Yes, but it's a fair question given my short response so let me clarify. I think you're giving too much oxygen to an absurd theory that Elon may be doing this for altruistic reasons, even if you are pointing it out as a theory and not fully endorsing it yourself. There is nothing remotely altruistic about Elon, and that's ok by the way, pure altruism doesn't move the needle either in solving big societal problems. But Elon's completely lack of humanity and understanding the needs of everyday people, as is the case with many in Silicon Valley, is a big reason why at an aggregate level, tech is causing more problems than its solving IMO. The problem of course is never the tech itself, but how we apply it and our completely inability to restrict ourselves to the helpful applications.
Personally I think we should be celebrating Elon's failures with Twitter not because there is any chance in hell of Twitter's demise leading to less time online, but more because of his recklessness approach to free speech not panning out and looking more and more likely a fringe part of the dark web over time being a positive reflection on humanity.
I'll take back my note on you the author seeming like you are living in the same bubble Elon is, as I do not have nearly enough information to make such an assumption as I do about Elon since he's much more public of course, but I do think you are giving too much air time to an insane theory that makes Elon look like a hero here when he's clearly not.
I like where you're going with it but I disagree. Elon isn't killing Twitter because he wants to kill it. It's just in a transformative stage. They're trying a bunch of things super publicly and that's amplifying all of the things that don't work. Ironically a lot of that is because those discussions are sourced from Twitter.
He's also not a god, he's just a really smart and determined guy. He probably doesn't know what the hell is going on inside the chaos like anyone else.
For what it’s worth, I’d love to have a place on Notes that combines long form with more connections with people. The things that made Twitter great were (1) comments and original post were on the same visual playing field, and (2) anyone could reply, so famous and regular people could interact. Those two things, combined with enough density of interesting people, created unexpected but interesting conversations. We’ll see if anyone can replicate that magic...
I'm not so certain that Twitter is _dying_, it's just changing (after years of total stasis), and maybe those changes will be fatal, or maybe they won't. I think they're incentivizing the wrong things so I don't have my hopes up, but I mostly only follow tech, programming, and design people and my experience hasn't changed much.
Anyway, after your satire bit I agree with you that I like my brain without Twitter, but I do get genuine value from the content and that's the first thing I miss whenever I take a break. Programming tips. A new frontend library. My favorite product announcing a new feature. An endorsement of a Substack post by an author I don't follow. Another good Barbie movie meme. Architecture photos. A banger Medlock thread about taxes. More design screenshots. That's basically my interest graph, and Twitter is still the only place delivering that.
So I'm more interested in experiments with the _interest graph_ than the social graph. The Threads feed is basically built on social + status right now and it's painfully boring. I'd love something with, say, the frequency of Morning Brew and the variety, personalization, and short-form format of Twitter.(Nuzzel was kind of like this! RIP.) I don't know where the content would come from, though — today it could be Twitter, but no sane developer would build anything new on the Twitter API right now. Maybe the format and the value are inseparable, I don't know.
Super bad take. Who cares about facts or data? Downloads have surged retention from d1 to d30 appreciably higher since takeover. But sure let’s just spread false narratives. Packy disappointed in you.
This is such a pathetic attempt to defend Elon, as if the toxicity and time spent on Twitter is not just gonna shift elsewhere. Not surprised coming from a diehard Elon fanboy, but hoping others are smart enough to see the obvious: Elon's ego and arrogance led him to making a poor business decision in purchasing Twitter in the first place, and poor management decisions with what he's done with it since. He lives in very tiny bubble and is completely clueless to the true societal needs of everyday people, as seems to be the case with the author of this post.
Elon bought twitter for the IP. He will use it to make self driving cars reality. You tell your car where you want to go, the car follows hashtags (what3words or long and lat) along the route, all cars posts to the hashtag if they want warn or coordinate
twitter engagement has fallen off a cliff. anyone with any shred of credibility is leaving the platform in droves. twitter is a cesspool for nazis and a breeding ground for incels. twitter is absolutely dying according to every key metric and sentiment.
You're going to a lot of bother to show how much you dislike the fact that Elon restored free speech (or something close to it) to Twitter. Do us, and yourself, a favor and leave it. You think it's dying - escape now, while you still can!
Twitter clearly doesn't deserve you, and I hear the weather on Threads is nice.
helluva long walk to get to end of that pier... gotta appreciate your dedication to the bit!
👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼
coulda stopped at flowcharts, but hell to the NAH, u took it ALL THE WAY to 50,000 words.
damn impressive
💪🏽🔥🚀
this was your dumbest one yet! definitely a waste of words. happens to the best of us & yes, i did read the post.
Yes, but it's a fair question given my short response so let me clarify. I think you're giving too much oxygen to an absurd theory that Elon may be doing this for altruistic reasons, even if you are pointing it out as a theory and not fully endorsing it yourself. There is nothing remotely altruistic about Elon, and that's ok by the way, pure altruism doesn't move the needle either in solving big societal problems. But Elon's completely lack of humanity and understanding the needs of everyday people, as is the case with many in Silicon Valley, is a big reason why at an aggregate level, tech is causing more problems than its solving IMO. The problem of course is never the tech itself, but how we apply it and our completely inability to restrict ourselves to the helpful applications.
Personally I think we should be celebrating Elon's failures with Twitter not because there is any chance in hell of Twitter's demise leading to less time online, but more because of his recklessness approach to free speech not panning out and looking more and more likely a fringe part of the dark web over time being a positive reflection on humanity.
I'll take back my note on you the author seeming like you are living in the same bubble Elon is, as I do not have nearly enough information to make such an assumption as I do about Elon since he's much more public of course, but I do think you are giving too much air time to an insane theory that makes Elon look like a hero here when he's clearly not.
Great post, love the thought experiment and the execution!
I like where you're going with it but I disagree. Elon isn't killing Twitter because he wants to kill it. It's just in a transformative stage. They're trying a bunch of things super publicly and that's amplifying all of the things that don't work. Ironically a lot of that is because those discussions are sourced from Twitter.
He's also not a god, he's just a really smart and determined guy. He probably doesn't know what the hell is going on inside the chaos like anyone else.
It’s amazing to me how controversial this question is.
Even in the comments here it’s so polarised.
Some people love to hate Twitter. Some people will continue to defend it.
For what it’s worth, I’d love to have a place on Notes that combines long form with more connections with people. The things that made Twitter great were (1) comments and original post were on the same visual playing field, and (2) anyone could reply, so famous and regular people could interact. Those two things, combined with enough density of interesting people, created unexpected but interesting conversations. We’ll see if anyone can replicate that magic...
I'm not so certain that Twitter is _dying_, it's just changing (after years of total stasis), and maybe those changes will be fatal, or maybe they won't. I think they're incentivizing the wrong things so I don't have my hopes up, but I mostly only follow tech, programming, and design people and my experience hasn't changed much.
Anyway, after your satire bit I agree with you that I like my brain without Twitter, but I do get genuine value from the content and that's the first thing I miss whenever I take a break. Programming tips. A new frontend library. My favorite product announcing a new feature. An endorsement of a Substack post by an author I don't follow. Another good Barbie movie meme. Architecture photos. A banger Medlock thread about taxes. More design screenshots. That's basically my interest graph, and Twitter is still the only place delivering that.
So I'm more interested in experiments with the _interest graph_ than the social graph. The Threads feed is basically built on social + status right now and it's painfully boring. I'd love something with, say, the frequency of Morning Brew and the variety, personalization, and short-form format of Twitter.(Nuzzel was kind of like this! RIP.) I don't know where the content would come from, though — today it could be Twitter, but no sane developer would build anything new on the Twitter API right now. Maybe the format and the value are inseparable, I don't know.
Here’s a contrarian take: Elon made a mistake. It happens to the best of us.
Hi Packy
I love your blog, very intuitive and super smart, but I'm really busy....maybe make it a bit shorter?
PS I hope you're right about Elon killing Twitter, it needs killing.
Super bad take. Who cares about facts or data? Downloads have surged retention from d1 to d30 appreciably higher since takeover. But sure let’s just spread false narratives. Packy disappointed in you.
Twitter is not dying. It’s just that people that expect a certain unified narrative are getting different sides of the same issue now and it’s weird.
They’re just not used to it.
With it you get some annoying extreme views but I’d take that any day over the censored curated neutered timeline I had before.
This is such a pathetic attempt to defend Elon, as if the toxicity and time spent on Twitter is not just gonna shift elsewhere. Not surprised coming from a diehard Elon fanboy, but hoping others are smart enough to see the obvious: Elon's ego and arrogance led him to making a poor business decision in purchasing Twitter in the first place, and poor management decisions with what he's done with it since. He lives in very tiny bubble and is completely clueless to the true societal needs of everyday people, as seems to be the case with the author of this post.
James... did you read the post?
Elon bought twitter for the IP. He will use it to make self driving cars reality. You tell your car where you want to go, the car follows hashtags (what3words or long and lat) along the route, all cars posts to the hashtag if they want warn or coordinate
That is reason he so concerned about capacity
twitter engagement has fallen off a cliff. anyone with any shred of credibility is leaving the platform in droves. twitter is a cesspool for nazis and a breeding ground for incels. twitter is absolutely dying according to every key metric and sentiment.
> twitter engagement has fallen off a cliff
*fake* twitter engagement has fallen off a cliff. elon has done the unthinkable of an internet company. he finally got rid of most of the bots
also, for a lot of people, without the ministry of truth in charge, engagement has actually 10x'ed
this is democracy in action. real people voting on real opinions. not some fake, corrupted propaganda-filled fantasy world
> anyone with any shred of credibility is leaving the platform in droves
anyone *without* a shred of credibility is leaving the platform because without the censors, they're getting fact-checked and ratio-ed into oblivion
You're going to a lot of bother to show how much you dislike the fact that Elon restored free speech (or something close to it) to Twitter. Do us, and yourself, a favor and leave it. You think it's dying - escape now, while you still can!
Twitter clearly doesn't deserve you, and I hear the weather on Threads is nice.