Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter may soon go through

[Ag3ma]

It's something to do with the valuation built on misconception of the company as a tech, not a car manufacturer, if I remember correctly.

Yes. I think a lot of this is potentially just clever marketing and positioning, backed up by Musk's prior history in Paypal, etc.

I also think Tesla is wildly overpriced because hydrogen fuel cells are looking increasingly credible, likely offering better range, quicker refuelling, and potentially even more environmentally favourable (consider the effort it takes to dig out and refine the materials for batteries). Tesla has cut out its niche on the back of a disruptive new technology of battery-powered engines, but there's another one possibly imminent which will create a second disruption that Tesla isn't even in the game on (although, of course, with that market cap it can simply buy out a hydrogen fuel cell company to jump-start operations).

This is why a few years back Musk was keen to squash talk about hydrogen fuel cells a few years ago. It's nothing to do with how credible the technology is, and everything to do with protecting investors' willingness to pour money into his company.

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

Twitter Admits in Court Filing: Elon Musk Is Simply Wrong About Government Interference At Twitter

It is amazing the degree to which some people will engage in confirmation bias and believe absolute nonsense, even as the facts show the opposite is true. Over the past few months, we’ve gone throu…

www.techdirt.com

It is amazing the degree to which some people will engage in confirmation bias and believe absolute nonsense, even as the facts show the opposite is true. Over the past few months, we’ve gone through the various “Twitter Files” releases, and pointed out over and over again how the explanations people gave for them simply don’t match up with the underlying documents.

To date, not a single document revealed has shown what people now falsely believe: that the US government and Twitter were working together to “censor” people based on their political viewpoints. Literally none of that has been shown at all. Instead, what’s been shown is that Twitter had a competent trust & safety team that debated tough questions around how to apply policies for users on their platform and did not seem at all politically motivated in their decisions. Furthermore, while various government entities sometimes did communicate with the company, there’s little evidence of any attempt by government officials to compel Twitter to moderate in any particular way, and Twitter staff regularly and repeatedly rebuffed any attempt by government officials to go after certain users or content.

Now, as you may recall, two years ago, a few months after Donald Trump was banned from Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube, he sued the companies, claiming that the banning violated the 1st Amendment. This was hilariously stupid for many reasons, not the least of which is because at the time of the banning Donald Trump was the President of the United States, and these companies were very much private entities. The 1st Amendment restricts the government, not private entities, and it absolutely does not restrict private companies from banning the President of the United States should the President violate a site’s rules.

As expected, the case went poorly for Trump, leading to it being dismissed. It is currently on appeal. However, in early May, Trump’s lawyers filed a motion to effectively try to reopen the case at the district court, arguing that the Twitter Files changed everything, and that now there was proof that Trump’s 1st Amendment rights were violated.

In October of 2022, after the entry of this Court’s Judgment, Twitter was acquired by Elon Musk. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Musk invited several journalists to review Twitter’s internal records. Allowing these journalists to search for evidence that Twitter censored content that was otherwise compliant with Twitter’s “TOS”, the journalists disclosed their findings in a series of posts on Twitter collectively known as the Twitter Files. As set out in the attached Rule 60 motion, the Twitter Files confirm Plaintiffs’ allegations that Twitter engaged in a widespread censorship campaign that not only violated the TOS but, as much of the censorship was the result of unlawful government influence, violated the First Amendment.

I had been thinking about writing this up as a story, but things got busy, and last week Twitter (which, again, is now owned by Elon Musk who has repeatedly made ridiculously misleading statements about what the Twitter Files showed) filed its response, where they say (with risk of sanctions on the line) that this is all bullshit and nothing in the Twitter Files says what Trump (and Elon, and a bunch of his fans) claim it says. This is pretty fucking damning to anyone who believed the nonsense Twitter Files narrative.

The new materials do not plausibly suggest that Twitter suspended any of Plaintiffs’ accounts pursuant to any state-created right or rule of conduct. As this Court held, Lugar’s first prong requires a “clear,” government-imposed rule. Dkt. 165 at 6. But, as with Plaintiffs’ Amended Complaint, the new materials contain only a “grab-bag” of communications about varied topics, none establishing a state-imposed rule responsible for Plaintiffs’ challenged content-moderation decisions. The new materials cover topics ranging, for example, from Hunter Biden’s laptop, Pls.’ Exs. A.14 & A.27-A.28, to foreign interference in the 2020 election, Pls.’ Exs. A.13 at, e.g., 35:15-41:4, A.22, A.37, A.38, to techniques used in malware and ransomware attacks, Pls.’ Ex. A.38. As with the allegations in the Amended Complaint, “(I)t is … not plausible to conclude that Twitter or any other listener could discern a clear state rule” from such varied communications. Dkt. 165 at 6. The new materials would not change this Court’s dismissal of Plaintiffs’ First Amendment claims for this reason alone.
Moreover, a rule of conduct is imposed by the state only if backed by the force of law, as with a statute or regulation. See Sutton v. Providence St. Joseph Med. Ctr., 192 F.3d 826, 835 (9th Cir. 1999) (regulatory requirements can satisfy Lugar’s first prong). Here, nothing in the new materials suggests any statute or regulation dictating or authorizing Twitter’s content-moderation decisions with respect to Plaintiffs’ accounts. To the contrary, the new materials show that Twitter takes content-moderation actions pursuant to its own rules and policies. As attested to by FBI Agent Elvis Chan, when the FBI reported content to social media companies, they would “alert the social media companies to see if [the content] violated their terms of service,” and the social media companies would then “follow their own policies” regarding what actions to take, if any. Pls.’ Ex. A.13 at 165:9-22 (emphases added); accord id. at 267:19-23, 295:24-296:4. And general calls from the Biden administration for Twitter and other social media companies to “do more” to address alleged misinformation, see Pls.’ Ex. A.47, fail to suggest a state-imposed rule of conduct for the same reasons this Court already held the Amended Complaint’s allegations insufficient: “[T]he comments of a handful of elected officials are a far cry from a ‘rule of decision for which the State is responsible’” and do not impose any “clear rule,” let alone one with the force of law. Dkt. 165 at 6. The new materials thus would not change this Court’s determination that Plaintiffs have not alleged any deprivation caused by a rule of conduct imposed by the State.

Later on it goes further:

Plaintiffs appear to contend (Pls.’ Ex. 1 at 16-17) that the new materials support an inference of state action in Twitter’s suspension of Trump’s account because they show that certain Twitter employees initially determined that Trump’s January 2021 Tweets (for which his account was ultimately suspended) did not violate Twitter’s policy against inciting violence. But these materials regarding Twitter’s internal deliberations and disagreements show no governmental participation with respect to Plaintiffs’ accounts. See Pls.’ Exs. A.5.5, A-49-53.5
Plaintiffs are also wrong (Ex. 1 at 15-16) that general calls from the Biden administration to address alleged COVID-19 misinformation support a plausible inference of state action in Twitter’s suspensions of Cuadros’s and Root’s accounts simply because they “had their Twitter accounts suspended or revoked due to Covid-19 content.” For one thing, most of the relevant communications date from Spring 2021 or later, after Cuadros and Roots’ suspensions in 2020 and early 2021, respectively, see Pls.’ Ex. A.46-A.47; Am. Compl. ¶¶124, 150. Such communications that “post-date the relevant conduct that allegedly injured Plaintiffs … do not establish [state] action.” Federal Agency of News LLC v. Facebook, Inc., 432 F. Supp. 3d 1107, 1125-26 (N.D. Cal. 2020). Additionally, the new materials contain only general calls on Twitter to “do more” to address COVID-19 misinformation and questions regarding why Twitter had not taken action against certain other accounts (not Plaintiffs’). Pls.’ Exs. A.43-A.48. Such requests to “do more to stop the spread of false or misleading COVID-19 information,” untethered to any specific threat or requirement to take any specific action against Plaintiffs, is “permissible persuasion” and not state action. Kennedy v. Warren, 66 F.4th 1199, 1205, 1207-12 (9th Cir. 2023). As this Court previously held, government actors are free to “urg[e]” private parties to take certain actions or “criticize” others without giving rise to state action. Dkt. 165 at 12-13. Because that is the most that the new materials suggest with respect to Cuadros and Root, the new materials would not change this Court’s dismissal of their claims.

Twitter’s filing is like a beat-by-beat debunking of the conspiracy theories pushed by the dude who owns Twitter. It’s really quite incredible.

First, the simple act of receiving information from the government, or of deciding to act upon that information, does not transform a private actor into a state actor. See O’Handley, 62 F.4th at 1160 (reports from government actors “flagg[ing] for Twitter’s review posts that potentially violated the company’s content-moderation policy” were not state action). While Plaintiffs have attempted to distinguish O’Handley on the basis of the repeated communications reflected in the new materials, (Ex. 1 at 13), O’Handley held that such “flag(s)” do not suggest state action even where done “on a repeated basis” through a dedicated, “priority” portal. Id. The very documents on which Plaintiffs rely establish that when governmental actors reported to social media companies content that potentially violated their terms of service, the companies, including Twitter, would “see if [the content] violated their terms of service,” and, “(I)f [it] did, they would follow their own policies” regarding what content-moderation action was appropriate. Pls.’ Ex. A.13 at 165:3-17; accord id. at 296:1-4 (“[W]e [the FBI] would send information about malign foreign influence to specific companies as we became aware of it, and then they would review it and determine if they needed to take action.”). In other words, Twitter made an independent assessment and acted accordingly.
Moreover, the “frequen[t] [] meetings” on which Plaintiffs rely heavily in attempting to show joint action fall even farther short of what was alleged in O’Handley because, as discussed supra at 7, they were wholly unrelated to the kinds of content-moderation decisions at issue here.
Second, contrary to Plaintiffs’ contention (Ex. 1 at 11-12), the fact that the government gave certain Twitter employees security clearance does not transform information sharing into state action. The necessity for security clearance reflects only the sensitive nature of the information being shared— i.e., efforts by “[f]oreign adversaries” to “undermine the legitimacy of the [2020] election,” Pls.’ Ex. A.22. It says nothing about whether Twitter would work hand-in-hand with the federal government. Again, when the FBI shared sensitive information regarding possible election interference, Twitter determined whether and how to respond. Pls.’ Ex. A.13 at 165:3-17, 296:1-4.
Third, Plaintiffs are also wrong (Ex. 1 at 12-13) that Twitter became a state actor because the FBI “pay[ed] Twitter millions of dollars for the staff [t]ime Twitter expended in handling the government’s censorship requests.” For one thing, the communication on which Plaintiffs rely in fact explains that Twitter was reimbursed $3 million pursuant to a “statutory right of reimbursement for time spent processing” “legal process” requests. Pls.’ Ex. A.34 (emphasis added). The “statutory right” at issue is that created under the Stored Communications Act for costs “incurred in searching for, assembling, reproducing, or otherwise providing” electronic communications requested by the government pursuant to a warrant. 18 U.S.C. § 2706(a), see also id. § 2703(a). The reimbursements were not for responding to requests to remove any accounts or content and thus are wholly irrelevant to Plaintiffs’ joint-action theory
And, in any event, a financial relationship supports joint action only where there is complete “financial integration” and “indispensability.” Vincent v. Trend W. Tech. Corp., 828 F.2d 563, 569 (9th Cir. 1987) (quotation marks omitted). During the period in which Twitter recovered $3 million (late 2019 through early 2021), the company was valued at approximately $30 billion. Even Plaintiffs do not argue that a $3 million payment would be indispensable to Twitter.

I mean, if you read Techdirt, you already knew about all this, because we debunked the nonsense “government paid Twitter to censor” story months ago, even as Elon Musk was falsely tweeting exactly that. And now, Elon’s own lawyers are admitting that the company’s owner is completely full of shit or too stupid to actually read any of the details in the Twitter files. It’s incredible.

It goes on. Remember how Elon keeps insisting that the government coerced Twitter to make content moderation decisions? Well, Twitter’s own lawyers say that’s absolute horseshit. I mean, much of the following basically is what my Techdirt posts have explained:

The new materials do not evince coercion because they contain no threat of government sanction premised on Twitter’s failure to suspend Plaintiffs’ accounts. As this Court already held, coercion requires “a concrete and specific government action, or threatened action” for failure to comply with a governmental dictate. Dkt. 165 at 11. Even calls from legislators to “do something” about Plaintiffs’ Tweets (specifically, Mr. Trump’s) do not suggest coercion absent “any threatening remark directed to Twitter.” Id. at 7. The Ninth Circuit has since affirmed the same basic conclusion, holding in O’Handley that “government officials do not violate the First Amendment when they request that a private intermediary not carry a third party’s speech so long as the officials do not threaten adverse consequences if the intermediary refuses to comply.” 62 F.4th at 1158. Like the Amended Complaint, the new materials show, at most, attempts by the government to persuade and not any threat of punitive action, and thus would not alter the Court’s dismissal of Plaintiffs’ First Amendment claims.
FBI Officials. None of the FBI’s communications with Twitter cited by Plaintiffs evince coercion because they do not contain a specific government demand to remove content—let alone one backed by the threat of government sanction. Instead, the new materials show that the agency issued general updates about their efforts to combat foreign interference in the 2020 election. For example, one FBI email notified Twitter that the agency issued a “joint advisory” on recent ransomware tactics, and another explained that the Treasury department seized domains used by foreign actors to orchestrate a “disinformation campaign.” Pls.’ Ex. A.38. These informational updates cannot be coercive because they merely convey information; there is no specific government demand to do anything—let alone one backed by government sanction.
So too with respect to the cited FBI emails flagging specific Tweets. The emails were phrased in advisory terms, flagging accounts they believed may violate Twitter’s policies—and Twitter employees received them as such, independently reviewing the flagged Tweets. See, e.g., Pls.’ Exs. A.30 (“The FBI San Francisco Emergency Operations Center sent us the attached report of 207 Tweets they believe may be in violation of our policies.”), A.31, A.40. None even requested—let alone commanded—Twitter to take down any content. And none threatened retaliatory action if Twitter did not remove the flagged Tweets. As in O’Handley, therefore, the FBI’s “flags” cannot amount to coercion because there was “no intimation that Twitter would suffer adverse consequences if it refused.” 62 F.4th at 1158. What is more, unlike O’Handley, not one of the cited communications contains a request to take any action whatsoever with respect to any of Plaintiffs’ accounts.6
Plaintiffs’ claim (Ex. 1 at 14) that the FBI’s “compensation of Twitter for responding to its requests” had coercive force is meritless. As a threshold matter, as discussed supra at 10, the new materials demonstrate only that Twitter exercised its statutory right—provided to all private actors—to seek reimbursement for time it spent processing a government official’s legal requests for information under the Stored Communications Act, 18 U.S.C. § 2706; see also id. § 2703. The payments therefore do not concern content moderation at all—let alone specific requests to take down content. And in any event, the Ninth Circuit has made clear that, under a coercion theory, “receipt of government funds is insufficient to convert a private [actor] into a state actor, even where virtually all of the [the party’s] income (I)s derived from government funding.” Heineke, 965 F.3d at 1013 (quotation marks omitted) (third alteration in original). Therefore, Plaintiffs’ reliance on those payments does not evince coercion.

What about the pressure from Congress? That too is garbage, admits Twitter:

Congress. The new materials do not contain any actionable threat by Congress tied to Twitter’s suspension of Plaintiffs’ accounts. First, Plaintiffs place much stock (Ex. 1 at 14-15) in a single FBI agent’s opinion that Twitter employees may have felt “pressure” by Members of Congress to adopt a more proactive approach to content moderation, Pls.’ Ex. A13 at 117:15-118:6. But a third-party’s opinion as to what Twitter’s employees might have felt is hardly dispositive. And in any event, “[g]enerating public pressure to motivate others to change their behavior is a core part of public discourse,” and is not coercion absent a specific threatened sanction for failure to comply….
White House Officials. The new materials do not evince any actionable threat by White House officials either. Plaintiffs rely (Ex. 1 at 16) on a single statement by a Twitter employee that “[t]he Biden team was not satisfied with Twitter’s enforcement approach as they wanted Twitter to do more and to deplatform several accounts,” Pls.’ Ex. A.47. But those exchanges took place in December 2022, id.— well after Plaintiffs’ suspensions, and so could not have compelled Twitter to suspend their accounts. Furthermore, the new materials fail to identify any threat of government sanction arising from the officials’ “dissatisfaction”; indeed, Twitter was only asked to join “other calls” to continue the dialogue

Basically, Twitter’s own lawyers are admitting in a court filing that the guy who owns their company is spewing utter nonsense about what the Twitter Files revealed. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything quite like this.

Guy takes over company because he’s positive that there are awful things happening behind the scenes. Gives “full access” to a bunch of very ignorant journalists who are confused about what they find. Guy who now owns the company falsely insists that they proved what he believed all along, leading to the revival of a preternaturally stupid lawsuit… only to have the company’s lawyers basically tell the judge “ignore our stupid fucking owner, he can’t read understand any of this.”


Link to PDF of documents: https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/23833511/govuscourtscand3871331950.pdf

Was not aware of the term "tweeps" before. Am mourning the end of those innocent days already.


Oh alright, might as well make this a threefer;

Twitter’s U.S. Ad Sales Plunge 59% as Woes Continue (Published 2023)

In internal forecasts, the company projected that ad sales would keep declining, handing a tough challenge to its new chief executive.

www.nytimes.com

Elon Musk recently said Twitter’s advertising business was on the upswing. “Almost all advertisers have come back,” he asserted, adding that the social media company could soon become profitable.

But Twitter’s U.S. advertising revenue for the five weeks from April 1 to the first week of May was $88 million, down 59 percent from a year earlier, according to an internal presentation obtained by The New York Times. The company has regularly fallen short of its U.S. weekly sales projections, sometimes by as much as 30 percent, the document said.

That performance is unlikely to improve anytime soon, according to the documents and seven current and former Twitter employees.

Twitter’s ad sales staff is concerned that advertisers may be spooked by a rise in hate speech and pornography on the social network, as well as more ads featuring online gambling and marijuana products, the people said. The company has forecast that its U.S. ad revenue this month will be down at least 56 percent each week compared with a year ago, according to one internal document.

These issues have been inherited by Linda Yaccarino, the NBCUniversal executive whom Mr. Musk named Twitter’s chief executive last month. She started her new job on Monday.

On a Twitter Space audio event on Monday, Mr. Musk said advertisers in Europe and North America have put “extreme pressure” on the company, leading “half our advertising” to disappear. “They are trying to drive Twitter bankrupt,” he said.

He did not respond to a request for comment and Ms. Yaccarino, through a spokesman, declined to comment.

Linda Yaccarino, Twitter’s new chief executive, has inherited declining ad sales and other issues. Credit... Cindy Ord/Getty Images

The state of Twitter’s advertising is crucial because ads have long made up 90 percent of the company’s revenue. After Mr. Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion in October and took the company private, he vowed to build “the most respected ad platform.” But he quickly alienated advertisers by firing key sales executives, spreading a conspiracy theory on the site and welcoming back barred Twitter users.

In response, several large ad agencies and brands, including General Motors and Volkswagen, paused their ad spending on Twitter. Mr. Musk has said Twitter was on track to post $3 billion in revenue in 2023, down from $5.1 billion in 2021, when it was a public company.

Twitter’s valuation has since plunged. In March, Mr. Musk said the company was worth $20 billion, down more than 50 percent from the $44 billion he paid for it. Last week, the mutual funds giant Fidelity, which owns shares in Twitter, valued the company at $15 billion.

Twitter feels increasingly “unpredictable and chaotic,” said Jason Kint, chief executive of Digital Content Next, an association for premium publishers. “Advertisers want to run in an environment where they are comfortable and can send a signal about their brand,” he added.

ome of Twitter’s biggest advertisers — including Apple, Amazon and Disney — have been spending less on the platform than last year, three former and current Twitter employees said. Large specialized “banner” ads on Twitter’s trends page, which can cost $500,000 for 24 hours and are almost always bought by large brands to promote events, shows or movies, are often going unfilled, they said.

Twitter has also run into public relations snafus with big advertisers like Disney. In April, Twitter mistakenly gave a gold check mark — a badge meant to signify a paying advertiser — to the @DisneyJuniorUK account, which Disney doesn’t own. The account posted racial slurs, leading Disney officials to demand from Twitter an explanation and assurances that it wouldn’t happen again, two people with knowledge of the situation said.

Disney, Apple and Amazon declined to comment.

Six ad agency executives who have worked with Twitter said their clients continued to limit spending on the platform. They cited confusion over Mr. Musk’s changes to the service, inconsistent support from Twitter and concerns about the persistent presence of misleading and toxic content on the platform.

Last month, for instance, a picture that appeared to show an explosion near the Pentagon — which artificial intelligence experts identified as a synthetically generated image — was shared by dozens of Twitter accounts and briefly caused the stock market to tumble.

Some advertisers also continue to worry about Mr. Musk’s tweets. Last month, he posted several times comparing the billionaire financier George Soros, a frequent target for conspiracy theorists, to the “X-Men” comic book villain Magneto. Ted Deutch, the chief executive of the American Jewish Committee, noted that both Mr. Soros and Magneto are Holocaust survivors, and that “the lie Jews want to destroy civilization has led to the persecution of Jewish people for centuries.”

“Musk should know better,” he said.

Last week, Ella Irwin, Twitter’s head of trust and safety, the division that oversees content moderation, and AJ Brown, the head of brand safety and ad quality, resigned, three current and former employees said. Ms. Irwin and Mr. Brown did not respond to requests for comment.

Mr. Musk has promoted new tools, known as adjacency controls, so advertisers can keep their ads away from tweets containing specific keywords or posts by certain users. Some advertisers are using the tools to keep their content away from Mr. Musk’s tweets, four people familiar with the situation said.

Still, some marketers are returning to the platform. GroupM, a media-buying organization that is part of the ad giant WPP, informed employees in May that it was removing its “high risk” flag on Twitter and guiding clients to return, at their discretion, to business as usual, two people familiar with the decision said. IPG, another large advertising company, has recommended that clients proceed with caution when dealing with Twitter, after suggesting last fall that they temporarily pause their spending.

Last month, Elon Musk posted several tweets attacking the billionaire financier George Soros, a frequent target for conspiracy theorists. Credit... Tingshu Wang/Reuters

Twitter is exploring ways to make it easier for advertisers to buy space on the platform, testing an automated system outside the United States to make deals, two people familiar with the arrangement said. Insider earlier reported the move.

The company is experiencing ad growth in areas that it once shied away from or prohibited, including online gambling and marijuana products. In one week last month, four of Twitter’s top 10 U.S. advertisers were online gambling and fantasy sports betting companies, according to one presentation. Twitter has also started allowing ads for cannabis accessories, including “bongs, vapes, rolling paper,” as well as erectile dysfunction products and services, according to internal emails.

Adult content, which is permitted on Twitter, has become a concern among the company’s sales staff. When some employees tried to drum up interest from advertisers for Mother’s Day, they found that potential sponsored search terms, like “MomLife,” surfaced pornographic videos, according to two people familiar with the conversations.

These are issues that some advertisers hope Ms. Yaccarino will solve.

Dave Campanelli, the chief investment officer of Horizon Media, said he was hoping for change after Ms. Yaccarino started, because media agencies like his struggled to maintain contact with Twitter last fall after Mr. Musk arrived.

“For a period, we weren’t even sure who to get on the phone with to talk to,” he said. “With Linda coming in, that could change that in a big way.”

He acknowledged that Twitter’s mercurial boss and volatile environment might pose a challenge for Ms. Yaccarino.

“It’s a tall order,” Mr. Campanelli said.

 

[Thaluikhain]

" Twitter had a competent trust & safety team that debated tough questions around how to apply policies for users on their platform and did not seem at all politically motivated in their decisions "

Ah-huh.

 

[Chimpzy]

Twitter’s U.S. Ad Sales Plunge 59% as Woes Continue (Published 2023)

In internal forecasts, the company projected that ad sales would keep declining, handing a tough challenge to its new chief executive.

www.nytimes.com

Maybe he'll start caring if it hits 69%

 

[Ag3ma]

Maybe he'll start caring if it hits 69%

I think what's possibly so funny is that he's dug this hole so big, he won't be climbing out for a long time.

Twitter might have had issues on the financial front, but they were probably resolvable with relatively modest measures. Musk's Twitter doesn't look like it'll getting back to where Twitter was in 2021 for many years... if it even can.

 

[Casual Shinji]

Musk's Twitter doesn't look like it'll getting back to where Twitter was in 2021 for many years... if it even can.

It can't - you drop your momentum in the tech world then that's pretty much it. And what's happening to twitter right now is far worse then not keeping up with the competition.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

Oh alright, might as well make this a threefer;

Twitter’s U.S. Ad Sales Plunge 59% as Woes Continue (Published 2023)

In internal forecasts, the company projected that ad sales would keep declining, handing a tough challenge to its new chief executive.

www.nytimes.com

Come now. Elon Musk wouldn't lie about something, would he?! I mean, there are rules!

 

[BrawlMan]

I think what's possibly so funny is that he's dug this hole so big, he won't be climbing out for a long time.

Twitter might have had issues on the financial front, but they were probably resolvable with relatively modest measures. Musk's Twitter doesn't look like it'll getting back to where Twitter was in 2021 for many years... if it even can.

It can't - you drop your momentum in the tech world then that's pretty much it. And what's happening to twitter right now is far worse then not keeping up with the competition.

​

 

[Dreiko]

Ads suck, peolpe who offer to run ads on things have insanely undue influence in our society and it is fascistic. If twitter can be untethered from their dulling influence to a degree, that is a good thing. The only one losing is like...rich stock-holders or something. I don't care if those folks lose money if we can be somewhat more free from the influence of advertisers and their profit-seeking blandness and risk-aversion.

 

[BrawlMan]

​

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

Ads suck, peolpe who offer to run ads on things have insanely undue influence in our society and it is fascistic. If twitter can be untethered from their dulling influence to a degree, that is a good thing. The only one losing is like...rich stock-holders or something. I don't care if those folks lose money if we can be somewhat more free from the influence of advertisers and their profit-seeking blandness and risk-aversion.

Ah dreiko, is probably time for a Pro Tip: wiser wafflers preface these posts with a disclaimer like "ok i don't know anything about this subject, only read the one headline, so all words henceforth will be opinions delivered directly from the bottomhole." For even a hint of self awareness would increase likelihood of responses being something other than mockery. It's easy too!

Anywayyyy, out of the hundreds of places to begin, am just gonna go straight for the basics: Elon has no interest in minimising ads, and anyone who has had to use Twitter here in recent times will have first hand experience of that - as now there's more ads than has ever been before...ads on everyones' posts, replies, further down same replies, scam bots in DMs... advertisers being less interested in the platform has no bearing on how aggressive Musk has been with injecting ads everywhere he can. The only difference is there's just less variety of ads, it's all more dodgy and desperate types of sellers instead. He's gonna scramble for that sweet chedda whether they abandon the site or not.

 

[BrawlMan]

Anywayyyy, out of the hundreds of places to begin, am just gonna go straight for the basics: Elon has no interest in minimising ads, and anyone who has had to use Twitter here in recent times will have first hand experience of that - as now there's more ads than has ever been before...ads on everyones' posts, replies, further down same replies, scam bots in DMs... advertisers being less interested in the platform has no bearing on how aggressive Musk has been with injecting ads everywhere he can. The only difference is there's just less variety of ads, it's all more dodgy and desperate types of sellers instead. He's gonna scramble for that sweet chedda whether they abandon the site or not.

Go ahead Elon! Continue to burn down your empire like The Man Child you are!

 

[Ag3ma]

Anywayyyy, out of the hundreds of places to begin, am just gonna go straight for the basics: Elon has no interest in minimising ads, and anyone who has had to use Twitter here in recent times will have first hand experience of that

No indeed. The idea is that the ads become so annoyingly invasive that enough users will pay for a subscription to get rid of them.

In which case I guess you could sort of argue that Elon wants to minimise ads, but only because there's a better way to make money. Of course, then potentially having a service with low ad revenues and thus a potential major revenue growth area, the trick will be how to sneak ads back in without aggravating everyone who paid to get rid of them.

 

[XsjadoBlayde]

Ok it's almost hilarious how bad the bot problem is when even trying to mention it gets the replies bombarded by them.





However, people adapt.






And people refine.

 

[Gordon_4]

Ok it's almost hilarious how bad the bot problem is when even trying to mention it gets the replies bombarded by them.


View attachment 8966


However, people adapt.


View attachment 8967



And people refine.



View attachment 8968

 

[Ag3ma]

Ok it's almost hilarious how bad the bot problem is when even trying to mention it gets the replies bombarded by them.

I take it that what's happening here is that someone designs a T-shirt (or equivalent) and then 1500 rip-off merchants clone it and spam the crap out of Twitter with ads for their rip-offs?

Perhaps in the end this will be what kills copyright law: complete inability to control parasites living off other people's creations.

 

[Eacaraxe]

...but there's another one possibly imminent which will create a second disruption that Tesla isn't even in the game on...

No argument Tesla is overvalued and Musk is a shithead, but here he ain't wrong. There's no imminent disruption in Tesla's market share from hydrogen vehicles; Tesla makes passenger vehicles, not commercial vehicles.

HFC's have greatly improved, but commercial-scale hydrogen production, transportation, and storage certainly has not. And, they likely won't on a scale to replace battery electric vehicles today or in the foreseeable future; you're arguing with the laws of thermodynamics on that one. Like I said in a past thread, where hydrogen meets meet economic feasibility is in the commercial market; that is to say, on-site, on-demand, hydrogen electrolysis for HFC commercial fleets. What makes that economically feasible won't be any discrete aspect of the electrolysis process itself, nor the efficiency of hydrogen power plants, but small reactor-powered electrolysis.

Personal vehicles are going to stay battery-powered; it's more efficient, the infrastructure to support them is already there, and the first generation of solid-state battery vehicles will probably hit the market by 2030. Or to put it simply, if it runs on gas today, it'll be replaced by batteries; if it runs on diesel, it'll be replaced by hydrogen.

 

[Ag3ma]

HFC's have greatly improved, but commercial-scale hydrogen production, transportation, and storage certainly has not. And, they likely won't on a scale to replace battery electric vehicles today or in the foreseeable future; you're arguing with the laws of thermodynamics on that one. Like I said in a past thread, where hydrogen meets meet economic feasibility is in the commercial market; that is to say, on-site, on-demand, hydrogen electrolysis for HFC commercial fleets. What makes that economically feasible won't be any discrete aspect of the electrolysis process itself, nor the efficiency of hydrogen power plants, but small reactor-powered electrolysis.

The laws of thermodynamics make hydrogen mostly commercially unfavourable compared to batteries (at least by current tech), but I think other considerations may well come into play. Hydrogen also doesn't need to be made on-site, it can be made in refineries and shipped, just like petrol.

Commercial issues also affect solid state batteries: they are seriously expensive. This will undoubtedly come down, potentially be a lot, but will it come down enough in amount and time?

Personal vehicles are going to stay battery-powered; it's more efficient, the infrastructure to support them is already there, and the first generation of solid-state battery vehicles will probably hit the market by 2030. Or to put it simply, if it runs on gas today, it'll be replaced by batteries; if it runs on diesel, it'll be replaced by hydrogen.

Sure, but if HFCs exist for industrial vehicles, they will therefore exist for private vehicles. And therefore it is highly likely at least some cars will run on them.

Although I'd agree that the technologies will probably coexist.

 

[Eacaraxe]

The laws of thermodynamics make hydrogen mostly commercially unfavourable compared to batteries (at least by current tech), but I think other considerations may well come into play. Hydrogen also doesn't need to be made on-site, it can be made in refineries and shipped, just like petrol.

The logistic and safety requirements of storing and transporting elemental hydrogen are what make it economically unviable. Onsite production is really the only way to bypass it, which is what makes it ideal for fueling commercial fleets opposed to personal vehicles. That's how small reactors enter the picture: they produce both the heat and electricity to purify and electrolyze water, and damned efficiently. It's something at which we're already...pretty good, to say the least:



Really, really, good.

Commercial issues also affect solid state batteries: they are seriously expensive. This will undoubtedly come down, potentially be a lot, but will it come down enough in amount and time?

It's anybody's guess, but hopefully. It's the horse Musk put his money on, make of that what you will.

Sure, but if HFCs exist for industrial vehicles, they will therefore exist for private vehicles. And therefore it is highly likely at least some cars will run on them.

Diesel passenger vehicles exist, too. It's just a matter of which tech is best-fit for what application.

 

[Ag3ma]

The logistic and safety requirements of storing and transporting elemental hydrogen are what make it economically unviable.

The world is already full of petrol lorries and tankers. Hydrogen is more problematic in some ways, but less so in others.

I think a bigger problem is that most of it currently comes from fossil fuels. To get off fossil fuels, hydrogen would be better produced without, but that is not very cheap as it effectively requires substantial energy generation to create hydrogen in the first place.