The different companies buying ads are not interchangeable. Brands, who typically have the biggest budgets, all care about brand management (where their brand is shown, what it's shown next to, before and after), which can't be done effectively now that the staff that handles these things has been gutted. There's no way to get those advertisers back without rebuilding that part of the business and there's no other type of advertiser that can step in to fill the size of that gap.

If anything, the reduced quality of the performance marketers who move in to buy ads for scammy weight loss, skin care, get rich quick offers are going to drive away any big brand advertisers who are actually trying to stay on Twitter and weather the storm.

As a user I welcome the removal of brand advertising. Smaller companies offering products can introduce you to products you might never have seen. Seeing Volkswagen spend 50,000 on an ad telling me how edgy they are creates a toxic fake plastic world that I hope they keep to themselves.

Same here. Looking at a list of companies who have paused advertising on Twitter; I have zero interest in many of them. Like the California Lottery or DirecTV.

While I dislike advertising in general, if I have to see ads I hope it's an opportunity for smaller businesses to promote actually useful products for me.

You won't get "small business ads" anyway, just rock bottom scam and click bait ads.

I’ve actually noticed a lot more sponsored posts that are nearly indistinguishable from a quote tweet. They don’t appear to be scams, more like somebody threw a couple bucks at Twitter to boost their opinion or something.

Clicking through to the thread usually has the same person taking up the first reply with a request to follow them but other than that I’m not seeing any real marketing activity.

This so much. Can't wait for scamming and malware infested ads on twitter. Just another nail for the coffin.

soon it'll just be my pillow and other weird scam stuff

Or your local hardware store. The one walmart doesn't want you to know about it so they push brand ads that play a catchy song. Let's bring back smaller companies and smaller products. Do you really need to learn how Volkswagen is changing the world (while trying to make you forget when they faked those environmental standards a few years back)?

Local hardware stores died out years ago. They can't compete with the supply chains of the big box stores and online stores.

I’m not sure where you are but they are all over the Bay Area.

I wish I was naive as you and I am sincerely hoping this will happen.

i can assure you, if my local hardware store has ads on racist/fascist content, they’re not only not getting my business, i will be sure to use the power of word-of-mouth, and anyone who knows anything about retail knows that word-of-mouth is far more powerful than any ad, ever.

disclaimer to add: my local hardware store owner would be horrified if their ads were on racist content—he’s a pretty rad person, which is why he gets so much business.

Sure, obviously twitter will be full of corner store and gardening ads. That's everywhere without big brand ads, not scams and crypto right?

People are considering this possibility and investing accordingly. One guy has tracked the performance of some of these companies openly proclaiming their anti-Twitter position and claims that they've been underperforming the stock market. This means there's a chance to short them.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/anti-twitter-advertisers-h...

The guy telling you how to invest to hurt companies that "hate free speech" doesn't really seem like a reliable source of market tips.

Still thinking about this. This bit really struck me:

> ...those companies have reportedly pulled hundreds of millions of dollars worth of advertising from the social media platform (despite Musk's insistence that "Twitter’s strong commitment to content moderation remains absolutely unchanged.")

I wanna say, but you know that's a lie. You love Musk because it's a lie. The whole reason you cheer for him is that he promised to stop banning the people you like. Who are you trying to convince by claiming Twitter's moderation policy is unchanged? The left isn't fooled and the right doesn't care.

Twitter is a very weak advertising channel. It's not going to move the needle in the broader advertising market.

Twitter was never a good advertising stream (besides product placement) so this is a win win for companies.

It was a 5 billion business.

Calling a drop in price a market distortion is fairly loaded language.

This is the market, demand rises and falls. Currently the demand is falling and prices will have to drop to match. That’s not a distortion, it’s normal market behavior.