True; before that you simply had to be “notable”, whatever that meant.

Spending $10 one time with one of many companies that sold likes, follows, retweets, etc. for peanuts.

No, before Elon the blue tick was just a blue tick next to your name. Now posts by blue ticks are also sorted before other posts in the interface.

Before Elon, posts on Twitter were sorted and hidden at the whim of engagement-maximizing algorithm. After Elon, the same is the case, maybe with the same tweak to the algorithm.

I thought the idea that timeline sorting order on social media sites is deterministic or scrutable to the viewer is long dead by now - it's not been the case for at least a good decade now!

While that's true, the thing where ~all bluetick replies are promoted above ~all normal replies is a post-Musk 'innovation'. Stupid idea; there's 25 years of experience showing that pay-for-attention is corrosive to social sites (dating/hookup sites have been trying to make it work basically forever, and have generally ended up having to ration it).

The point remains that Pre and Post Musk Twitter are NO different when it comes to inflammatory tweets.

The players and ordering has changed only.