52 AM on November 25, 2022 [3 favorites]

Former. Gah.
posted by Artw at 9:23 AM on November 25, 2022

Clips of the Christchurch Massacre are regarded here in New Zealand as "objectionable material" and Accessing, possessing, or distributing (including sharing or hosting or showing other people) the video file are criminal offences against New Zealand law. So Twitter would seem to be in some legal jeopardy in Aotearoa if these clips remain available. (I know Musk doesn't give a flying fuck about that.) More to the point is the government agencies that use Twitter here. Weather and traffic updates are two notable examples. What do they do? Do they remain on the platform?

There are reports that the team at Twitter working on the so-called Christchurch Call in response to the massacre have been disbanded. This makes the platform here in Aotearoa very problematic for both government officials and those individuals who have a high profile here on Twitter.

There are some good, solid, progressives still using Twitter here. And I understand why they do. But it is going to become increasingly hard to justify being active if clips of the massacre remain accessible. And even if they are removed, the barrier has been broken and, as has been noted here many times, Twitter is becoming a cesspit for the far-right to spread their filth.

Edit: I have just read that both accounts involved in sharing this material have now been suspended.
posted by vac2003 at 10:40 AM on November 25, 2022 [3 favorites]

I’ve a lot more respect for people using it because it’s still retaining usefulness than people pretending they can “fight back” and “save it” by staying on there. Pure delusion, that.
posted by Artw at 10:49 AM on November 25, 2022 [2 favorites]

And now Twitter's banning a John Brown Gun Club branch that posted "Every queer a riflethem" after the Club Q murders. Also a "@CBP mugging at gunpoint".

Even the most charitable read is that Elon has unbanned all the fascists, loved them up, and cut 80% of the undervalued contract workers who used to sift through their hate. So now when the fascists go flagmobbing their targets, anybody left inside Twitter who's not an asshole (all the luck finding a way out fast) doesn't even have the capacity to prevent bad bans. Much less the political cover against their fashy CEO if they did.
posted by away for regrooving at 10:50 AM on November 25, 2022 [8 favorites]

Yeah shit is getting bad very fast. Undeniably bad. Like Trumpism before it I’m sure there’s people who want to pay it no mind or pretend it isn’t significant, which is a bit trickier with Elmo being such an asshole about it.

The question is less does he want to make Twitter a tool for fascists (he does) and more does he care about ruining it as a normal business while doing that? Will he keep it going pumped up with Thiel-bucks in its zombie state, or will it actually collapse? The former has a much more of a problem.
posted by Artw at 11:26 AM on November 25, 2022 [1 favorite]

An Ireland- based Twitter executive (global vice president for public policy) has got an injunction preventing Twitter from dismissing her. (She didn't click yes on the email, so is being treated as if she resigned.)
posted by scorbet at 12:02 PM on November 25, 2022 [1 favorite]

Elon Musk and the Narcissism/Radicalization Maelstrom, by Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo. Unfortunately it's paywalled but it's a very strong examination of how Musk has been radicalized over the past few years into a dedicated right wing culture warrior. Highlights a lot of Musk's little high five reply tweets to white supremacists and anti-LGBT radicals.
posted by Nelson at 12:15 PM on November 25, 2022 [7 favorites]

I predict that the next couple of months will see a dramatic drop in usage as people burn out on the drama and tire of scrolling past the hot takes of Nazis and trolls on breaking news items.
posted by interogative mood at 2:15 PM on November 25, 2022 [2 favorites]

With chaos spreading on Twitter, some have questioned whether Apple and Google might ban the app for allowing hate speech. Musk has responded by saying he'd create his own phone if they did.

One has to wonder what the board of Tesla thinks about Musk being spread so thin.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 7:32 PM on November 25, 2022 [2 favorites]

They're probably thankful they can get meaningful work done while he's thrashing around elsewhere.
posted by sebastienbailard at 9:20 PM on November 25, 2022 [10 favorites]

I organised for a volunteer group I'm part of to download our Twitter archive.

It took 6 days to get the notification. Then today the main Tweeter in the group got "Temporarily Unavailable" when they clicked the download link, and we're all logged out, and he's not receiving 2FA SMS messages. It's a mess.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 9:44 PM on November 25, 2022 [2 favorites]

I find the idea that he could in any universe build a phone outside of the Google and Apple ecosystems so laughable as to be beyond fiction. Microsoft gave up after a fairly decent effort. Blackberry anyone? Palm Pilot maybe? This stuff is really, really hard requiring billions of dollars of sustained research, development, marketing and every other expense you can possibly imagine. I would have believed him more if he had said he was going to drive his Telsa up Mt Everest.
posted by vac2003 at 11:08 PM on November 25, 2022 [6 favorites]

Oh, it's fantastical nonsense of course. But on the other hand, it's not like "sell cheap reskinned Android phones to conservatives" hasn't already been tried: MAGA World’s ‘Freedom Phone’ Actually Budget Chinese Phone.
posted by We had a deal, Kyle at 11:29 PM on November 25, 2022 [4 favorites]

people using it because it’s still retaining usefulness

FWIW I'm finding post.news looking fairly convincing for replacing the news/current events firehose that Twitter provided, although unfortunately there doesn't seem to be anything like fedifinder for it yet for replicating follow-sources.

Speaking of, there's a good article here from Seth Abramson on Twitter loss.

Perhaps it feels like a battlefield has been abandoned to the forces of authoritarianism—or the whims of an arrogant, capricious, outrageously careless centibillionaire (and his depressingly predictable cult of personality). Others are leaving behind friends and longtime acquaintances. But everyone who leaves Twitter is leaving behind one thing above all: words. Everything you said, every conversation you had, now sits over on some other seemingly far-distant digital space even if you downloaded a copy of it for yourself via the site’s “download your archive” function.

...

So while it is not my place to say that abandoning Twitter required bravery—or that anyone else here or on Mastodon or Hive or Plurk or Amino or Tribel or Countersocial was “brave” to leave Twitter—I can say this much: it was not an act of cowardice, and it was certainly not an acceptance of defeat. We have all left entire universes of meaning and relationship and affection behind in moving away from Twitter, and we did it to better continue whatever fights we are now invested in rather than to abandon our principles. As law professor Jen Taub put it so eloquently here on Post, “Elon Musk turned up the heat too quickly and the frogs escaped before he could boil us. That impetuous impatience may have killed Twitter but saved democracy.”

This is approximately my view. It is morally intolerable to occupy a space in which the only standard of conduct is that you cannot commit a crime

One thing I realised when looking at using tweetdeleter to nuke all my tweets and likes is that among other things I'd be deleting my side of a 3AM chat with David Graeber, and not that I was contributing much to the convo, it does bring home that, although a hellsite, there is a lot of value that's going to be lost due to Musk.
posted by Buntix at 2:29 AM on November 26, 2022 [6 favorites]

Best line I saw about Musk creating his own phone: “Apple and Google haven’t returned calls seeking comment because they’re laughing so hard they can’t breathe right now.”
posted by azpenguin at 2:32 AM on November 26, 2022 [9 favorites]

The Phase 1 release of the new Twitter phone will function exclusively in the closed underground loop adjacent to the Las Vegas Convention Center. And only during conventions.
posted by mochapickle at 2:48 AM on November 26, 2022 [3 favorites]

He canned people for Thanksgiving. I'd make a joke about "what's he going to do for Christmas, kill puppies?" except frankly, he might very well kill puppies.

My money is on Twitter banning puppy adoption accounts because the fash mob mass report them for abuse because they are trying to adopt out non-pure bred dogs.
posted by srboisvert at 4:47 AM on November 26, 2022

Musk bans leftist/anarchist @crimethinc and others:

On November 24, a white nationalist who speaks at conferences alongside Richard Spencer posted a tweet approving of a wave of bans on Twitter. Elon Musk responded favorably to him, and far-right troll Andy Ngo answered Musk, specifically requesting that the @crimethinc account be banned from Twitter. Within a couple hours, Musk had fulfilled Ngo’s request.

The @crimethinc account on Twitter dates from May 2008. The account has never been suspended or received a warning throughout fourteen years of Twitter administrations. Ngo was not bringing any new material to Musk’s attention, but reposting years-old screenshots.

posted by TheophileEscargot at 4:49 AM on November 26, 2022 [9 favorites]

Elon Musk says he will back Trump rival Ron DeSantis in 2024 if he runs for president
posted by clawsoon at 4:55 AM on November 26, 2022

Elon Musk says he will back Trump rival Ron DeSantis in 2024 if he runs for president

"My preference for the 2024 presidency is someone sensible and centrist. I had hoped that would the case for the Biden administration, but have been disappointed so far," Musk tweeted.

I find Neville Chamberlain disappointingly liberal, so I'll support Hilter.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 5:12 AM on November 26, 2022 [9 favorites]

The words "sensible" and "centrist" do not belong in a sentence that also includes "Ron DeSantis", unless the sentence is something like "Ron DeSantis is a dangerous extremist, a bigoted bully, and a petty tyrant who is in no way sensible or centrist."
posted by Daily Alice at 6:32 AM on November 26, 2022 [9 favorites]

My money is on Twitter banning puppy adoption accounts because the fash mob mass report them for abuse

One of the accounts on the "Antifa" list being circulated is the adorable WeRateDogs.
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 7:39 AM on November 26, 2022 [4 favorites]

who told them all the dogs we post are antifa? it’s true, but who told them?
posted by clawsoon at 7:43 AM on November 26, 2022 [7 favorites]

Users are split over Black Twitter’s chances to survive under Elon Musk. In previous conversations on Metafilter it's been fashionable to talk about Twitter as having no cultural value. Black Twitter is a great counterexample, a community and social movement that greatly benefited from the medium. I'm not part of that group so it's not my place to say, but I really hope it finds a new home somehow.

The CNN article mentions Mastodon as one alternative, also a couple of Black Twitter-specific new social media projects: Fanbase and The Black Twitter App. Fanbase looks to be in the seeking-funding stage. Black Twitter App has already launched, here's a recent article about it. I can't tell if it's a separate social network or just an interface for Twitter.

One thing I appreciate about Black Twitter is it's embedded in Twitter itself, it's not an isolated separate community. I'm sure that comes at costs but it has been great for people like me, a constant trickle of exposure to a different world view.
posted by Nelson at 8:11 AM on November 26, 2022 [2 favorites]

PS: I've found this discussion very useful in keeping up with all the chaos and changes from Musk's destruction of Twitter. It's been 29 days now, so I think this Metafilter post is about to be closed to new comments.
posted by Nelson at 8:12 AM on November 26, 2022 [7 favorites]

@realGeorgeHotz: "I’ll put my money where my mouth is. I’m down for a 12 week internship at Twitter for cost of living in SF. It’s not about accumulating capital in a dead world, it’s about making the world alive."

Looks like he's... let's see... founder of a vehicle automation machine learning company.

Musk responded, "Sure, let's talk."

Hardcore confirmed. Or he wants Musk to buy him out. Or something.

LOL. Someone with a hacking/cracking background offers to work for your company that is in trouble for practically free and you say "sure" should be yet another huge red flag for investors/advertisers. If you are going to invite a wolf into your company you'd better still have some IT security people on your payroll.
posted by srboisvert at 8:25 AM on November 26, 2022 [5 favorites]

It's been 29 days now, so I think this Metafilter post is about to be closed to new comments.

There's another one here that'll be open for a while longer.
posted by nobody at 8:27 AM on November 26, 2022

who told them all the dogs we post are antifa? it’s true, but who told them?

You just know it was Bront.
posted by srboisvert at 8:28 AM on November 26, 2022 [8 favorites]

LOL. Someone with a hacking/cracking background offers to work for your company that is in trouble for practically free and you say "sure" should be yet another huge red flag for investors/advertisers.

That guy seems too much of a useless idiot to pull off any effective scam artistry.
posted by Artw at 8:33 AM on November 26, 2022

Black Twitter is a great counterexample, a community and social movement that greatly benefited from the medium.

And arguably, Twitter as a medium greatly benefited, and became what it was, because of it.

There's a movement to get it migrated over to Post that seems to have some traction. I know there have been some problems with Mastodon, in particular with the hyper-polite moderation/CW culture clashing with anti-racist activism and narration.
posted by Buntix at 9:09 AM on November 26, 2022 [3 favorites]

I was reading a thoughtful Mastodon thread about the interactions between Black Twitter and Mastodon lately.
posted by TheophileEscargot at 9:17 AM on November 26, 2022 [6 favorites]

I was reading a thoughtful Mastodon thread

Definitely interested to see if things play out as @[e-mail] says in their post

@SevenDeviled I've been using it for sometime now, and the antiviral design of Mastodon makes it difficult to amass people in large numbers, and that makes it difficult for the conventional Hindutva playbook. Let's see how things play out. And from an Indian perspective, the discourse has largely been anticaste so far, not populated by the standup comedy style caste based jokes that you saw on early Twitter. Been hopeful about Mastodon for a few years now. Don't know how it'll turn out.

as dog-piling is pretty much the go-to tactic of the far-right everywhere [Mumsnet being a prime and weird example]. Also means I'm less likely to get @'ed into threads by Hindutva fash trying to tag in this RSS* fanboi as I use my non-Asterix name over on the Twitter.

* RW Hindu nationalist paramilitary, not the google reader one.
posted by Buntix at 10:05 AM on November 26, 2022 [3 favorites]

Lack of discoverability via search has some real upsides/downsides here, but it does limit the possibilities of dogpiling behavior considerably.
posted by Artw at 10:12 AM on November 26, 2022 [1 favorite]

Josh Gad's Twitter bio is now: "I play Elon Musk on HBO’s Avenue 5"

And tweeted he: "Always meant to be an amalgamation of Musk, Branson, Trump, Elizabeth Holmes and Billy MacFarland." in reply to @@KevinMKruse: "I’m not sure if @Aiannucci had Musk in mind when he created Judd on Avenue 5, but I’m going to choose to believe it."
posted by Buntix at 10:25 AM on November 26, 2022

Oh, this is awful: Wired: They Wanted a Baby, Then Twitter Fired Them

Before the sale, and as one of many strategies to improve employee retention and morale, Twitter had recently started offering $24,000 in assistance for employees pursuing IVF as a path to parenthood after a higher-up in company leadership had experienced IVF personally. IVF is a long, difficult, and highly emotional process, with a ton of tests, consultations, counseling, treatments, multiple cycles/attempts. Stability and support mean everything.

Now several employees who were in various stages of the IVF cycle have been suddenly let go, so it's up to lawyers and litigation to figure out if those expensive and deeply personal treatments can continue.
posted by mochapickle at 6:54 PM on November 26, 2022 [6 favorites]