I mostly agree with your analysis, but I take issue with your conclusion. Pre-Musk Twitter provided an invaluable haven for marginalized communities, and a fast-track to elevating important voices and viewpoints. Twitter enabled Zelensky to put children's faces on a horrific war, Twitter enabled threats to US democracy to be clarified prior to the midterms. Twitter enabled Westerners to read first-hand accounts of the desperate struggles for freedom in Iran and China. Personally, these were primary reasons for spending time on Twitter.
Most of us will indeed be fine with an alternative to Twitter (the brand is so damaged, who would buy it, even in a fire sale?), but it's a life-and-death matter to many in the world. Their loss of access is a tragedy, engineered by a man who is a farce.
Much as the way that removing DJT from Twitter helped to decentralize him from the media, I think reducing people's attention from Twitter (and Musk himself) may be the best thing for everyone in terms of reducing the importance of this particular platform (and I was a dedicated user for 15 years). It took up too much of my time and attention for someone whose livelihood had to no connection to his Twitter presence, though that's on me, not anyone else. Two more days and my Twitter account will disappear for ever into the deletion bin and despite any temptations to reactivate it, I intend to leave that chapter behind me. Like you say, Dave, no matter what happens to Twitter in the next 12 months, almost everyone's lives will be largely unaffected, except perhaps in our memories and feelings.
The more I hear about Post ,the less I like it--and the more that the people who are pushing it hard look like shills of some kind or another. It certainly doesn't feel like a solution to anything.
What I would love to hear your take on is if there is any way to measure "fine ness". Is the more decentralized nature of communication in 2006 superior to today?
More broadly I'm wondering if there are possible ways to break the boom-bust cycle of internet communications. The end state of a few giant corporations controlling everything we say on the internet seems undesirable.
Trying to second-guess reasons for Musk's kamikaze dive into Twitter is fun, but in the end irrelevant, he's burning Twitter as we know it to the ground. As you and others much smarter than me point out, the user base is Twitter, the technology is nothing magic, and he's trashed the old mechanism for managing the user base and replaced it with nothing while focusing on rewriting the code to resemble his first love X, the do-everything app. Clearly he cares nothing for the existing user base, and believes he'll make it up in volume by releasing all the demons in Hell to (re)join Twitter.
It might be instructive to imagine what a profitable Twitter 2.0 might look like, assuming my assertions above are reasonable. A tiered service with less-than-basic free (ads and micropayment transactions, essentially read-only) at the bottom, and a series of subscription options. The foundation is the old Twitter use model, with subscription levels or micropayments opening up different views, levels of access privilege, and access to ancellary services. A robust free-speech zone that handwaves away the ability of various bad actors and their bots to game the system and overwhelm individual targets with propaganda, doxxing, and death threats, unless he reinvents the controls he just threw away. He has to offer content though, and based on who he's inviting in its going to be some content alright. The plan always trips up on his teenage libertarian concept of free speech, which in a virtual commons like Twitter will always descend into the pit that bad actors gaming the system will dig.
I mostly agree with your analysis, but I take issue with your conclusion. Pre-Musk Twitter provided an invaluable haven for marginalized communities, and a fast-track to elevating important voices and viewpoints. Twitter enabled Zelensky to put children's faces on a horrific war, Twitter enabled threats to US democracy to be clarified prior to the midterms. Twitter enabled Westerners to read first-hand accounts of the desperate struggles for freedom in Iran and China. Personally, these were primary reasons for spending time on Twitter.
Most of us will indeed be fine with an alternative to Twitter (the brand is so damaged, who would buy it, even in a fire sale?), but it's a life-and-death matter to many in the world. Their loss of access is a tragedy, engineered by a man who is a farce.
Much as the way that removing DJT from Twitter helped to decentralize him from the media, I think reducing people's attention from Twitter (and Musk himself) may be the best thing for everyone in terms of reducing the importance of this particular platform (and I was a dedicated user for 15 years). It took up too much of my time and attention for someone whose livelihood had to no connection to his Twitter presence, though that's on me, not anyone else. Two more days and my Twitter account will disappear for ever into the deletion bin and despite any temptations to reactivate it, I intend to leave that chapter behind me. Like you say, Dave, no matter what happens to Twitter in the next 12 months, almost everyone's lives will be largely unaffected, except perhaps in our memories and feelings.
The more I hear about Post ,the less I like it--and the more that the people who are pushing it hard look like shills of some kind or another. It certainly doesn't feel like a solution to anything.
Although it seems like five months, it’s only been five weeks since NilayPatel called it ;)
What I would love to hear your take on is if there is any way to measure "fine ness". Is the more decentralized nature of communication in 2006 superior to today?
More broadly I'm wondering if there are possible ways to break the boom-bust cycle of internet communications. The end state of a few giant corporations controlling everything we say on the internet seems undesirable.
Trying to second-guess reasons for Musk's kamikaze dive into Twitter is fun, but in the end irrelevant, he's burning Twitter as we know it to the ground. As you and others much smarter than me point out, the user base is Twitter, the technology is nothing magic, and he's trashed the old mechanism for managing the user base and replaced it with nothing while focusing on rewriting the code to resemble his first love X, the do-everything app. Clearly he cares nothing for the existing user base, and believes he'll make it up in volume by releasing all the demons in Hell to (re)join Twitter.
It might be instructive to imagine what a profitable Twitter 2.0 might look like, assuming my assertions above are reasonable. A tiered service with less-than-basic free (ads and micropayment transactions, essentially read-only) at the bottom, and a series of subscription options. The foundation is the old Twitter use model, with subscription levels or micropayments opening up different views, levels of access privilege, and access to ancellary services. A robust free-speech zone that handwaves away the ability of various bad actors and their bots to game the system and overwhelm individual targets with propaganda, doxxing, and death threats, unless he reinvents the controls he just threw away. He has to offer content though, and based on who he's inviting in its going to be some content alright. The plan always trips up on his teenage libertarian concept of free speech, which in a virtual commons like Twitter will always descend into the pit that bad actors gaming the system will dig.