Twitter - will you use it?

[pixy0stix]

Nov 11, 2022 19:48:12 GMT -5 AAM2012 said:

Maybe my tinfoil hat is too tight…

Do we think Musk might have bought Twitter to run it into the ground to reduce independent, reliable and quick communication?

While I get there was a lot of noise and garbage….there was also a lot of good in communication within Twitter.

I vacillate between this, or that his ego really was this big and he thought he had a better plan.

[aurora]

Nov 12, 2022 10:00:32 GMT -5 pixy0stix said:

Nov 11, 2022 19:48:12 GMT -5 AAM2012 said:

Maybe my tinfoil hat is too tight…

Do we think Musk might have bought Twitter to run it into the ground to reduce independent, reliable and quick communication?

While I get there was a lot of noise and garbage….there was also a lot of good in communication within Twitter.

I vacillate between this, or that his ego really was this big and he thought he had a better plan.

Yeah, I think a lot of it was ego. He wanted to control the narrative and thinks since he's the richest man in Earth he is smart enough to do anything he wants.

[bears]

twitterisgoinggreat.com/ is a website that basically has a timeline of all the news happening at Twitter. It's not a real news source, but I've seen most of this information elsewhere and it's really interesting (in the way a dumpster fire is interesting) to see it all together.

[litebright]

Nov 11, 2022 19:48:12 GMT -5 AAM2012 said:

Maybe my tinfoil hat is too tight…

Do we think Musk might have bought Twitter to run it into the ground to reduce independent, reliable and quick communication?

While I get there was a lot of noise and garbage….there was also a lot of good in communication within Twitter.

I don't quite go this far, but it has crossed my mind to think about how much the RW has been salivating over wanting their own social media site and that the ones that they have tried to build from scratch (Truth Social, Parler, Gab, etc.) are still very fringey and ONLY attract RW-ers. IMO what they would really love is for Twitter to be their playground and Musk seems amenable to that, he wants to be a "free speech" hero by putting his thumb on the moderation scales so "conservative" (read: racist, misogynist, anti-LGBTQ+, conspiracy theories, etc.) speech isn't "censored". I was reading something over the weekend that made the point is that part of the attraction of Twitter for the RW is that they get to poke at, argue with/"own" libs in real-time; I also think part of the thrill of spreading conspiracy theories is relishing the reaction from others, both the reinforcement and also the people trying to fact-check /call them out. An echo chamber isn't as satisfying. They want a SM platform that is more mainstream than the chans or their own apps, more polished than Reddit and with little to no moderation.

Musk very well might be willing to give them that, especially if he can get in on the RW grift and charge people for using it. But users aren't going to stay on a platform like that. Advertisers won't (aren't!) either. 

One thing I am pretty sure of, though, is that he thinks Twitter is something other than what it actually is. He responded to a telecom ex-CEO who floated the idea of running Twitter operations/dealing with people so Musk can focus on other things, by saying that Twitter is "at its core a software and servers company" that needs a "technologist" to run it. Um, LOFL. Twitter's servers and software are incidental to the actual product and value of the company, and if that is how he thinks of Twitter he is fundamentally misunderstanding what he bought (no surprise!). You could solve every one of Twitter's code/technology problems and it would still have major issues because the problem is PEOPLE. People who want to lie and yell slurs and scam people and make others miserable and influence politics/power maliciously, for the whole range of motivations that a human being can have because they're craven or desperate or immature or have some other gaping hole in their personality/empathy/humanity. 

I don't know where this all is going or where Twitter will end up, but I am 100% certain that if the problem is people (and it is!) then Musk has no idea how to deal with that in any way that makes or keeps Twitter a viable commercial business. 

[rubytue]

Update… as of this morning, I’ve removed my Twitter history and set my account to private.

It’s so surreal watching it die in real time. For all the abuse that happened on Twitter, there was a lot of good, too. Aside from breaking news events, there are a lot of folks in the disability and chronic illness community that are truly mourning it. We found community and connections when there weren’t others we saw in person like us. From “behind a computer screen” no one knows if you are deaf, blind, physically disable. You can find a tribe. You can interact with people and be respected for what you contribute, not judged and dismissed. There are many really mourning the implosions. This is one reason why I tried to stick around.

crutchesandspice.com/2022/11/16/with-twitter-crumbling-it-feels-like-the-world-is-collapsing-on-disabled-people/

[mrsukyankee]

rubytue, what did you do to remove your Twitter history?

[Pom]

I will miss the humor and connection to people. places and causes around the world.

Space Karen ruins everything.

[rubytue]

Nov 18, 2022 11:41:24 GMT -5 mrsukyankee said:

rubytue , what did you do to remove your Twitter history?

Mostly because I had a flash of work paranoia. Although, it’s probably too late for that (as in, if it is going to be a problem, they already have it). And I saw lots of stuff about archiving, and some of the advice articles mentioned doing it. 

[AAM2012]

Nov 18, 2022 19:02:48 GMT -5 rubytue said:

Nov 18, 2022 11:41:24 GMT -5 mrsukyankee said:

rubytue , what did you do to remove your Twitter history?

Mostly because I had a flash of work paranoia. Although, it’s probably too late for that (as in, if it is going to be a problem, they already have it). And I saw lots of stuff about archiving, and some of the advice articles mentioned doing it. 

I think they’re asking HOW did you do it :-)

[rubytue]

Nov 19, 2022 14:17:28 GMT -5 AAM2012 said:

Nov 18, 2022 19:02:48 GMT -5 rubytue said:

Mostly because I had a flash of work paranoia. Although, it’s probably too late for that (as in, if it is going to be a problem, they already have it). And I saw lots of stuff about archiving, and some of the advice articles mentioned doing it. 

I think they’re asking HOW did you do it :-)

Oooooohhhh. Read, Ruby. I saw “why” 😂

mrsukyankee, I used semiphemeral.com

[estrellita]

TFG's account was reinstated. So.. yeah.

[litebright]

I deleted the app from my phone. My account is for work, so I'll keep it for now, but I am read-only on Twitter 99% of the time and definitely see the atmosphere changing already, even in my very-curated feed. I do not follow EM, but he is in my feed every time I look at the site now. I admit, I've been on there more lately to watch the trainwreck, but there is definitely an exodus that is taking effect and you can see what it is becoming. Somebody said that Twitter is turning into $8chan, and yup, that's what I see happening. EM's image in response to TFG saying he wouldn't come back to Twitter? Disgusting.

[estrellita]

litebright omg, I hadn't seen that response about TFG not wanting to return so I went to find it. Yikes. There is something seriously wrong with this man (as if there wasn't before, but it just keeps getting worse).

[wanderingback]

I haven’t been on Twitter in probably a week at this point. One of the orgs I do advocacy work with sent out an email instructing us how to archive our tweets. They recommend not deactivating so that it’s harder for people to copy your identity.

This is so messed up. I connected with a lot of Black professionals that I never would have otherwise through Twitter. In addition to advocacy work through Twitter. And lastly, keeping up to date about the pandemic via Twitter. I actually found out independent healthcare workers were eligible for the covid vaccine in my city early 2021 via Twitter about an hour or so before my work got an email. I was able to book my appointment and tell my team before spots were taken up.

At this point I prob don’t need to find another social media distraction, so I won’t jump to another platform at this moment. I had already given Facebook up about 3 years ago, so I wonder what’s going to be next in social media.

[Wallflower]

As a sign of the right-wing nature of my small town, the Town Office just announced that they have just set up a Twitter account. I'm trying to keep my eyes from rolling out of my head and it's difficult.

[rubytue]

wanderingback , FWIW, most of my follows in the medical world moved over to med-mastodon.com/. My patient advocacy cohort hasn’t embraced it yet. Not that I’m encouraging SM. 😂