The ongoing Elon Twitter saga: "insert demographic" melts down

[Werewolf]

Im a bit lost in this and admit have only caught the head lines. Elon is throwing a tantrum, because private companies don't want to do business with his private company?, and he's saying " No, you must pay me and always do business with me?"

Yes.

Apparently for Musk "Free Speech" means you must advertise with him, and anyone who says otherwise, or does anything to discourage it is doing something illegal.

The funniest part of the lolsuit threat is that he's apparently going to try and go after people who just donated to the organisations that were pointing out the type of content that adverts are currently running alongside on Twitter.

I guess the richest man in the world must have a hobby to entertain himself, and when he's not trolling on twitter nothing quite wastes money like frivolous lawsuits* involving your very expensive lawyers when the matter will get thrown out of court on long established precedent what anyone who has passed law school will know about, and that there will likely be a line of lawyers willing to work for free to defend.


*Well I can think of one or two things, but apart from spaffing 20 billion or so on a joke, lolsuits are pretty much the top of the list.

 

[Werewolf]

So, has he launched his thermonuclear lawsuit yet?

Give him time, it's only 9:47 in Texas and 7:47 in California.

 

[Roar87]

Im a bit lost in this and admit have only caught the head lines. Elon is throwing a tantrum, because private companies don't want to do business with his private company?, and he's saying " No, you must pay me and always do business with me?"

No, Media Matters set up a Twitter account and engineered it in a certain way to try and get a specific type of advert to get posted next to a controversial post. This isn't representative of a normal user experience, they went out of their way to create a set of circumstances to make Twitter/X look bad and to damage their brand. Kind of like taking a see through suitcase full of money into the roughest part of London at midnight then using the fact you got robbed as a way of saying the UK is unsafe for tourists. It's not a genuine experience or representative.

 

[Colonel_Klinck]

I bet i use Twitter more than the average person on here and i literally don't see any of this stuff. It's a bit bizarre how there can be such disparity in experiences on the platform.

I don't think it is at all. Everyone will trigger the algorithm in different ways. I can honestly say I've never seen any child porn (thank ****), I've seen porn though, I've zero idea why as I've never gone looking for it, never click on it or follow any accounts that I think could lead to it. When I want porn I don't go to Twitter to see it.

 

[Colonel_Klinck]

No, Media Matters set up a Twitter account and engineered it in a certain way to try and get a specific type of advert to get posted next to a controversial post. This isn't representative of a normal user experience, they went out of their way to create a set of circumstances to make Twitter/X look bad and to damage their brand. Kind of like taking a see through suitcase full of money into the roughest part of London at midnight then using the fact you got robbed as a way of saying the UK is unsafe for tourists. It's not a genuine experience or representative.

Twitter admits that adverts can appear next to such content. So good luck suing someone who says adverts can appear next to such content. Its not like they don't have the tech to stop it. They stop adverts appearing next to child porn so they can easily stop adverts appearing next to such content, they choose not to.

 

[Mr Jack]

No, Media Matters set up a Twitter account and engineered it in a certain way to try and get a specific type of advert to get posted next to a controversial post.

Tell me, how exactly does Media Matters investigate what ads Xitter puts next to objectionable content without looking at said content? This defence is completely laughable. They carried out basic investigative journalism. The reality is that Xitter does put ads next to these accounts. They have the receipts.

Although I suspect Musk describing anti-Semitic posts as "the actual truth" has had rather more impact on advertisers wanting to be on Xitter than the Media Matters report anyway.

 

[Mr Jack]

Give him time, it's only 9:47 in Texas and 7:47 in California.

How about now?

Or was it the silly empty threat everyone expected from Elon?

 

[Werewolf]

How about now?

Or was it the silly empty threat everyone expected from Elon?

He's a very busy man, I mean he's the sole reason 3 companies are working and he's already splitting himself in thirds so that he can spend all day every day at each of them.

Or he's either forgotten about it, or been talked out of it by a lawyer who actually groks the law and is about to be replaced.

 

[Trusty]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1726671127840493811

 

[Sankari]

Still no sign of the 'thermonuclear' lawsuit Musk vowed to file first thing on Monday morning.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1726674914051305632

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1726682073912803360

 

[unwashed potato!]

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1726671127840493811

Didn't x say they have placed ads by Nazi content? I don't see how that Tweet adds anything other than for those that need to be reaffirmed of their false belief that it doesn't happen.

And saying "I don't see it happening at a later date" doesn't really mean anything either.

Did they create new accounts that twitter hasn't yet built a profile of? Do they follow certain accounts to test the system?

People moaned that media matters did journalistic work, while praising those that haven't.

 

[Penfold101]

I don't know why this is such a big story - they're all private companies and can do what they want. Elon said he didn't care about the economics of Twitter at all so why would he care about the advertisers leaving?

 

[Trusty]

Didn't x say they have placed ads by Nazi content? I don't see how that Tweet adds anything other than for those that need to be reaffirmed of their false belief that it doesn't happen.

And saying "I don't see it happening at a later date" doesn't really mean anything either.

Did they create new accounts that twitter hasn't yet built a profile of? Do they follow certain accounts to test the system?

People moaned that media matters did journalistic work, while praising those that haven't.

You can test it, do what Media Matters did. Create a new anon account and follow the nazi accounts Media Matters did, it'll take you half and hour to do.

You don't even use Twitter, like how would you know whether any of this happens, its very odd

 

[unwashed potato!]

You can test it, do what Media Matters did. Create a new anon account and follow the nazi accounts Media Matters did, it'll take you half and hour to do.

You don't even use Twitter, like how would you know whether any of this happens, its very odd

No I can't. I can't do that 1 month ago when the algorithm was what it was before media matters released their findings.

How odd to suggest that.

 

[Sankari]

You can test it, do what Media Matters did. Create a new anon account and follow the nazi accounts Media Matters did, it'll take you half and hour to do.

You don't even use Twitter, like how would you know whether any of this happens, its very odd

It was a bit more complex than that, according to old mate. MM is being accused of gaming the system to achieve the result they wanted.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1725914126277304823

 

[Trusty]

No I can't. I can't do that 1 month ago when the algorithm was what it was before media matters released their findings.

How odd to suggest that.

Are you saying the algo has been changed? Where have you seen that?

 

[Sankari]

Are you saying the algo has been changed? Where have you seen that?

The new algorithm was introduced last week, by my estimation.

The company formerly known as Twitter is preparing to roll out a “major update” to its algorithm, according to a recent post by X owner Elon Musk. While today the app’s For You feed surfaces popular and trending posts from its broader network alongside highlights from those you follow, the new algorithm will surface posts from smaller accounts, Musk said.

The posts and accounts will include those outside users’ “friends and follows” network, he noted, meaning the change will attempt to expose users to new accounts they may find interesting but haven’t yet discovered. It would also allow smaller creators the opportunity to be discovered by a wider audience, which fits into Musk’s plan to turn X into a creator platform.

(Source).

 

[Mr Jack]

*lol* Michael Shellenberger *lol*

Surprised he wasn't too busy talking about UFOs to post this, tbh. Not sure why anyone would consider this crank credible on anything?

But again: what difference does any of this make? Media Matters found, with proof, that Twitter serves ads next to neo-Nazi content. That is the fact of the matter. The rest of it is wild bleating. Media Matter going looking is standard investigative journalism. You go and investigate and you report on what you find. You cannot find ads on neo-Nazi content without looking at neo-Nazi content.

 

[Trusty]

The new algorithm was introduced last week, by my estimation.



(Source).

I looked on Github, i couldn't find any recent update to the algo.

Commits · twitter/the-algorithm

Source code for Twitter's Recommendation Algorithm - Commits · twitter/the-algorithm

github.com

 

[Trusty]

Surprised he wasn't too busy talking about UFOs to post this, tbh. Not sure why anyone would consider this crank credible on anything?

But again: what difference does any of this make? Media Matters found, with proof, that Twitter serves ads next to neo-Nazi content. That is the fact of the matter. The rest of it is wild bleating. Media Matter going looking is standard investigative journalism. You go and investigate and you report on what you find. You cannot find ads on neo-Nazi content without looking at neo-Nazi content.

I dont think it really matters. If he tested it, he tested it i suppose.

When you see stuff like below and see the difference in outrage from people, i do wonder whether there is an ulterior motive.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1724980293462008082