Twitter board agrees to $44 billion sale to billionaire Tesla founder Elon Musk

[aerius]

Watching Musk and Twitter self-destruct is glorious.
Couldn't happen to a more deserving bunch of twats.

[Solauren]

Those who had the right widget at the right time ought to have given it to the world for free. Insulin could have made a billionaire but the only moral choice was to give away that fortune.

Really depends on the 'widget'. Something that is needed for life (i.e medical), I can see making it as cheap as possible, but there are costs that have to be recovered. Nothing is free, and it's unlikely to ever be.

I totally agree, however, price gouging over 'needed to live' stuff is absolutely wrong.

However, for stuff that is not absolutely needed for life (which is basically most consumerism), then they have the right to charge whatever they want. Just like people have the right to say 'fuck that price'.

The problem is, most people won't do that. There are idiots out there that keep paying for new Apple iPhones, despite all the shit that's been revealed (i.e updates that deliberately slow them down).

Billionaires are the worst of humanity. Even the 'good' ones have gallons of blood on their hands if only because they wouldn't accept less to give humanity more.

That's largely situational. Some industries have an absolutely bloody history to them. No question.

Others, not so much, to none at all.
Case in point - what blood does the guy that came up with Minecraft have on his hands?
I'm also not really seeing any blood on Musks hands. He started with software development, and has moved on to SpaceX, and trying to make environmentally sustainable vehicles. He's an idiot otherwise, but I'm not seeing any blood on his hands.

[bilateralrope]

Twitter pauses paid verifications after users abuse service to impersonate brands and people

PUBLISHED FRI, NOV 11 20229:23 AM ESTUPDATED AN HOUR AGO
thumbnail
Sofia Pitt
@SOFIA_PITT

• The option to sign up for Twitter’s new verification service for $7.99 has disappeared from the iOS app.
• Twitter CEO Elon Musk launched the paid verification service earlier this week.
• Twitter reinstated the “official” badge given to some accounts on Friday.
• Some users who already paid for the service say their paid-for blue checkmark has disappeared from their account.

Twitter appears to have paused its $7.99/month Blue subscription service, which allowed people to pay for a verification check mark, after users were abusing it to impersonate brands and famous people.

Twitter launched the service earlier this week in its iPhone app, allowing users to buy a checkmark that had previously been used to show that an account was verified or official. As of Friday, the iPhone app no longer shows an option to sign up for Twitter Blue.

The quick suspension of the service suggests that, at least currently, CEO Elon Musk’s big plan to generate new revenue from users isn’t working as expected.

The paid subscription service led to a plethora of pranksters creating imposter accounts on Twitter. It left the platform even more ripe for misinformation, and many checkmarks were used to impersonate brands with unflattering messages. That, too, presents a big problem for advertisers, some of which have already paused spending on the platform.

Some users who already paid for the service say their paid-for blue checkmark has disappeared from their account.

A Twitter spokesperson was not immediately available for comment. Musk was not immediately available for comment.

This was Musk's plan to compensate for the loss of advertiser revenue. Instead, it had so much impersonation that he had to kill it while probably driving more advertisers away.

Honestly, I'm surprised Musk backed off the Twitter Blue subscription so quickly.

[Broomstick]

Those who had the right widget at the right time ought to have given it to the world for free.

I'm OK with Widget Inventor making some money from said widget.... but I agree that the wealth generated should be spread around rather than concentrated in the hands of just one person.

[Darth Yan]

Those who had the right widget at the right time ought to have given it to the world for free. Insulin could have made a billionaire but the only moral choice was to give away that fortune.

Really depends on the 'widget'. Something that is needed for life (i.e medical), I can see making it as cheap as possible, but there are costs that have to be recovered. Nothing is free, and it's unlikely to ever be.

I totally agree, however, price gouging over 'needed to live' stuff is absolutely wrong.

However, for stuff that is not absolutely needed for life (which is basically most consumerism), then they have the right to charge whatever they want. Just like people have the right to say 'fuck that price'.

The problem is, most people won't do that. There are idiots out there that keep paying for new Apple iPhones, despite all the shit that's been revealed (i.e updates that deliberately slow them down).

Billionaires are the worst of humanity. Even the 'good' ones have gallons of blood on their hands if only because they wouldn't accept less to give humanity more.

That's largely situational. Some industries have an absolutely bloody history to them. No question.

Others, not so much, to none at all.
Case in point - what blood does the guy that came up with Minecraft have on his hands?
I'm also not really seeing any blood on Musks hands. He started with software development, and has moved on to SpaceX, and trying to make environmentally sustainable vehicles. He's an idiot otherwise, but I'm not seeing any blood on his hands.

Musk’s dad was involved in South African mining, which is bloody.

[Jub]

I dropped a new thread for the billionaire debate: viewtopic.php?f=5&t=170986

[bilateralrope]

Musk proposes turning Twitter into a bank to avoid bankruptcy

Musk aims to grow Twitter users by 1 billion, then link accounts to debit cards.
ASHLEY BELANGER - 11/12/2022, 8:31 AM

Confidence in Twitter has hit what might be an all-time low just two weeks into Elon Musk’s tenure as owner. Yesterday on a call, Musk told Twitter staff that bankruptcy is a real possibility, as next year Twitter could face billions more in losses.

The Verge posted a full transcript of Musk’s staff meeting, where different employees attempted to find out what their priorities should be to help Musk keep Twitter afloat as the economy remains unstable. Musk kept his responses brief and said top priorities included growing Twitter’s user base by 1 billion (while critically monetizing more users), compensating creators on the platform, and improving Twitter search. In short, he asked his remaining team members to go “hardcore” to make Twitter “more compelling,” so he can sell that product to users, or else resign. One of his biggest and out-there ideas, which he says is "definitely happening," is tweaking Twitter to become a digital payments platform.

“If you have a compelling product, people will buy it,” Musk told staff. “That has been my experience at SpaceX and Tesla.”

Musk’s brutal honesty about a potential Twitter bankruptcy has increased doubts that the platform will survive Musk’s leadership style. In addition to dipping Twitter into debt by $13 billion when he bought it, then losing $4 million a day in ad revenue, Musk now has to deal with interest payments that Reuters reported will total “close to $1.2 billion in the next 12 months.”

Those interest payments, Reuters said, would amount to more than Twitter’s most recently disclosed cash flow of $1.1 billion in June. And Musk’s team seems to be well aware of this risk, feeling pressured to perform well and asking Musk how he plans to address the cash flow problem.

“We just definitely need to bring in more cash than we spend,” Musk replied. “If we don’t do that and there’s a massive negative cash flow, then bankruptcy is not out of the question.”

The world’s richest man facing bankruptcy sounds almost as absurd as some of the best parody accounts trolling users on Twitter today, and some wonder if Musk is throwing the term around as a way to stir up staff that feels connected to the platform they built. Bloomberg noted that Musk has used “the threat of financial ruin” in the past to motivate his employees. “He’s trying to convey the notion that if people don’t work hard, Twitter will be left in a very difficult spot,” a person familiar with Musk’s management style told Bloomberg.

Of course, the threat of bankruptcy affects more than just staff. Bloomberg said that debt investors and credit raters were just as concerned by Musk’s statements, sending inquiries to hedge funds and asset managers to see if anyone wants to buy out some of Twitter’s debt at much lower rates. Banks that helped finance Twitter through $6.5 billion in leveraged loans could face billions in losses, Bloomberg’s calculations show.

As banks weigh available options amid Twitter’s bleak finances, Musk continues pouring money into Twitter, selling $4 billion in Tesla stock to “save” Twitter, The New York Times reported.

Cutting costs of Twitter staff

During the Twitter staff call, one employee asked Musk: “Why is our leadership trying to increase attrition rate if we’re already understaffed and barely able to keep things running?”

Musk doubled down after already laying off thousands of Twitter employees, saying, “I’m not trying to increase attrition, but I think we are not understaffed. I think we are overstaffed. That is my opinion, which you’re welcome to disagree with.”

According to The New York Times, Musk’s layoffs were so rushed that he failed to realize he dismissed staff members “who ran key money-generating products” that “no one else knows how to operate.” In that way, Musk has shown that in his ambition to launch new products, he has overlooked some of the money-making opportunities that already existed on the platform.

For Twitter staff attempting to keep up with the logic driving how Musk calls the shots, one of the few very clear points Musk has made is that he believes Twitter can only function with people willing to work the way he wants to work. That includes forcing the majority of employees to end remote work and then charging them to eat in the office cafeteria, ending perks that could further impact employee retention.

Musk told employees on the call that his experience has led him to believe that paranoia is necessary to survive a recession, and Musk’s paranoia about Twitter extends to his employees. The New York Times reported that Musk refused to pay out scheduled bonuses to employees until a payroll audit confirmed that all of Twitter’s employees were “real humans” and not “ghost employees.”

Early on during Musk’s takeover, commentators suggested that those laid off by Twitter could find themselves in a more comfortable situation than those Musk keeps on staff. The New York Times reported that Meta and Google have been recruiting staff exiting Twitter, even as Meta is undergoing its own layoffs. Those sticking with Musk must be prepared to work “maniacally,” he says, to support whatever move he makes next, creating an ongoing environment where employees can’t easily predict their day to day, which experts say makes it even more likely that turnover will remain high.

Tweaking Twitter to behave more like a bank

Near the end of Twitter’s staff call, one employee who seemingly wasn’t satisfied with how Musk answered an earlier question about staff priorities asked Musk, “Sorry, just to be a little bit more specific, is your recommendation that all of us in different teams, we try different things in the next few months to see what works, what doesn’t, or do you have a specific recommendation of what our focus should be?”

Musk repeated his top priorities, directing staff to envision a Twitter that works more like a financial institution, where digital payments are sent as easily as direct messages, creators can get paid more than they would on platforms like YouTube, and average users can generate higher interest on payments accounts held right there on Twitter.

“That’s definitely a direction we’re going to go in, enabling people on Twitter to be able to send money anywhere in the world instantly and in real time,” Musk confirmed, detailing plans to link debit cards to Twitter accounts and even issue checks to users so they can pay rent from their Twitter accounts.

“It sounds like more of a bank,” one employee noted. “Do you also foresee us loaning?”

Musk—who in the past two weeks has conducted business by riling key advertisers, threatening to diminish reach of Twitter’s top users' posts, and firing key staff in charge of key money-generating products—responded, “Well, if you want to provide a comprehensive service to people, then you can’t be missing key elements.”

If Musk goes through with this 'Twitter bank' idea, I wonder which regulator will laugh more when he tries to get their approval.

[LadyTevar]

Well well well...

There seems to be a little crisis going on with Wall Street, thanks to Musk's $8 BlueTick.

Eli Lilly stock drops after fake "Fee Insulin" Tweet
Lockheed Martin and other companies look billions in Twitter Blue chaos

The Stock Market is volatile right now, with a single Tweet from a False BlueTick sending investors into immediate Sell-Offs. I'm not sure how long the trick will keep working, but right now the Trolls seem to be winning.

I don't know if Musk's mass LayOffs made this easier, because there's not enough people to verify who's actually paying that $8, or if there's collusion in the Twitter ranks, but it's a perfect storm for Trolls and Cons. Musk is going to be paying for this out the nose as well.

[bilateralrope]

Musk's plan was always for the Twitter Blue subscription to go without any verification. It went exactly as everyone except Musk predicted.

As for how much liability Twitter has here, I have doubts. Once people are aware that the blue checkmark can no longer be trusted, the stock prices should recover from the lies. Making it harder to argue that the lies caused harm. Any uncomfortable (for the company) truths that were made widely known will still have an effect. But telling the truth, especially a truth that was public knowledge but not widely known, is not something that can be sued over.

So all that's left is if someone was intentionally manipulating stock prices. Which isn't impossible, but someone will need to prove that a specific person was manipulating stock instead of just trolling.

[Adam Reynolds]

These blue checked Twitter parody accounts are truly the greatest source of comedy I have seen in a long time. Here are most of the highlights I have seen:

• Lockheed Martin stated that they would be halting weapons sales to Saudi Arabia, Israel, and the United States pending further investigations into their records of human rights abuses.
• Eli Lily tweeted that insulin is now going to be free.
• Coca-Cola said they would put cocaine back if they got 1000 retweets, while Pepsi tweeted that Coke is better
• AIPAC said that they love apartheid
• OJ Simpson confessed to the murder.
• Nestle bragged about stealing your water and selling it back to you.
• Chiquita apologized for the fake account and said that they haven't actually overthrown any democracies since 1954.
• Jesus responded to a tweet from CNN questioning the assumption that he was fake. Oddly enough the other message of his is more or less accurate, in which he said that prayers are meaningless without action.
• BYU tweeted that their checkmark is as legitimate as the LDS church, and they leave us to figure out what that means. They also stated that they know Brigham Young was racist and don't care.
• George W. Bush stated that he missed killing Iraqis and then Tony Blair agreed with him.
• Telsa delivered breaking news that a second Roadster hit the World Trade Center and that they would be donating 10,000 Teslas to Ukraine to serve as advanced explosive devices. They were also bragging about Musk killing CA's high speed rail and stated that they only hit pedestrians after testing it in a simulation first, noting that they do not respect school speed limits. Finally they tweeted an image of survivorship bias when talking about how good their collision survival ratings are.
• SpaceX was saying they'll be ceasing all missions and donating their outstanding subsidies to sustainable agriculture because we can't look to other planets to save us and confessed that Mars was too far away to reach. They also stated that they really don't know why they received billions in government subsidies to do the same thing NASA has already been doing for decades. They then admitted that this all started because Elon heard that his dick would be bigger on Mars.
• Rudy Guliani talked about being stuck on his back like a turtle after being pushed over by George Soros and complimented Nancy Pelosi's thighs
• Ben Shapiro, Ted Cruz, and Joe Biden all made various sexual comments. Ben Shapiro also clarified that the difference between sex and gender was that he never wanted to have a gender with his sister.
• The Washington State Department of Natural resources tweeted that the Twitter wildfire is at 44 billon acres and 0% contained.

The best part is that people who bought them are looking to cancel with Paypal or their credit card companies. The ultimate irony of PayPal helping people cancel their payments to Elon Musk just adds a layer of comedy on top of this.

[Elfdart]

Matt Seybold has an interesting theory about what Elon Musk is up to:

Turning Twitter into AM radio*: an open sewer for fundies, incels and fascists to do circlejerks as normies and regular advertisers flee like mice from a burning attic.

LINK

Seems plausible, except it gives Musk credit for business savvy that he hasn't shown so far.

* For about 20 years, the main advertisers on AM radio are hucksters peddling self-help pablum, gold coin scams, fake hair growth pills, fake weight loss pills and fake boner pills, with a sprinkling of a few local shops taking advantage of low ad rates.

[Elfdart]

These blue checked Twitter parody accounts are truly the greatest source of comedy I have seen in a long time. Here are most of the highlights I have seen:

• Lockheed Martin stated that they would be halting weapons sales to Saudi Arabia, Israel, and the United States pending further investigations into their records of human rights abuses.
• Eli Lily tweeted that insulin is now going to be free.
• Coca-Cola said they would put cocaine back if they got 1000 retweets, while Pepsi tweeted that Coke is better
• AIPAC said that they love apartheid
• OJ Simpson confessed to the murder.
• Nestle bragged about stealing your water and selling it back to you.
• Chiquita apologized for the fake account and said that they haven't actually overthrown any democracies since 1954.
• Jesus responded to a tweet from CNN questioning the assumption that he was fake. Oddly enough the other message of his is more or less accurate, in which he said that prayers are meaningless without action.
• BYU tweeted that their checkmark is as legitimate as the LDS church, and they leave us to figure out what that means. They also stated that they know Brigham Young was racist and don't care.
• George W. Bush stated that he missed killing Iraqis and then Tony Blair agreed with him.
• Telsa delivered breaking news that a second Roadster hit the World Trade Center and that they would be donating 10,000 Teslas to Ukraine to serve as advanced explosive devices. They were also bragging about Musk killing CA's high speed rail and stated that they only hit pedestrians after testing it in a simulation first, noting that they do not respect school speed limits. Finally they tweeted an image of survivorship bias when talking about how good their collision survival ratings are.
• SpaceX was saying they'll be ceasing all missions and donating their outstanding subsidies to sustainable agriculture because we can't look to other planets to save us and confessed that Mars was too far away to reach. They also stated that they really don't know why they received billions in government subsidies to do the same thing NASA has already been doing for decades. They then admitted that this all started because Elon heard that his dick would be bigger on Mars.
• Rudy Guliani talked about being stuck on his back like a turtle after being pushed over by George Soros and complimented Nancy Pelosi's thighs
• Ben Shapiro, Ted Cruz, and Joe Biden all made various sexual comments. Ben Shapiro also clarified that the difference between sex and gender was that he never wanted to have a gender with his sister.
• The Washington State Department of Natural resources tweeted that the Twitter wildfire is at 44 billon acres and 0% contained.

The best part is that people who bought them are looking to cancel with Paypal or their credit card companies. The ultimate irony of PayPal helping people cancel their payments to Elon Musk just adds a layer of comedy on top of this.

Supposedly, Eli Lily's stock value dropped by a third because of this. Fuck 'em.

[Solauren]

Matt Seybold has an interesting theory about what Elon Musk is up to:

Turning Twitter into AM radio*: an open sewer for fundies, incels and fascists to do circlejerks as normies and regular advertisers flee like mice from a burning attic.

LINK

Seems plausible, except it gives Musk credit for business savvy that he hasn't shown so far.

* For about 20 years, the main advertisers on AM radio are hucksters peddling self-help pablum, gold coin scams, fake hair growth pills, fake weight loss pills and fake boner pills, with a sprinkling of a few local shops taking advantage of low ad rates.

More likely it's going to be an unintended side-effect then an actual goal.

[Zaune]

Matt Seybold has an interesting theory about what Elon Musk is up to:

Turning Twitter into AM radio*: an open sewer for fundies, incels and fascists to do circlejerks as normies and regular advertisers flee like mice from a burning attic.

LINK

Seems plausible, except it gives Musk credit for business savvy that he hasn't shown so far.

* For about 20 years, the main advertisers on AM radio are hucksters peddling self-help pablum, gold coin scams, fake hair growth pills, fake weight loss pills and fake boner pills, with a sprinkling of a few local shops taking advantage of low ad rates.

I don't see how that demonstrates "business savvy" if it was intentional, because if AM radio is the correct comparison then we also have to include the part where demand is steadily shrinking and it's likely to disappear entirely in a few years. (Even if that's at least as much to do with the underlying technology being superseded than bad management by the stations, this is far from a perfect analogy.)

[Adam Reynolds]

LINK

Seems plausible, except it gives Musk credit for business savvy that he hasn't shown so far.

In the comments under this post, someone noted that for a creative accountant Musk has good rockets and AI chips. Sadly this seems to show that the bullshit filter hasn't yet worn off.

[Adam Reynolds]

Apparently Twitter laid off 4400 of its 5500 contractors yesterday. Most contractors are learning of this when they suddenly have their access revoked with no warning. One manager noted that a contractors was deactivated without notice in the middle of critical changes to child safety workflows. One contractor only learned about this by reading a post about the issue on Twitter and then trying to log in.

Source: https://twitter.com/CaseyNewton/status/ ... 2076858371

This comment is also excellent:

"People are starting to say Elon Musk isn't actually a real engineer. But he definitely said "I don't know why people think Twitter is so complicated. I could fix it in like a weekend." And then proceeded to fuck everything up. That's exactly like an engineer."

More accurately it is exactly like the engineering and science trained "quants" who caused the financial crisis.

[Zaune]

In the comments under this post, someone noted that for a creative accountant Musk has good rockets and AI chips. Sadly this seems to show that the bullshit filter hasn't yet worn off.

The AI chips part is wrong on more than one level but SpaceX does appear to be slightly less of a shitshow than Twitter and even Tesla, I'll give them that much.

[LaCroix]

So far - Elon made some Profit by finding some e-car and space nerds, and giving them a playground.
He started off by being a rich son of a mining mogul - in south africa. Let's consider his idea about how one should treat employees under this viewpoint.

Tesla is not really a commercial success, more of a stock market success... it took them 17 years to start making a profit - it now makes 3 billion from a 200 billion (340 at the beginning of the year before people finally startet to realize the scam) worth - so barely above 1 percent profit on the years average... fucking insane that the company still exists. They are only kept afloat by energy credit sales, afaik...

Most of the success in spaceX is due to forcing/tricking people to burn themselves out for him in atrocious work conditions, where sleep is considered a form of mutiny. Only worked because the people were desperate to work in the field, and since there are only a few positions at government agencies, they were willing to "pay" for the privillege. But still - it worked DESPITE Elon managing the operation, not because of him...

What has he so far promised to do in the last 10 years?

He then promised a vacuumtuberail - which never materialized, because anyone with a brain would know that the idea was ludicrouly stupid, that's why it was already abandoned in the 1900s.

A subway highspeed tunnel - that never materialized, because it was just as stupid.

Better, faster tunnel boring - and then made a 3m hole instead of a standard 6m one, and still took just as long and the same cost to dig it, if not more...

A cybertruck - that has never been built by an actual factory, but only a few made by hand.
A robot - which evolved from a guy in spandex into a shuffling bot that showed no interaction with its surroundings in a full year of throwing money at it.
A tesla 3, which is according to German Servicetechs, would fail road legality within less than the warranty period, because of shitty components.
(Only if the battery does not blow up before that.)

I am still kind of at the fence regarding Starlink, as it really does not seem to be profitable idea, since most areas that use a lot of internet have cheaper infrastructure, and the ones that don't do not have the money to pay for starlink... But I am willing to wait on the jury for that one.

The factory in Germany, which he was laughing about might be stricken by water shortage would be impossible because it has just rained a bit, recently, and promptly had issues with excactly that?

This year, he has lost kind of 500 million dollars a day at Tesla, and now is complaining about 4 million a day at Twitter?

He bought a company that made less than 300 million a year on average, and put a 1 billion a year interest loan on the books.
Immediately alienates the Advertizers and actively insults and threathens them.
Trying to charge 8$ a pop for blue? There is less than a million people who would "need" blue.

Then thinks he can solve the issue by firing staff to make up the cost?
Clear billionaire thinking - beliving that everyone has an insane salary like he has.

It is clearly obvious that this person has NO idea what he is doing and only had some success by exploiting motivated people available at the time, who already had an idea about wht they were doing. But whenever he tries one of his ideas, it went up in flames, spectaculary, like... a Tesla...

[bilateralrope]

A robot - which evolved from a guy in spandex into a shuffling bot that showed no interaction with its surroundings in a full year of throwing money at it.

It's like Musk had never seen the videos of Boston Dynamics robots.

As for Teslas, there were three stories around the end of last year and the start of this one that made me decide that I will never purchase a Tesla:
- Tesla allowing people to play games or watch movies on the cars center console while the car is in motion. Which, according to Musk, wasn't illegal because Tesla said the driver wasn't allowed to use it.
- Musk tweeting about the cars being able to make fart noises at pedestrians
- Teslas intentionally performing illegal rolling stop manoeuvres when set to assertive mode.

In all three cases, the NHTSA said that those things were illegal because of safety concerns, and Tesla backed down. Leaving an impression of a company that is going to keep adding illegal and dangerous functionality to the car via software updates.


A Twitter manager says laid-off engineers he's rehired are 'weak, lazy, unmotivated'

Business Insider US
Sam Tabahriti
13 Nov

• A Twitter manager described laid-off engineers he rehired as "weak, lazy, unmotivated."
• A screenshot of what appeared to be Slack messages has circulated on the Blind app.
• A source confirmed the manager worked for Twitter and said his comments sparked much internal debate.

A Twitter manager who rehired engineers after they lost their jobs in the recent mass layoffs appeared to criticise them on the company's internal messaging system.

A screenshot of the comments made by the senior director of engineering was posted by another Twitter worker on the anonymous forum Blind. They read: "This is going to be the challenge. The engineers I am bringing back are weak, lazy, unmotivated, and they may even be against an Elon Twitter."

"They were cut for a reason, so we need to think of these people as just needing to be around until the knowledge transition is completed," the manager continued.

A source at Twitter who spoke on condition of anonymity confirmed the manager's identity to Insider. The individual's LinkedIn profile showed that they had worked for Twitter since 2013.

The manager has been contacted for comment by Insider.

The comments have sparked much internal debate on Slack, according to Insider's source.

A screenshot of the messages also circulated online, which was also shared by data journalist Joshua Byrd.

The managing editor of the tech-and-democracy focused newsletter Platformer, Zoë Schiffer, tweeted that she had confirmed the manager did work at Twitter but later deleted her tweet saying: "I don't think naming someone at his level is necessary (not because the screenshot isn't real)."

Insider also surveyed Blind, a forum where employees can hold anonymous conversations, and found a post asking users whether they thought Elon Musk would take action following the manager's comments.

Of 157 responses, 60 thought Musk would promote the manager, 56 thought he would do nothing and 41 said he would fire the individual.

Musk fired half Twitter's workforce after taking control, but a few days later some employees were already asked to come back.

Twitter didn't immediately respond to a request for comment by Insider.

Sounds like this manager is surprised that firing someone, then rehiring them, really hurts employee motivation. He's probably going to be really surprised when those engineers suddenly quit because they found a new job.

[bilateralrope]

Musk trolls senator demanding answers on Twitter fake-account scandal

“Selling the truth is dangerous and unacceptable."
ASHLEY BELANGER - 11/15/2022, 7:53 AM

Unlike brands like Nintendo and Eli Lilly, Senator Ed Markey (D-Mass.) knew who was behind the parody account recently impersonating the lawmaker on Twitter. Washington Post reporter Geoffrey Fowler had asked permission to create the fake Markey account, part of the reporter’s quest to see how hard it could really be to impersonate a public official under Elon Musk’s new paid verification system.

What Fowler found was that it wasn’t hard at all to launch a fake Markey account. As soon as Fowler confirmed the ease with which any public official could be impersonated, an outraged Markey used his real Twitter account to call out Musk for allowing the impersonation because he favors “putting profits over people and his debt over stopping disinformation.”

Musk took almost two days to respond to Markey, opting to troll the Senator rather than take the complaint seriously.

“Perhaps it is because your real account sounds like a parody?” Musk tweeted.

The fake Markey account has been taken down, but that clearly did not settle the matter, and now Musk poking fun at the senator could have consequences that go beyond a tweet thread.

Markey has chosen to wield a bigger platform than the one Musk owns to compel answers from Musk on the fake account fiasco of the past week. Attached to Markey’s tweet was an official letter the senator wrote to Musk, demanding that Musk provide answers to Markey's key questions about Twitter by the day after Thanksgiving. Some of Markey's questions are ones that everyone has been wondering since Musk’s Twitter Blue rollout failed so spectacularly that it had to be paused.

Markey’s list of questions for Musk includes an attempt to get details on how exactly the paid-for blue checkmark verification differs from the original verification process. Also, perhaps more importantly, he asks Musk if the paid verification system will be coming back.

What Markey really wants to know is whether Twitter ever had some sort of internal process planned to distinguish between fake accounts and real ones. If Musk says that they did, Markey wants to know why The Post reporter was able to create a fake account in spite of those processes. If Musk says they did not, Markey wants to know if any new verification system that Musk has plans to reintroduce will have an internal process to prevent fake accounts from ever getting that deceptive blue tick.

Markey’s letter asks Musk to respond by November 25, reminding Musk that “[a]llowing an imposter to impersonate a US Senator on Twitter is a serious matter that you need to address promptly.”

Markey did not immediately respond to Ars’ request for comment, and Twitter’s communications department has reportedly been shuttered.

Markey adds to scrutiny on Musk’s Twitter deal

After Musk’s flippant response to Markey’s call out, Markey pushed back, tweeting, “One of your companies is under an FTC consent decree. Auto safety watchdog NHTSA is investigating another for killing people. And you’re spending your time picking fights online. Fix your companies. Or Congress will.”

In his letter, Markey said that Musk’s changes to Twitter verification risks undermining “the ability for users to be critical consumers of news and information on the platform, including from public officials,” which risks “the spread of disinformation.”

As Markey pointed out, Musk already faces federal scrutiny from the FTC, and last week, US President Joe Biden suggested that Musk’s Twitter purchase “is worthy of being looked at,” due to national security concerns over Musk’s ties to foreign countries. Ruffling Markey’s feathers doesn’t seem to do Musk any favors as scrutiny compounds—especially since Markey sits on the Senate Commerce committee and already has a reputation as a formidable tech industry watchdog.

“Twitter must explain”

Like many Twitter users, Markey assumes that Musk misunderstands what the blue checkmark meant to Twitter users. It wasn’t some sort of coveted status symbol, Markey reminded Musk in his letter, so much as an indication to users that they could trust an account was truly run by the notable figure depicted in the bio. Responding to scrutiny from Twitter users and advertisers, Musk took some steps to stop people from “tricking” Twitter users. He's paused paid verification and announced that soon “Twitter will enable organizations to identify which other Twitter accounts are actually associated with them."

But to critics like Markey, the damage has already been done: Twitter's reputation as a reliable information source is tarnished, and confidence in Musk has plummeted. For now, Markey views Twitter as a “breeding ground for manipulation and deceit,” thanks to Musk’s “lax verification.” For Musk to actually move past the chaos caused by fake accounts from the past week, Markey has asked Musk to answer to Congress and acknowledge any mistakes made during his rushed rollout of Twitter Blue.

“Apparently, due to Twitter’s lax verification practices and apparent need for cash, anyone could pay $8 and impersonate someone on your platform,” Markey complained to Musk in his letter. “Selling the truth is dangerous and unacceptable. Twitter must explain how this happened and how it will prevent it from happening again.”

Whether or not Musk will actually respond to the senator is still up in the air. Musk seems to take celebrities’ complaints much more seriously than sitting senators like Markey. When Doja Cat complained that she couldn’t change her display name, Musk responded by promptly looking into the issue on the very same day, earnestly tweeting, “Working on it!” Soon after, Doja Cat could edit her display name, which now says “fart.”

Here are Markey's committee assignments. They include:
- Subcommittee on Communication, Media, and Broadband
- Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, and Data Security
- Subcommittee on Space and Science
- Subcommittee on East Asia, the Pacific, and International Cybersecurity Policy (Chairman)

While those might change with the new senate, those sound like subcommittees that would easily be able to justify looking closer at Musk's businesses. This is the senator Musk decides to pick a Twitter fight with.

This could get fun to watch.

[Dominus Atheos]

Schadenfreude is the best feeling.

https://cheezburger.com/1834759/viral-t ... ing-him-on











My god that man's a dumbass, and I'm loving every minute of it.

[bilateralrope]

Musk ignored Twitter staff’s warning that scammers would abuse paid verification

"Motivated scammers/bad actors could be willing to pay," internal report warned.
JON BRODKIN - 11/16/2022, 7:07 AM

Elon Musk ignored internal warnings from Twitter's trust and safety team when he rolled out his failed paid verification scheme, according to an article co-published by Platformer and The Verge. About a week before the November 9 launch of Musk's revamped Twitter Blue subscription, which gave users who pay $8 per month a blue checkmark even if they weren't previously verified, the trust and safety team circulated "a seven-page list of recommendations intended to help Musk avoid the most obvious and damaging consequences of his plans for Blue," the article said.

"Motivated scammers/bad actors could be willing to pay... to leverage increased amplification to achieve their ends where their upside exceeds the cost," the document said. This warning was "labeled 'P0' to denote a concern in the highest risk category," the Platformer/Verge article said.

Detailing another P0 risk, the trust and safety team warned the paid checkmarks could lead to "impersonation of world leaders, advertisers, brand partners, election officials, and other high-profile individuals... Legacy verification provides a critical signal in enforcing impersonation rules, the loss of which is likely to lead to an increase in impersonation of high-profile accounts on Twitter."

The problems Twitter employees warned of arose quickly after the Twitter Blue rollout, as scammers eagerly paid $8 for checkmarks that made it easy to impersonate prominent accounts. Musk halted the paid verification scheme after only two days, although Musk said it would "probably" be reinstated by the end of next week.

Musk seeks revenue as advertisers flee

Musk is aiming to make Twitter Blue a major source of revenue, with paid verification as the major draw for people who wouldn't otherwise subscribe. "We need roughly half of our revenue to be subscription," he reportedly told employees in an email last week.

A Twitter help page says users who "receive the blue checkmark as part of a Twitter Blue subscription will not undergo review to confirm that they meet the active, notable and authentic criteria that was used in the previous process." Despite the lack of vetting, accounts that paid for Twitter Blue were denoted as "Verified accounts" when clicking on the user profile's checkmark.

Some big companies stopped advertising on Twitter even before the paid-verification rollout, causing what Musk called "a massive drop in revenue." After his paid-verification scheme led to a new rash of official-looking fake accounts, Musk said a forthcoming feature would help corporations avoid impersonation. "Rolling out soon, Twitter will enable organizations to identify which other Twitter accounts are actually associated with them," he wrote Sunday.

The internal report prepared before the paid-verification rollout "offers a wish list for features that would make the product safer and easier to use, most of which have not been approved," the Platformer/Verge article said. The internal report also warned, "Removing privileges and exemptions from legacy verified accounts could cause confusion and loss of trust among high profile users."

The Musk-led Twitter did adopt the trust and safety team's recommendation to use an "Official" badge to identify some high-profile accounts, regardless of whether they paid for a verification checkmark. But Musk pulled the Official label just hours after it launched, the same day the Twitter Blue changes took effect.

Sounds like Musk was the only person who wasn't expecting the blue checkmark subscription to be flooded with impersonators.

I doubt anyone who warned him will waste their time trying the next time he proposes something stupid, even if he hasn't fired them yet.

[bobalot]

Over the years, I have gotten into a number of debates with friends and colleagues by pointing out that Musk is not Tony Starkesque genius but a clown that panders to the internet with shitty memes and his ideas like hyperloop are completely unworkable.

His memeing his way into buying Twitter, offering to pay too much for Twitter, trying to unsuccessfully pull out of the sale and then destroying the company with his own idoicy is just perfect.

[bilateralrope]

Elon Musk demands Twitter staff commit to ‘long hours’ or leave: Read the email

PUBLISHED WED, NOV 16 20228:17 AM ESTUPDATED 2 HOURS AGO
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Lora Kolodny
@LORAKOLODNY

New Twitter CEO and sole director Elon Musk sent a companywide email to Twitter employees on Wednesday, demanding they commit to working “long hours.”
The companywide ultimatum, sent around midnight San Francisco time and shared with CNBC, comes after Musk has already fired key Twitter executives, laid off half of Twitter’s full-time employees and slashed the number of contractors working with the company without notice.

New Twitter
CEO and sole director Elon Musk sent a companywide email to remaining employees of the social media business on Wednesday, demanding they commit to working “long hours at high intensity” or receive “three months of severance,” if they did not consent to these conditions, or support his vision for “Twitter 2.0.”

The companywide ultimatum, sent around midnight in San Francisco time and shared with CNBC, comes after Musk has already fired key Twitter executives, laid off half of Twitter’s full-time employees, and slashed the number of contractors working with the company without notice. This week, he also fired veteran engineers at Twitter after they criticized him in public, or in the company’s internal Slack channels.

Since Musk, who’s also CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, took over Oct. 28, he has announced sweeping changes planned for Twitter. One change that he insisted the company roll out quickly, called Twitter Blue verification, had to be rescinded, however.

The $7.99/month Blue subscription service allowed people to pay for a blue check mark that looked like the mark previously reserved to show an account was verified or official.

A deluge of impersonators bought the paid subscriber checkmarks to pose as legitimate celebrities, brands and politicians, and in some cases, they posted false information about companies.

For example, accounts impersonated the multinational drug company Eli Lilly
. One impersonator caused a serious problem when they tweeted, “we are excited to announce insulin is free now.” The tweet remained on the social media platform for hours before it was taken down. The real Eli Lilly account later tweeted: “We apologize to those who have been served a misleading message from a fake Lilly account.”

Eli Lilly’s stock price dropped sharply after the false message was posted, and the company has decided to suspend advertising on Twitter indefinitely.

Musk now plans a revised Twitter Blue Verified release on Nov. 29.

Here’s the full email that Elon Musk sent to Twitter employees on Wednesday (transcribed by CNBC):

From: Elon Musk

To: Team [at Twitter]

Subj. A Fork in the Road

Date: Nov. 16, 2022 [time stamp removed]

Going forward, to build a breakthrough Twitter 2.0 and succeed in an increasingly competitive world, we will need to be extremely hardcore. This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade.

Twitter will also be much more engineering-driven. Design and product management will still be very important and report to me, but those writing great code will constitute the majority of our team and have the greatest sway.

At its heart, Twitter is a software and servers company, so l think this makes sense.

If you are sure that you want to be part of the new Twitter, please click yes on the link below:

[Link removed]

Anyone who has not done so by 5pm ET tomorrow (Thursday) will receive three months of severance.

Whatever decision you make, thank you for your efforts to make Twitter successful.

Elon

Looks like Musk doesn't want anyone working for him if they are good enough to find a job elsewhere.

The result of that decision will surprise nobody except Musk.

[EnterpriseSovereign]

I wonder how many employees will react with "Bye, Felicia"?