This appears to be the only comment this account has ever made
So either
People who manipulate opinions for some group, country, or company on social media keep accounts stored so when needed they can perform their job.
Or, this person read hackernews for 3 years and never commented (ignoring deleted comments) until just now and only to basically say "no".
> Or, this person read hackernews for 3 years and never commented (ignoring deleted comments) until just now and only to basically say "no".
Yes, comparing tumblr to twitter was so idiotic I just had to say no.
Sometimes people lurk because they know they’re going to be scrutinised by self appointed gatekeepers and so try and wait until they have something perfect. Only to later just jump in the pool with something simple.
Your either is not complete, there are plenty of other possibilities.
On the other hand, twitter is a pretty global platform, yes a big share of its users is from the US, but japan, brazil, the middle east constitute a huge part of its userbase, so while I wouldn't say that losing the part of twitter that hates elon and his policies won't be a problem (if that ever happens), it's impact won't be as large as tumblr, because no one cares about elon in japan.
The topics discussed on twitter are also far less niche and more current, politicians, celebrities, artists, companies all use it, so it mostly can't experience meltdown by changing its policies, because what's keeping people on twitter is other people, not the policies. Yes this does mean that if those people leave every one will with them, but there is simply no alternative to twitter to leave to right now, mastadon is a joke, discord and reddit are just a different form of social media that wouldn't satisfy twitter users Maybe someone can make a new platform just like twitter? but I doubt that elon's decisions can be that bad.
He mostly has to keep it the same, and he won't lose a single user.
Can you elaborate on his policies? I personally do not have first-hand knowledge of them. As far as I know, it’s currently a big question mark.
Neither my comment nor the comment to which I was replying made any claim about the reliability of Elon’s statements, my beliefs on that subject, or the effects of Elon’s actions on my beliefs.
"Question: Can you elaborate on his policies? I personally do not have first-hand knowledge of them. As far as I know, it’s currently a big question mark.
Witness: Elon has expressed support for free speech and treating both left and right equally."
Does the witness wish to clarify their statement or will they state the factors which lead to their belief that Elon Musk would do things in line with he says?
So this is actually a very interesting question to me, is this your gut or do you have data for this, I can certainly see why you say this, but based on all the people here who talk about how to “use twitter right” my gut was the opposite, certainly in terms of cultural relevance you are correct, but in terms of MDAU’s I assume twitter is mostly people following their “niche” (not as niche as tumblr” interests. Like for me that is music and software engineers/former coworkers, and decidedly not politicians and journalists. Twitter seems to have some exclusivity there but seems to compete heavily with Instagram in the artist/influencer space.
I think if someone created Twitter for journalists, pundits, wonks, and politicians -ONLY- maybe it would be a place to go? Like something that requires a journalism credential, or a TV host, or an actually office holder title. Sure there'd be crazies, but at least there'd be a source for hot takes.
Twitter could still exist for "citizen journalism", but the two wouldn't mix as heavily.
I was thinking about this a bit and I think the real value is Twitter is the random chance that $FAMOUS_PERSON might notice one of your tweets etc (Eg “Elon retweeted my hot take”)
If you take that away does that remove the essence of the site?
Instead of banning accounts he will just make them second class citizens.
I remember when the only social network was MySpace and then it wasn’t.
And Friendster.
Social networks don't have a particularly long life expectancy.
1. allow people to pay for a blue check to be verified
2. make "twitter blue" actually valuable (e.g. detailed analytics on your followers, tools for composing threads, actually monetizing revue)
3. payments
and clearly by this article, they are looking to reduce costs. Double revenue and halve costs and you have something pretty valuable.
> Nobody is going to pay for something that is no longer a status symbol because it can simply be bought
2. make "twitter blue" actually valuable (e.g. detailed analytics on your followers, tools for composing threads, actually monetizing revue)
> Or just give people these metrics because if they care about them they probably care about creating quality and engaging content and seeing how well it performs.
3. payments
> Perhaps - but for what? I don't see myself going to Twitter, let alone to find something to buy and then pay for it using Twitter-dollars or whatever they dream up.
> Nobody is going to pay for something that is no longer a status symbol because it can simply be bought
Tell that to all the luxury brands that make low-end products for everyone now. This is extremely naive. There is a price point where the blue checkmark will sell like wildfire, and then it's basically free money because there's no operational cost associated to it.
Let's say 5$/year for some kind of BS "verification" process that gives you a blue checkmark? Free money! Want to spend 20$/year for "extra-secure verification" to get a gold checkmark? FREE MONEY...
It most definitely does not, in the eyes of enough people to still be valuable. They will purchase the appearance of exclusivity, even if it's not actually that exclusive.
Of course there will be a minority of people who understand (and deride) the fake-exclusivity, but not enough for the blue checkmark to lose enough value.
‘Just charge for the check mark’ seems quite likely to fail in the ways your interlocutor alludes. Moreover, this particular status symbol is explicitly not a marker of wealth, but rather of a more nebulous type of status.
it is obviously worth testing and requiring a small payment is a good way of verifying they are a real person (not a bot).
all the more reason that everyone else will just leave, except for the bots