Twitter's Death Is Something We Should Have All Seen Coming
By: JADE KING
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Twitter is in its death throes once again. This weekend saw new technical limits imposed on non-premium users regarding how many tweets they could view in a day. Elon Musk claims this is to tackle "extreme levels of data scraping and system manipulation" with non-verified accounts now limited to reading just 1,000 tweets per day. Verified users however can scroll through 10,000 before being locked out. The reasons put forth by Musk are utter nonsense, and you don't have to dig far to discover why.
According to a number of reports and insiders speaking out online, Musk has failed to stay up to date with his Google Cloud subscription, and thus the corporation has limited the access it has to its services. The end of a quarter came along, and the social media platform has been faring so terribly that it's now paying the price for failing to foot the bills required to keep the lights on. Musk isn't protecting us from hackers or data scraping, he's covering up his own incompetence with yet another obnoxious lie. Forbes revealed yesterday that the company is facing a sixth lawsuit over unpaid office rent, so he must really hate paying bills.
Tweetdeck is also busted right now, and in less than a month will become exclusive to paid subscribers despite having even less functionality. Twitter is slowly but surely shutting all of us out. It's ironic, considering the platform itself is now suffering the consequences of ignoring the logistics that perpetuate its own existence.
Thousands are now signing up to alternatives in the space like Blue Sky or Hive Social with the fear that, at any moment, Twitter will cease to exist. I wrote about this exact phenomenon months ago, and how the
online world has been shifting to more socially progressive and far more forward-thinking applications like Instagram and TikTok, which, unlike Twitter, seem to recognise where trends are shifting.
As ashamed as I am to admit it, a large part of my social presence is still driven by Twitter. I joined it as a teenager, and over the years have made lifelong friends and professional links that wouldn't have been possible without it. Shitposts and bigots aside, it has always been an open platform for societal discussion, political activism, and finding spaces that represent what you love and who you are. It's natural to mourn a thing like this suddenly being taken away when it's been a constant in your life for so many years.
But ever since Mr. Emerald Mine and his horde of Muskrats took over, the writing has been on the wall. We saw awkward new features introduced and the distant promises of paywalls as hate speech once considered forbidden was excused because it aligns with Musk's own values. He is a rich, bigoted transphobe who would rather spend billions on a company he has no idea how to run instead of going to therapy and admitting his mistakes. That's how we got here. Comedy is also legal now and cisgender is a slur. All very normal changes.
Shortcuts and lay-offs were made following the acquisition due to misplaced confidence and panicked cost-cutting, all while Musk tweeted out how great things were going and how nobody was capable of giving Twitter a new lease of life except him. He obviously failed to mention that the only reason he had to buy it was because he tried to pull out of deal negotiations without bothering to read the fine print in his own contract. We are all suffering the loss of this platform that many rely on for their social connections and livelihoods because one man with far too much money and far too big an ego decided he wanted to play Mark Zuckerberg for funsies. If we just laughed at his jokes maybe things would be different.
What was previously a platform worth celebrating has devolved into a cesspit that elevates the loudmouthed idiots who pay for the privilege to have their terrible takes thrown atop the pile. It encourages the spread of misinformation, disinformation, and whatever Musk wants us to be interacting with. As a consequence, advertisers are running scared and the fruitless attempt to turn a free social media platform into a paid premium place for discussion isn't working and was never going to. But still we cling onto the sinking ship, seeking out alternatives while also hoping things somehow turn around. But like most things with a rich white guy at the helm, he'll walk away from this unscathed and fall upward into further fortunes.
Part of me fears the continued collapse of a free internet which in better times felt like a landscape anyone could use as a foundation for their own growth and success. However, that dream is faltering in the face of capitalism as all the wrong people or wrong voices are continually helped to the top with us powerless to stop them. I'm confident that there will always be a virtual water cooler for individuals to gather in search of purpose in the online world, but the coming death of Twitter is a tragedy we'll take a while to recover from.
It's become a social norm, penetrating the zeitgeist in ways that a replacement might never live up to. Maybe it's best not to, and we can move on to pastures new without a fool like Elon Musk ruining it for all of us. Check back in six months to see if anyone is actually using the Blue Sky accounts they're setting up as Twitter slowly circles the drain.
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The head twit at it again.
I honestly don't see how he can get away with not paying rent. Any one of us peons would be out on the street already.
I'm waiting for him to buy truth social from it's largest stake holder.
I thought they owed like 18 million.
that sounds like the SEC fine the 2 "financiers" had to pay for insider trading.
Nothing like stating Twitter will be the town square while you wall people off....
Hehe, I love how he was pontificating about freedom of speech, while at the same time censoring criticism of himself. Seems his idea of free speech is allowing speech that isn't negative about him personally.
Poor Elon, his wealth has only increased by 500+ million a day for 2023, glad to see so many worried about him, I’m pretty sure he is going to be okay.
I don't pay a lot of attention to twitter or Musk but he paid $44 billion and the last time I heard it was worth $22 billion. It could be even less today and I really don't have any idea what he is trying to accomplish, if anything.
I just looked up twitters current value and it is somewhere around $15 billion.
I have never has a twitter account yet now it is like a private club. I looked at several people, some funny stuff and some people that posted cat vids, etc.
If it keeps going like it is I don't see it lasting. He is worth enough I guess he doesn't care though.
I don't have one either and probably never will
I had one a dozen years ago to taunt bill o'reilly, a lot of fun until he blocked me...
I loved it when Al Franken taunted O'Really.
part 2 is where al really starts leaning hard on poor old billo...
from 44 billion to 15 billion...wow
what an astute business tycoon...
More a engineer at heart, still as the founder, CEO and chief engineer of SpaceX; CEO and product architect of Tesla, Inc.; founder of the Boring Company; co-founder of Neuralink and OpenAI; is a pretty successful record. Richest man in the world is another metric.
Well, an employer of engineers to be fair.
Q. What's the easiest way to make a small fortune?
A. Start with a huge fortune and buy Twitter.
Poor Elon, his wealth only increased by 500 million a day so far this year, he made enough to buy Twitter in the first three months this year.
Uh huh, that is why he had to borrow money from the Saudis to purchase it...
So... I guess we need to cut his taxes again then?
Deflection fail.
look at all the jobs he's created at twitter since he bought it... /s
Educate yourself.
Elon Musk has gained $530 million a day so far in 2023 as Twitter falls apart.
https://www.sfgate.com/tech/article/elon-musk-net-worth-july-2023-18183179.php#:~:text=Since%20the%20start%20of%202023,million%20a%20day%20in%202023.
You do realize that creating jobs isn’t the purpose of owning a business? Right?
Anyone that cannot even insert a link in a comment is not going to teach me shit.
[✘]
Did you even read the title of what you posted? Clue is the second part, while twitter falls apart...
I realize that creating jobs is a predominant reason given by Republicans for cutting taxes to businesses.
Read the comment I was responding to and then maybe context will be evident.
You deflection is week, a business job is not to create jobs,
Thank yourself because I am not dealing with your bullshit.
Twitter is still the best place to follow breaking news, but you have to know how to cut through all the rift raft and gaslighting.
I have read that as a complaint before. Said that it is almost like control of their own timeline is taken away. Instead of being able to customize it, it is filled with paid subscriptions...
And should all be cheering. Social media has been terrible for our species. It has made sure that the turds rise to the top.
There’s no question that Musk is a genius but he can be socially retarded. However, there is something to what he is saying. AI is a monster but it does have the disadvantage of not relying on absolutely current records. To be supremely powerful AI must be able to factor in social trends in real time, which requires excessive and ubiquitous scraping of social media. With unlimited access to this sea of social turbulence AI will become far more dangerous. That kind of access is a force multiplier.
There are absolutely questions. He got a bunch of money from his parents, had one investment pay off big time, and then proceeded to hire other people to design and build an electric vehicle and use his wealth to force it into the mainstream. Now I am not saying he didn't make smart decisions and have them pay off, but he also didn't really come up with anything new and certainly didn't develop it himself. Calling him a genius is a stretch IMO.
The Hill) – Twitter sent a cease-and-desist letter to Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, threatening to sue the social media giant over its launch of rival platform Threads on Thursday.
A last desperate act, sue everyone else.