Twitter C/D

Was classique. May be dudded. Only manageable for me via Tweetdeck.

Also, hello again.

I finally deleted the app from my phone today. I asked myself, what would I do if Trump bought Twitter? And that made the choice even easier.

https://www.platformer.news/p/musk-discusses-putting-all-of-twitter

Lots of good stuff in here, including musings about paywalling the whole site, but this is my favorite.

Meanwhile, the health team was told to listen to Musk adviser David Sacks’ podcast for insights into why they had just lost half their colleagues, according to a former employee. Sacks, a venture capitalist who has been helping to manage the Musk transition, co-hosts the “All-In” podcast with fellow Twitter adviser Jason Calacanis and VC Chamath Palihapitiya.

“The most recent podcast covers the current layoffs happening across tech and provides some insight into why this is happening/necessary,” a vice president told employees. “I think it is worth listening to in order to understand the macro environment we are operating in."

He told his new employees that they should listen to his podcast. Amazing.

honestly thats grounds for mob justice

Looool

Other employees have warned about a secondary feature of the new Blue that Musk added at the last minute: reducing ad load in the Twitter app by half. Estimates showed that Twitter will lose about $6 in ad revenue per user per month in the United States by making that change, sources said. Factoring in Apple and Google’s share of the $8 monthly subscription, Twitter would likely lose money on Blue if the ad-light plan is enacted.

Unable to change your Twitter display name like @evacide? Seeing weird manual RTs? Replies not loading? Twitter is breaking. For @techreview, I spoke to an engineer still employed about how the platform is failing - not with a bang, but with a whimper https://t.co/WST1QKQMba

— Chris Stokel-Walker ~ @sto✧✧✧@info✧✧✧.excha✧✧✧ (@stokel) November 8, 2022

One thing that interests me, is how difficult it is to maintain a service as superficially simple as Twitter at scale. I feel like I could probably write out its basic features quite quickly and simply on a single piece of paper (at least as regards users - I realise the advertising side is more complex). I know that scalability is the issue, but as someone who isn't an IT professional, that's all somewhat shrouded in mystery for me.

The Onion went on a tear in the last 12 hours and then this happened pic.twitter.com/SkDgYmpiB3

— Ryan Mac 🙃 (@RMac18) November 8, 2022

It might turn ok in the end.

Emma Kennedy has had her Twitter account suspended after being mistaken for parody. pic.twitter.com/OnQEqU2Apn

— Jon Mao (Not Parody) (@JonMao___) November 7, 2022

the system works

One thing that interests me, is how difficult it is to maintain a service as superficially simple as Twitter at scale. I feel like I could probably write out its basic features quite quickly and simply on a single piece of paper (at least as regards users - I realise the advertising side is more complex). I know that scalability is the issue, but as someone who isn't an IT professional, that's all somewhat shrouded in mystery for me.

― Alba, Tuesday, November 8, 2022 5:31 AM (two hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

basically its just hard cause millions of computers both servers where the data is stored and most of the computation happens and users phones or whatever have to communicate and remain synchronized "in real time", and twitters been around for a while so the way all that happens isnt as ideal as if you were to build it new today, but yeah it is crazy how hard it is, computers are bad

So only 100,000 people were paying for Twitter Premium (or whatever)? And minus verification that premium becomes even less appealing. What a knucklehead. A few people on here have suggested Tesla or Rockets, Inc. or Tunnelpeople are OK places to work because Musk is barely involved. Is this what it's like when he *is* involved? What a hilarious mess.

there was an interesting recent new yorker piece on the guy who did the foundation work on this synchronisation everywhere in real time, and how he's old now and -- iirc -- the groundwork allowing this to happen is somewhat crumbling, but its upkeep runs through a sequence of ancient technician beefs (the guy is super-cranky and getting worse, which doesn't help) and office-political disputes

anyway i can't remember his name so this has been more helpful participation and content by me, yes

link?

my "can't remember his name" post has people asking a lot of questions about links already answered by my post

The Thorny Problem of Keeping the Internet’s Time
An obscure software system synchronizes the network’s clocks. Who will keep it running?
Nate HopperSeptember 30, 2022

The link is through Google so I'd need to clean it up.

thank u

u yung ppl w/yr non-failing memories, it's a scandal

An obscure software system synchronizes the network’s clocks. Who will keep it running?

look it's true that Elon has a lot of really dumb ideas that might actually kill Twitter on the spot, but its also true that he fired all the people who would actually be responsible for implementing them, so who knows maybe it'll be fine :)

Another thoughtful thread on twitter.

Before returning to my Twitter asceticism, which is not prompted by the Musk takeover but by a need for mental focus, a couple of thoughts on the platform and its fate. I am more ambivalent than many about cheering its end: it's been very important and useful for me.

— James B (@piercepenniless) November 8, 2022

idk if it will mostly go audio-visual. Staying on ilx and twitter -- which is a really good at aggregating so much web content -- means I've never really been that out there.

Good piece, about right imo.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/11/08/1062886/heres-how-a-twitter-engineer-says-it-will-break-in-the-coming-weeks/

Alongside the minor malfunctions, the Twitter engineer believes that there’ll be significant outages on the horizon, thanks in part to Musk’s drive to reduce Twitter’s cloud computing server load in an attempt to claw back up to $3 million a day in infrastructure costs. Reuters reports that this project, which came from Musk’s war room, is called the “Deep Cuts Plan.”

lol what an appealing name

Hope they pulled the plug on the data centre in Ireland, if that was one of them!

please enjoy THE PHYSICAL MANIFESTATION OF TWIDDOR’S RAPID DESCENT INTO CHAOS THANKS TO INEPT MANAGEMENT FROM A MANBABY EDGELORD POUNDS ME IN THE BUTT out now https://t.co/yy8yHvIVXd or on patreon https://t.co/mls9h13YK1 pic.twitter.com/TnSXLLgfaN

— Chuck Tingle (@ChuckTingle) November 8, 2022

Reuters reports that this project, which came from Musk’s war room, is called the “Deep Cuts Plan.”

missed opportunity to call it the 1000 cuts plan

blue check, blue check official, blue check lite

A lot of folks have asked about how you'll be able to distinguish between @TwitterBlue subscribers with blue checkmarks and accounts that are verified as official, which is why we’re introducing the “Official" label to select accounts when we launch. pic.twitter.com/0p2Ae5nWpO

— Esther Crawford ✨ (@esthercrawford) November 8, 2022

Not all previously verified accounts will get the “Official” label and the label is not available for purchase. Accounts that will receive it include government accounts, commercial companies, business partners, major media outlets, publishers and some public figures.

— Esther Crawford ✨ (@esthercrawford) November 8, 2022

The new Twitter Blue does not include ID verification – it’s an opt-in, paid subscription that offers a blue checkmark and access to select features. We’ll continue to experiment with ways to differentiate between account types.

— Esther Crawford ✨ (@esthercrawford) November 8, 2022

She slept on the floor for this?

this is terrible product management

Oh good, I was worried a whole day would go by without a hilariously stupid development.

Soothes the dumbest blue checks who think it is a special privilege, keeps the door open for the grifters because their victims will never go looking for the “official” tag.

BRB, claiming @GeirHongro

I actually have a new prediction: Elon musk is going to create a second kind of blue check that will be given to those who already have them. Perhaps it’s not a blue check - or maybe the $8/month isn’t for a blue check. Either way, it’s going to be very funny

— Ed Zitron (@edzitron) November 1, 2022

got him lol

Good piece, about right imo.

https://www.technologyreview.com/2022/11/08/1062886/heres-how-a-twitter-engineer-says-it-will-break-in-the-coming-weeks/

― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Tuesday, November 8, 2022 3:42 PM (four hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

it should have occurred to me that if they actually fired engineers based on code commits or whatever, then they fired all the people who keep the site running

Note I am skeptical the site will break in the coming weeks, more likely the product and advertiser situation fails to stabilise and that does medium term damage. But it would be extremely funny if the product breaks and that article makes a good case that it might happen.

lmao @ sending this lady out to announce the plan, I guess Elon didn't wanna admit he capitulated

is there anything we can do to help it break

tweet @ Elon that crypto lowers sperm count, he'll black out and go on a banning spree

Official

look this is undoubtedly a better idea than just letting everyone be "verified" for $8 but I bet you Elon personally is gonna make a lot of decisions regarding who gets to keep "verified" status

thing is they just should let anyone who wants to get verified but theyre unwilling or unable to actually do the verification, and it should be free, or they could even charge a one time processing fee sure why not, but fake verification as a revenue stream is just wrong and shortsighted, as many have pointed out twitter itself greatly benefits from having reliable identities on there

lmfao

Update: It's now gone https://t.co/5C0t7txi14

— Marques Brownlee (@MKBHD) November 9, 2022

I just killed it

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 9, 2022

things just went from "well, this could have been done better" to "we like the shitshow option better for now"

Poor Esther slept on the floor for this

$8chan

twitter itself greatly benefits from having reliable identities on there

on the whole I'd say the general anonymity of posters on the internet is more of a bane than a boon. it promotes recklessness through lack of accountability. but it is now deeply embedded in all our expectations of how the internet works and any imposition of rules requiring use of your true identity would cause riots. people like to indulge their own recklessness, even if they deplore it in others.

good post
might kinda qualify for the post / username thread too

No problem with people not using their real names online (or offline, really). A pseudonymous identity is fine as long as it’s fairly stable and doesn’t involve impersonation.