- cross-posted to:
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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
I’m not sure if this is technically Technology news, but I can remove this post if it’s in the wrong community
Archive link: http://archive.today/3XM6s
Musk brought up the idea of charging all users of X/Twitter during a wide-ranging conversation focused on AI that featured Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday. “[We’re] moving to a small monthly payment for use of the X system,” Musk told Netanyahu, claiming that it is the only way to eliminate the problem of bots, as reported by Bloomberg’s Dave Lee.
Musk didn’t mention timing of his plan to charge X/Twitter users, nor did he say how much it would cost.
Musk, who also is CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has said X/Twitter ad sales have plunged 50% since he bought the company. “We’re still negative cash flow, due to ~50% drop in advertising revenue plus heavy debt load,” Musk posted on July 15.
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One of the richest people in the entire world wants still more money. Tell me again how “trickle-down economics” works?
Ok, I loathe the man, hate the shit show he’s made TwitX, think he’s a clown, generally hate billionaires, etc. But this is kinda a really stupid comment.
Hi @ripcord, we have one rule on Beehaw - “Be(e) nice”. In the future, please be respectful of other users when posting in Beehaw communities. Thanks!
You’re right, I could definitely have written this in a more respectful, constructive way.
No, see, it’s like an inverted pyramid, and the little our overlords permit us of the product of our labor trickles down to them, you see.
He’s the wealthiest man in the world. That doesn’t mean he has a lair full of cash and just wants more. People really struggle to understand the difference between wealth and money in the bank. This isn’t about hoarding money just for the sake of it.
You aren’t going to tell me Musk doesn’t have some cash laying around.
Is he just supposed to pay for the running of twitter out of his pocket or what? It says there they’ve lost 50% of advertisers, and are making negative profit. That isn’t sustainable. The purchase of twitter has cost him 40-something billion, and still keeps costing him even more. It’s not about just wanting more profit, but to atleast break even.
It’s a self inflicted wound. Can’t bring myself to care.
I understand the difference, but he’s collecting stuff just because it’s shiny. He’s short of cash because he has no impulse control, and I fail to see why he shouldn’t fail the same way other people who overextend themselves fail.
What makes you think he’s short on cash? Wealthy people don’t store their wealth in cash anyways. The money is tied to the stocks of the companies they’re running. That’s why he needed to lend the money for twitter too; he doesn’t have that kind of cash, but people are willing to borrow it to him because of his wealth.
If you just had read the article you’d see that they have lost 50% of the advertisers and are losing money. This isn’t about wanting more money just for the sake of it. No company can exist if their finances are on the negative.
And yet here they are…
What are you saying?
I fucking dare him to follow through. Please do it. Don’t wuss out Elon!
Should we all go make twitter accounts and say how great of an idea this is?
Yes! Absolutely!
Of COURSE Musk is buddying up with Bibi. He’s really leaning hard into the evil persona.
This is one way to finally get rid of Twitter. I wonder if Spez is considering charging for Reddit?
Reddit can still attract advertisers. Twitter, not so much.
He kinda is with the 3pa changes. Just making the devs middlemen
It really feels like a lot of social media platforms are intentionally self-sabotaging themselves. I keep expecting them to die off every time something like this happens, but they appear to continue on regardless.
I think that social media sites actually dying off is actually impossible with enough inertia (even if their base decreases) and that’s why they are emboldened to do such anti-consumer practices.
All this to say that I’m sure Steve Huffman has immediately started furiously texting everyone he knows about his new idea to charge for Reddit as well as a boosted version of Gold called “Alien Orange” or something.
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Even if a social network loses 99,99% of the user base due to charging to use it, those left are the ones that see no problem paying to use it, so they are more likely to eat up some insane pricing, which would help recoup losses from a smaller user base. Basically whales.
I think the only way to try to kill a social network is by going full scorched earth on it. Remove all your comments, or change them to be an annoying copy pasted comment about why you’re getting off the platform. And even then I don’t think it is helpful, I did that with Reddit but was forced to leave technical posts intact because I feared I might prevent someone from solving their issue.
They see no issue paying now.
When there’s no content left they’ll eventually notice it’s a shit deal.
It’s the regenerative braking version of monetizing a website.
It seems silly to not have actual physical brakes on a car and to rely on electric inertia to slow down, it works well in practice. When the pressure starts being applied it may seem like the vehicle is not slowing down but the process of slowing down has begun.
Twitter has had financial brakes applied to it and you just got to wait a little while and it’s either going to slow to a crawl and then stop, a new conductor is going to be put on board, or it’s going to completely derail.
Maybe it’s like when email scammers intentionally leave in tons of spelling and grammar mistakes. Anyone that notices probably wasn’t going to fall for the scam, anyway, leaving only the weak after culling the strong.
I’m not completely sure what the point would be, other than leaving you with a propaganda tool without dissenting comments built in, an idiot echo chamber. Who knows, maybe that’s worth the amount of financial loss he’s caused.
Maybe he’s trying to revert back to Minimal Viable Product while keeping only the dumb and bigoted.
Or maybe he’s just not as smart as everyone thought.
He should totally do it and charge per post as well.
Use unitys model and charge per view, “Your post got 200k views, start paying up! 1 cent per view”
I want to charge Musk every time he makes another asshole announcement about running one of his companies into the ground. Just fuck off, dude.
Like… a cavalry charge? Infantry? Rhinocerii?
I had been thinking “charge” in the financial sense, but now that you mention it, a bunch of rhinos would be much more entertaining!
If you had a nickel for every time musk edged a promising platform closer to worthlessness and destruction you’d have a mother fucking shit ton of nickels.
I hope he buys reddit next
I think he should seriously consider buying Meta so that we can watch it crash and burn just like Xitter. Facebook is the cancer of the internet and it deserves to go too.
Unfortunately, Twitter was only up for sale because it wasn’t able to effectively monetize. On the other hand, Meta has figured out how to make money hand over fist.
I think the easiest route to get Musk to own Meta is if we goaded him + Zuck into a pay per view fist fight over ownership of Meta.
How about we upgrade that to a thunderdome with chainsaws?
Twitter was profitable in the years before covid. They made a net income of $1.2 billion in 2018.
They made a slight (compared to their revenue) loss during the pandemic, presumably because advertisers generally were willing to spend less, but they were still earning more than enough - simply cut a few costs and they’d be profitable again. Or just wait for the market to improve since from the sounds of it they had more than enough savings to ride it out (that appeared to be their plan).
They didn’t sell to Musk because they were desperate, they sold to Musk because he signed a contract guaranteeing he would pay far more than the company was worth. If I owned a house that was worth a million dollars, and someone offered me ten million, hell yeah would I sell that house even if I wasn’t really interested in selling.
Beautiful idea
Musk is an absolute idiot. But I’d rather pay for a system than have it mine me for data. I’m guessing he wants to do both though. Because that’s what he does with Tesla cars.
Yeah, it’s both. Final answer.
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People won’t pay for something that used to be free… OTOH, neither will bot farms.
Either case will end Twitter, so I say go for it!
Fuckin do it, Elon. Double dog dare ya.
I think most people that have checkmarks will.
Especially, the people in social media/politics that talk about the elite/wealthy class.
And the “platform” thus charged, charged right off to another… 😂
Moving to a user supported service IS a good way to cut down on spam and wrest control from advertisers…
…IF you do it before you destroy all value, branding, community and cultural relevance
As so many others have said, this move at this point sounds like he’s trying to finally end this fiasco.
YES!!! DO!!! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-sfG8BV8wU
