Musk offers to buy Twitter

[Colstan]

This probably won't make y'all feel any better, but Alex Jones won't be back on Twitter.

 

[Eric]

This probably won't make y'all feel any better, but Alex Jones won't be back on Twitter.

View attachment 19505

Even a broken clock is right twice a day.

All of this aside, and regardless of my feeling on Musk, the fact that a single person has the total say over a platform this influential is almost criminal. I didn't like it with Jack Dorsey either but at least he wasn't a maniacal Bond villain. There should be checks, balances and oversight when it comes to something this big. A panel and a system of defined policies should be in place.

 

[Macky-Mac]

So we can expect to bump into not only illegally uploaded regular movies bur probably all manner of stuff that is NSFW and even if that were reported there'd likely be a backlog of reports and probably not many content moderators left working at Twitter by now. Ugh. Uglier and uglier!

perhaps Musk will find a way to monetize posting such stuff

 

[Colstan]

All of this aside, and regardless of my feeling on Musk, the fact that a single person has the total say over a platform this influential is almost criminal. I didn't like it with Jack Dorsey either but at least he wasn't a maniacal Bond villain. There should be checks, balances and oversight when it comes to something this big. A panel and a system of defined policies should be in place.

I've self-banned myself from the politics section, and this is right along the edge of that, but I'll toss in a few thoughts.

I personally don't care about Elon Musk, Twitter, or social media in general. Talked About is all I need, unless I'm feeling masochistic, and visit the other place to get yelled at about the next Mac Pro.

That being said, this all new to us. Not on the scale of a human lifetime, we're here in a blink of an eye, then gone. Life is hard, short, and painful. We should strive to find what enjoyment we can while we're here. Part of that is observing the social experiment that we are witnessing unfold right in front of us. Every time there is a new mass-communication method introduced, it results in substantial societal upheaval. That happened with the radio, telegraph, moving pictures, television, telephone and printing press. Now, we're in the internet era, and connected more than ever.

Evolutionary biologists have done studies on human relationships, and generally speaking, we've evolved to form bonds with roughly 150 individuals. (Some studies say up to 300, but that's still a relatively small number.) That's about the right size for a hunting tribe, which is the proper number to hunt down a mastodon (unrelated to the website mentioned above). That's the way we lived for about 98% of human history. Our brains are adaptable, but not designed to form a gigantic global community of 8 billion people.

We're right at the dawn of this new communication era, barely in its infancy, so we're still learning to crawl. Most likely, none of the current social media platforms we currently use will survive, not in their current form, at least. We're testing the limits of free speech, what's acceptable in the online "public square" and what is verboten. I don't have the answers, and I'm not particularly worried about it, either. This will all calm down, we'll work it out, eventually. It's going to be messy, chaotic, and at times ugly, as it tends to be whenever humans are involved in any endeavor. Still, we find ways to advance, regardless.

So, my suggestion is to not fret the details of Mr. Musk or anyone else in that sphere. It's all ephemeral, as are most things online. I don't know what will come of this, but he is shaking up the current order of things, and testing our limits. If he fails, then he fails, and we'll have learned a bit more about humanity along the way. At least I'd like to thinks so.

That's my personal thoughts on the matter, anyroad.

 

[Renzatic]

I don't know what will come of this, but he is shaking up the current order of things, and testing our limits. If he fails, then he fails, and we'll have learned a bit more about humanity along the way. At least I'd like to thinks so.

That's assuming everything he's doing is due to some preconceived plan. At a casual glance, this looks very much like a publicity stunt/public ego masturbation attempt gone horribly awry.

 

[Herdfan]

Evolutionary biologists have done studies on human relationships, and generally speaking, we've evolved to form bonds with roughly 150 individuals. (Some studies say up to 300, but that's still a relatively small number.) That's about the right size for a hunting tribe, which is the proper number to hunt down a mastodon (unrelated to the website mentioned above). That's the way we lived for about 98% of human history. Our brains are adaptable, but not designed to form a gigantic global community of 8 billion people.

So that's why I hate crowds.

 

[Colstan]

That's assuming everything he's doing is due to some preconceived plan. At a casual glance, this looks very much like a publicity stunt/public ego masturbation attempt gone horribly awry.

I don't assume he had a plan all along. My instinct tells me that this is very much improvised, not necessarily by design, and probably why I don't mind it. If this were a standard corporate acquisition then I wouldn't have given it any attention. It's a disruptive influence in a brand-new field; a completely different level of human interaction. That could work for the better, or worse, but it's different, which makes it interesting.

I get it, people here don't much like Mr. Musk. That's fine. I'm indifferent to him, I don't have much interest in Twitter or his fancy cars. I like his rocket ships and wish he would spend more time on those so that we can get to Mars, and some day, Titan. Remember when most everyone liked him (or at least didn't mind him) because of tech advances? I don't think he's a saint, but I don't see him as the devil, either. He's human, therefore imperfect, as we all are.

So that's why I hate crowds.

That makes two of us.

 

[Eric]

One regret I have about deleting my account was not plugging this site to my followers beforehand, really should've done that.

 

[SuperMatt]

Some Twitter users are saying that when Trump’s account was revived, they were automatically added as followers even though they didn’t follow him before. They had to manually unfollow. Others who had blocked him found he was unblocked.

 

[lizkat]

More Twitter users with substantial followings have actually bailed now and gone over to Mastodon. Jelani Cobb is one of them, wow. He is a one of The New Yorker's writers, and also the dean of Columbia Journalism School. His account is still up at Twitter, although inactive, and he posted an alt address at one of the journalism-oriented Mastodon instances. The guy has like 400k followers. This was put up by a Mastodon member.

​

 

[DT]

OK, fine ...

@MaskedRacerX@mastodon.world

 

[DT]

Side convo:

I think there's an even larger discussion, that there's social media site, that at the very least has people concerned about the future of our country. I guess part of the wake up call from recent events is that this could happen, that there's a (debatable ) valuable global communication system that was a public company, that could just be bought, made private and put under the control of one person.

I suppose that's a different discussion, that there's wealth that allows for this. Heck, it could've just as easily been Bezos, better/worse, he does have a Cock Rocket.

 

[Eric]

I've built a mastodon server, it's definitely a thing to get it all built and there are still some bugs, I don't remember the last time I used a VI editor lol. I'm going to break for a while and work on it some more but I'll keep you guys posted.

BTW the https://joinmastodon.org/ site has been hit and miss all day, I'm guessing they're getting hammered.

 

[lizkat]

Side convo:

I think there's an even larger discussion, that there's social media site, that at the very least has people concerned about the future of our country. I guess part of the wake up call from recent events is that this could happen, that there's a (debatable ) valuable global communication system that was a public company, that could just be bought, made private and put under the control of one person.

I suppose that's a different discussion, that there's wealth that allows for this. Heck, it could've just as easily been Bezos, better/worse, he does have a Cock Rocket.

Another part of the conversation is that it's the concentration of pols, influencers, governments, celebrities, scammers and the more than occasional gone-viral crazy that makes an outfit like Twitter even matter.

Most of the world is not "on" Twitter. Yet mainstream media hang out there all day and relay tweets they find interesting (read: controversial) into the pages of their own papers, websites, blogs, podcasts and TV shows.

So the question becomes this: what does it really mean if Twitter kicks the bucket? Maybe it's all for the better that journos would have to hunt around for awhile to find their favorite sources of clickbait... and pols would have to scout up free media placement on their own.

I don't necessarily agree that the demise of Twitter is a trivial or beneficial thing, since there are a lot of public service outlets and thousands of niche communities on that platform that are useful or fun to be in and enlightening as well, not just traders of stuff that generates clicks or revenue for the monetizers. They will not necessarily all be easy to rebuild elsewhere.

Still, it's interesting to realize that it's the mix of certain types of Twitter members --the gawkers and the peacocks, plus mass media forever hanging out in there waiting to be fed-- that has managed to make the Twitter bubble seem bigger (and louder) than it really is or ever could be to most of the rest of us.

Bottom line, Twitter's very symbiotic existence --and the fact that it has become a kind of one-stop-shop for mass media-- are a part of why pols and political activists and journalists alike can all end up way off the mark in their comprehension of "what's happening" and what potential electorates think about it all.

 

[Colstan]

The most newsworthy thing in this thread is that @DT is a hot rodder. Careful there, chief, we don't want to lose one of our most prolific members to the ugly side of a brick wall.

 

[Hrafn]

View attachment 19518
The most newsworthy thing in this thread is that @DT is a hot rodder. Careful there, chief, we don't want to lose one of our most prolific members to the ugly side of a brick wall.

My youthful co-workers have driven me at 100+ mph in a 55 zone. Unfortunately, I’ve seen cars wrapped around poles on that stretch of road. I’ll be offering to drive from here on out. FTR, I take that road at 60-65, so I’m not yet “grandpa”, and I always yield the right of way to someone faster…

 

[DT]

@lizkat Just terrific analysis.

 

[lizkat]

@lizkat Just terrific analysis.

Thanks.. but I confess to being royally pissed off at Musk, because I have really enjoyed Twitter -- at least the Twitter I was once able to shape to my own assorted purposes. Sure I'm not alone. I won't mind migrating to a Mastodon venue really --as opposed to landing on IG or Pinterest or etc platforms-- but I'll miss the old familiar hangout and ways of scouting up what I wanted from Twitter.

 

[DT]

View attachment 19518
The most newsworthy thing in this thread is that @DT is a hot rodder. Careful there, chief, we don't want to lose one of our most prolific members to the ugly side of a brick wall.

Hahaha, I'd clarify that my "racing" has - well, mostly - been done in sanctioned events, not on the street, take it to the track, there's plenty of opportunities to drive in a controlled environment, that doesn't endanger other people.

Both of these from Roebling Road in Savannah, GA.

 

[DT]

Thanks.. but I confess to being royally pissed off at Musk, because I have really enjoyed Twitter -- at least the Twitter I was once able to shape to my own assorted purposes. Sure I'm not alone. I won't mind migrating to a Mastodon venue really --as opposed to landing on IG or Pinterest or etc platforms-- but I'll miss the old familiar hangout and ways of scouting up what I wanted from Twitter.

Yeah, and I didn't mean to be dismissive in post #992 of the people who would/will miss Twitter for more "personal" use. Connecting with like minded people to discuss, oh I don't know, Picard vs. Kirk, the latest hidden iOS feature, the best microbrewery in New Smyrna Beach, you know, things are that aren't civilization altering, but just brough a lot of folks enjoyment. Feels like those things are sort of lost in the noise of extreme opinion, memes, everything seems to loud and bombastic, and that's a musk-ism that's really invading the platform.