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Elon Musk: Officially a fraud and piece of shit. Official or unofficial war criminal?


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2 hours ago, longhornmatt said:

The difference is the other companies will only fire the people they want to fire (and will actually have given thought to identifying who they want to fire and who they want to keep), they won’t aggressively piss off their key customers, and they won’t haphazardly invent and reverse critical corporate policies at the whim of a manchild based on how his Twitter interactions with random weirdos are going that day.

Wait, are you saying that Satya Nadella didn’t run a poll on Twitter asking if Microsoft should buy Activision?

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4 hours ago, SydneyCarton said:

I believe that chart references number of followers, not the reach of posts by a particular individual. That's not something that gets "boosted." It's followers. My understand, which I admit is quite limited since I don't actually USE twitter except to mock Geoff Ketchum, is that when accounts were "shadowbanned" their posts just didn't get seen by anyone. Not that their accounts themselves actually disappeared. 

So unless I'm completely off base here, which is possible, that chart only indicates and influx of new legitimate users, or bots, and who they follow and/or a vast reduction of followers from said politicians. 

Maybe you've put quotes around "shadowbanned" because you also think it's bullshit. I could be wrong but I've been under the impression that shadowbanning was just another rightwing conspiracy theory borne in part because some trumptard would lose followers and replies to their tweets whenever a crackdown on bots came along. (Or perhaps they'd compare their engagement to someone like Pres. Obama or Rep. Ocasio-Cortez and think they should be just as popular as those 2 legitimately engaging people. I don't know.) I feel 100% certain that if shadowbanning were real elmo would have shown proof of it by now.

 

4 hours ago, Cody2422 said:

I have no dog in this hunt, I don't use Twitter, never have and never will, but my hot sports opinion is that this thread will die a slow death like the vax thread in about 6 months.  All of the I'm leaving Twitter people (coincidentally the same as the get your vax or die people) will still be on Twitter.  If it turns into a profitable business and doesn't become an "alt-right, racist, xenophobic, islamophobic, insert-your-phobic" medium, all of the shit spewing will slowly dwindle away as there will be another topic of outrage to bicker and bitch about.  

So you're saying you don't use twitter and never have but you have very strong feelings about how it's used as well as its future condition that you really need to share here...for some reason? Fascinating.

Perhaps I'm miscounting but 3 separate twitter clones have basically come and gone, failing in large part because the one important thing they each lacked is the ability of trumptards/republiqans to "own the libs." They had a place, twitter, where they could own the libs but twitter decided its business interests were enhanced by moderating the most extreme "owning." Topics like organizing and enhancing violent overthrowing of governments, or propagating lies for one's personal benefit by mis-stating scientific facts despite the cost of tens of thousands of lives, received moderation. Twitter was not at all heavy-handed in their moderation. However, they did crack down on the lies the republiqan party told, and because their only interest in the world is to enhance their party's power, the republiqans went to war. They could still try to "own the libs" on twitter but certain lies were removed from their parlance. It's a very said indicator that the republiqan party cannot exist in a space where reality must be confronted. They're used to the safe space of things like fox news, where they can say whatever bullshit they want and nobody cares because some successful pillow-dealing drug addict is happy to help the Aussie Nazis keep it afloat.

 

 

3 hours ago, Brisketexan said:

If Twitter turns into an alt-right safe space, decent humans (particularly in the western world) won't engage, and mainstream advertisers won't place ads on it.  You can't have BOTH 1) an alt-right safe space, and 2) broad-based users and mainstream ad placement.  General Mills doesn't advertise its cereal on Parler.

Now a full-throttle wingtard has purchased twitter and it's a much different scenario than trying to build a new community - the "libtards" are already there. They're accustomed to using the site. Many of them are basically addicted to it. It's where they get their news and become aware of trends, up to the second. Leaving the site will be a challenge for many people, especially until a satisfactory alternative arises. I believe post.news has the greatest likelihood of becoming a replacement but it's just in beta testing right now and less than ~50k active users have been allowed in the door. They face the same challenge twitter did even pre-Elmo, which is revenue. But do the owners of post.news want/expect the same profits that the founders of twitter did? That will dynamically change the strategy and outlook for the site both in the near and long-term.

Edited by Chopper
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2 hours ago, longhornmatt said:

We’re about to be in a recession if we aren’t already.  Tech stock prices are down like 30-40% this year.  Nobody needed inspiration from Elon or activist investors to start trimming costs and commencing layoffs.  

The difference is the other companies will only fire the people they want to fire (and will actually have given thought to identifying who they want to fire and who they want to keep), they won’t aggressively piss off their key customers, and they won’t haphazardly invent and reverse critical corporate policies at the whim of a manchild based on how his Twitter interactions with random weirdos are going that day.

I read the article earlier this morning claiming tech CEOs were watching carefully because they may want to fuck up their employees and organization just like elmo if things somehow go well for him with the bird site. I forget which site published it - was it platformer or something? I scrolled back and I'm not seeing it but I'm in a hurry so...

I thought that article was a load of crap. The knowledge and process for managing people out of an org already exist. Dell, for an example close to home, is absolutely fucking brutal in their HR practices. People have no idea how much stress a brutal management system puts on employees and how much it costs an organization. But hey if we're basically spiraling backwards in time to become a country of Royals, Slaves and Plebes, maybe Elmo is on to something.

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2 hours ago, longhornmatt said:

It seems a better solution would be encouraging or even making people subscribe directly through Twitter instead of through the iOS store app.  But to do that, you’d have to know it was possible to use the internet without an iOS store app.

World’s alleged foremost tech genius, who will solve the energy crisis, global warming, hyper speed mass transportation, space travel, and mass communications, does not actually know how to access the internet without his idiot phone app - that is not something I had on my bingo card.   Just think what he could do when he unlocks that skill!

Except after the Epic suit against Apple the ruling is such that Apple can ask for the 30% no matter where it is taken (Epic eventually paid Apple).  Apple can also block you from the Apple store if you chose not to.  Apple could charge Twitter 80% if it wants to and there is nothing Musk could do about it.

Musk is throwing a hissy fit for sure, but anyone not getting behind his pushback on the App Store (and Google to lesser degree) doesn't realize what a problem it is.

Since Twitter is basically a mobile app focused product (80% of users)... the Apple cut is going to take 30% of any profits they try to raise.

This is also why Meta is pissed at Apple as they recently said they are going to be coming after their ad revenue as well... 30%

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34 minutes ago, MonkeyDoughnut said:

Musk is throwing a hissy fit for sure, but anyone not getting behind his pushback on the App Store (and Google to lesser degree) doesn't realize what a problem it is.

 

What would the alternative be to move away from apple setting its own price? The government setting the price? Elmo gets to decide how much he wants to pay? Please give me a break. As long as Apple sets a transparent policy and applies it within the law they can set their own price and policies. Any other industry where elmo and cocksuckers like him are in favor of the gov't setting prices? I mean we're talking about self-serving cunts who suffer from extreme tunnel vision and who are otherwise diametrically opposed to the long reach of even a basic government regulation to enhance consumer safety.

edit...NOW, if you told me the Congress was going to back the FTC in an effort to break up monopolies and oligopolies across the board in as many industries as they could tackle, ONE MILLION PERCENT I'm all on board. Tech is hardly the only industry that suffers a monopolistic choke hold. Railroads. Oil refineries esp in certain regions. Meat processing. Farm seeds. Many chemicals. Television. Cable. There are far, far too many. But to be kind, I'll put that fever dream in the nice to have column.

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Excerpts from a pw'd josh marshall article at TPM

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Yoel Roth is the former head of safety at Twitter. He held on for the first few weeks before eventually resigning. Afterwards he wrote an op-ed about the situation in the Times. It’s a very interesting piece, filled with more information than indignation. It’s worth reading. But one thing he noted had gotten very little attention so far in the coverage of the Musk-Twitter story. Twitter is deeply reliant on access to the Apple and Android (owned by Google) app stores.

 

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Just today, Musk went on Twitter and started a new freakout claiming that Apple had stopped advertising on Twitter and was now threatening to block Twitter’s access to the App Store. Musk is the least reliable of narrators. So we should by no means assume what he’s saying is true. But his comments probably do mean the Apple App Store is asking some questions.

What Roth explained in his Times op-ed is that reviewers at the app stores had frequently raised concerns about content and moderation issues in the pre-Musk era at Twitter. And they suggested that continued access could be at stake if Twitter didn’t address their concerns. So the point is, this isn’t something new they’re doing. It’s just something that doesn’t seem to have occurred to Elon Musk.

This kind of power isn’t something Apple has been unwilling to wield. A significant amount of the downturn in the fortunes of the once untouchable Facebook are due to changes Apple made to its privacy policies. As you can see these have tended to be fairly righteous moves — giving users a direct say in whether they want to share tracking information with apps like Facebook or — potentially — saying a newly nazi-curious version of Twitter isn’t welcome in the App Store. Still, that’s a huge, huge amount of power.

snip
 

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Apple’s market power and its anchor in hardware are key reasons why it’s been largely unscathed in the recent tech market downturn. While companies like Facebook, Amazon and even Google have seen their stock prices slide, in some cases dramatically, Apple has been fairly unscathed.

There’s no global moral to this story other than to observe that there’s power in the 21st century tech and information economy and there’s Apple. And it’s worth knowing the difference.

 

 

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https://www.theverge.com/2022/11/29/23485300/elon-musk-twitter-blue-avoid-in-app-fee-ios

 

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Twitter’s revamped Blue subscription might not be available as an in-app purchase on iOS when it eventually relaunches so that it can dodge Apple’s 30 percent cut of App Store purchases, according to Platformer. When the new Blue was briefly available earlier this month, you could only purchase it through Twitter’s iOS app. But while Elon Musk is publicly tweeting his displeasure with Apple, it appears he wants to avoid having to pay Apple’s fees. 

 

 

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Musk had said that the new Blue, which allows people to purchase a blue verification check mark, was set to relaunch on Tuesday after signups were paused following a wave of impersonators. But that launch has been delayed, Platformer says, and The Verge has also heard of the delay from a person with direct knowledge of the matter. Twitter employees have been told that there will be other changes to Blue, including a one-cent price increase from $7.99 to $8 and requiring phone number verification, Platformer reports.

 

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Over the course of this month, Musk has ramped up his tweets targeting Apple. On November 18th, he criticized the App Store’s cut by calling it a “hidden 30% tax on the Internet.” And on Monday, he claimed that Apple, reportedly one of Twitter’s biggest advertisers, has “mostly” stopped advertising on the social network and that it has“threatened to withhold Twitter from its App Store, but won’t tell us why.”

Apple hasn’t publicly acknowledged Musk’s tweets, but outsiders have speculated that actions like his mass layoffs that slashed teams responsible for content moderation, or as the decisions to bring back suspended accounts and former President Donald Trump could put Twitter at odds with App Store policies

 

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How many key twitter posters (key journalists, celebs) would have to wholly depart twitter and post instead on a worthy competitor's site in order for it to be the tipping point that causes tens of thousands of others to follow them? 200 people? 1,000? I don't think it's many.

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16 minutes ago, Chopper said:

How many key twitter posters (key journalists, celebs) would have to wholly depart twitter and post instead on a worthy competitor's site in order for it to be the tipping point that causes tens of thousands of others to follow them? 200 people? 1,000? I don't think it's many.

It’ll sadly probably be led by a celebrity exodus. 

Sadly because that’s the state of our society 

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10 minutes ago, Pig Bellmont said:

It’ll sadly probably be led by a celebrity exodus. 

Sadly because that’s the state of our society 

If my recollection is correct, twitter didn't really take off in popularity until someone came up with the blue check idea for journalists and the company requested many media companies to send rosters of their reporters so they could verify them en-masse and offer status and visibility. I've heard the rumored stat is "10 percent of twitter is responsible for 90% of the content" or something like that. There's some superstars on twitter...at some point I think/hope/expect (particularly at this rate of site degradation) that there will be a domino effect. Dependent of course on whether a worthwhile, accessible competitor arises.

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2 hours ago, Chopper said:

How many key twitter posters (key journalists, celebs) would have to wholly depart twitter and post instead on a worthy competitor's site in order for it to be the tipping point that causes tens of thousands of others to follow them? 200 people? 1,000? I don't think it's many.

1 hour ago, Pig Bellmont said:

It’ll sadly probably be led by a celebrity exodus. 

Sadly because that’s the state of our society 

There’s two tipping points I think, one is the advertiser exodus - a revenue tipping point of sorts.  Them now openly allowing COVID/medical misinformation is going to permanently drive medical companies away and his erratic behavior and attacks on Apple and Google are going to push tech companies away. When you are a tech company that’s had a profit of two years out of the last 16 and you’re publicly shitting on the biggest tech companies and trying to rally people to put pressure on the government to fuck with those companies as a punishment for yanking their ads, that’s going to be a “no” for a lot of companies.

He’s burned whatever relationship he had with Apple.  And Tim Cook is gay, and a lot more homophobic shit is popping up on Twitter, so toss that in the mix.

That revenue tipping point is where Twitter stops being a business and starts being an expensive hobby for Musk.

The second is the user tipping point.  Lot harder to do, because it relies on one or more companies to step up and provide an easy platform for shitposting and memes.  I’m not kidding.  Post.News is attracting a lot of the really solid folks from Twitter, but a helluva lot of ahitposters and meme junkies will still be around to drive traffic.  Of course, at some point Elmo will probably start charging them for bandwidth if the ad revenue drops too much, so that would be a tipping point.  This would have been the perfect time for tumblr to revive itself as a social media platform because it had the infrastructure for memes and shitposting.

 

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17 hours ago, MonkeyDoughnut said:

Except after the Epic suit against Apple the ruling is such that Apple can ask for the 30% no matter where it is taken (Epic eventually paid Apple).  Apple can also block you from the Apple store if you chose not to.  Apple could charge Twitter 80% if it wants to and there is nothing Musk could do about it.

Musk is throwing a hissy fit for sure, but anyone not getting behind his pushback on the App Store (and Google to lesser degree) doesn't realize what a problem it is.

Since Twitter is basically a mobile app focused product (80% of users)... the Apple cut is going to take 30% of any profits they try to raise.

This is also why Meta is pissed at Apple as they recently said they are going to be coming after their ad revenue as well... 30%

This. Apple (and Google, the duopoly, but focusing on Apple here) is a beast because they own the mechanism and ecosystem in which people interact with their digital worlds.

The downfall of social media we've seen lately has a lot of causes, but of the more underrated ones is Apple's App Tracking Transparency (ATT) that has eaten everyone's lunch the past 12+ months. Total boss move.

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It will be interesting to see if Musk can recruit other big name CEO/companies to create a coalition to go against Apple. Fortnite and Shopify are premiere names in consumers minds:

In taking the gloves off with Apple, Musk formed an alliance with other tech leaders who’ve been grumbling about the App Store:

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Tim Sweeney, CEO of Fortnite developer Epic Games, has gone to the mattresses over the fees: His company sued Apple over the 30% cut in 2020, pretty much lost, and appeared in court this month to appeal the verdict.

Spotify CEO Daniel Ek said last month that Apple is “choking competition” after Spotify’s audiobooks app was rejected from the App Store three times for allegedly not following App Store rules.

Sweeney and Ek are overjoyed to welcome Musk to the fam. Both CEOs retweeted posts from Musk about the App Store, and Sweeney used the renewed interest to update everyone on his feud with Apple, which he said “maintain[s] an illegal monopoly on app distribution.”

As the storm rages, Apple CEO Tim Cook has stayed silent, not taking Musk’s bait

 

 

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1 minute ago, MeerkatBong said:

It will be interesting to see if Musk can recruit other big name CEO/companies to create a coalition to go against Apple. Fortnite and Shopify are premiere names in consumers minds:

In taking the gloves off with Apple, Musk formed an alliance with other tech leaders who’ve been grumbling about the App Store:

 

Which op-ed author wrote that? Lol, I dont think other tech execs are looking to hitch their wagon to Elmo's star right now. 

(Chrispy for the love of god, please try to remember to link what you're citing)

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2 minutes ago, bolverk said:

I just copied and pasted a short phrase from your newsletter post and got the link. How hard can it be?

https://www.morningbrew.com/daily/stories/2022/11/29/elon-musk-tech-ceos-against-apple

Great! Crisis averted! @wildcat09, please see above for how to go to the website for our your own reading.

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16 minutes ago, MeerkatBong said:

It will be interesting to see if Musk can recruit other big name CEO/companies to create a coalition to go against Apple. Fortnite and Shopify are premiere names in consumers minds:

In taking the gloves off with Apple, Musk formed an alliance with other tech leaders who’ve been grumbling about the App Store:

 

here is (one reason) why Spotify was rejected 3x: https://www.macrumors.com/2022/10/25/spotify-audio-book-app-update-rejected-apple/

 


text

Spoiler

Apple last year agreed to an App Store rule change that allows developers to use communications like email to share information methods about payment options that are available outside of an iOS app, but Spotify is running into issues attempting to implement this feature. With the rule change, Spotify wanted to direct customers to buy books online to listen to in the app, rather than giving Apple a cut of its audiobook sales.

Apple apparently told Spotify that it can send customers emails about online purchases, but Spotify is not able to offer a button inside of the app to request emails. The feature was designed with Spotify's legal team involved, and Apple initially approved the update in September, but later reversed course, rejecting subsequent updates.

Spotify designed a nine-step process for purchasing an audiobook, which involved a customer tapping on an audiobook and seeing a screen with a lock over the play button. Pressing on the play button provided customers with a page where they could request information on how to buy a book through an email, and the email offered up a link to purchase the book.

An Apple spokesperson told MacRumors that Apple "has no issues" with reader apps like Spotify adding audiobook content, but Spotify did not follow Apple's guidelines around in-app communications directing users outside the app.

The App Store was designed to be a great business opportunity for developers, and we fully support initiatives to introduce new features in apps that provide lasting value for users. We have no issue with reader apps adding audiobook content to their apps, linking users out to websites to sign up for services, or communicating with customers externally about alternative purchase options. The Spotify app was rejected for not following the guidelines regarding including explicit in-app communications to direct users outside the app to make digital purchases. We provided them with clear guidance on how to resolve the issue, and approved their app after they made changes that brought it into compliance.

After the multiple rejections from Apple, Spotify released a version of the app that removes information about how to purchase an audiobook from the Spotify website, which Apple did approve. Spotify now informs users that there is no option to buy an audiobook in the app. "We know it's not ideal," says Spotify in the app text.

 

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17 minutes ago, MeerkatBong said:

It will be interesting to see if Musk can recruit other big name CEO/companies to create a coalition to go against Apple. Fortnite and Shopify are premiere names in consumers minds:

In taking the gloves off with Apple, Musk formed an alliance with other tech leaders who’ve been grumbling about the App Store:

 

Shopify charges a vig for their app store as well. Don't see them fighting against apple on this one.

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5 minutes ago, MeerkatBong said:

Careful, you are giving off the desperate "I don't like the content, let me attack the way the content was delivered" energy of someone who is mad.

I haven't read the content and probably wouldn't understand it anyway, I just thought the idea of a newsletter email without a link to the site is hilarious. Their entire purpose is marketing, seems weird. Having just browsed a few preceding posts, it seems to me that if there is a legitimate issue, Elon Musk probably shouldn't be the mouthpiece. He's seriously lost his mind. His erratic stances on all sort of shit since the takeover is truly bizarre, and there's no valid basis to take anything he says these days seriously.

Edited by 'stache
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2 minutes ago, 'stache said:

I haven't read the content and probably wouldn't understand it anyway, I just thought the idea of a newsletter email without a link to the site is hilarious. Their entire purpose is marketing, seems weird. Having just browsed a few preceding posts, it seems to me that if there is a legitimate issue, Elon Musk probably shouldn't be the mouthpiece. He's seriously lost his mind. His erratic stances on all sort of shit since the takeover is truly bizarre, and there's no valid basis to take anything he says these days seriously.

I agree he's probably not who you want to hitch your wagon to right now, but tech people are weirdos and tech bro politics make for strange bedfellows, I think. As stated originally, it will be interesting to watch if it gains legs or not. I tend to think it's just another one of Elmo's tempest in a teacup that will be mostly forgotten about when there is another dust-up and self-imposed humiliation in a day or two that makes headlines.

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9 minutes ago, wildcat09 said:

It's very funny to see so many entities that attempt to exercise monopolistic practices themselves get complained when someone else has them over a barrel. Everyone wants government help the moment the lack of regulation begins to hurt them.

It's also funny how many people will scream about net neutrality concerns but don't see an issue with what Apple is doing / has done.

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1 minute ago, MonkeyDoughnut said:

It's also funny how many people will scream about net neutrality concerns but don't see an issue with what Apple is doing / has done.

Can you explain to me how what apple is doing has anything to do with net neutrality? Right to repair and right to modify are certainly important issues, but are very distinct from issues like zero-rating content and differential rates for competitors content

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Just now, MonkeyDoughnut said:

It's also funny how many people will scream about net neutrality concerns but don't see an issue with what Apple is doing / has done.

I do see an issue with their monopolistic practices, but you don't fix that problem by singling out one company in one industry, especially not at the behest of other monopolistic assholes who are just mad they've got the short end of the stick for once.

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11 minutes ago, MonkeyDoughnut said:

It's also funny how many people will scream about net neutrality concerns but don't see an issue with what Apple is doing / has done.

Hey now, we are capitalists here in this country, can't have any of that talk.

YARN | Commie, commie, traitor to our country. | Seinfeld (1989) - S06E11  The Switch | Video clips by quotes | d62abe37 | 紗

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  • immamac changed the title to Elon Musk: [Fraud] Official or unofficial piece of shit?
  • blacklab changed the title to Elon Musk: Officially a fraud and piece of shit. Official or unofficial war criminal?

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