Has Twitter become better or worse since Musk controlled it?

[Kyriakos]

I suspect it would become massively worse. Twitter, up to now anyway, isn't just about news, but to a considerable extent about art, and relatively decentralized in that aspect. Musk is on the news often and controlling twitter will lead (at best) to something like what happened to reddit after the change in ownership (which had political aspects too).

So, this is a poll. I voted for worse. You?

 

[EnglishEdward]

Twitter has the benefit to me of drawing off fruit cases from other places.

I fear that if Elon Musk took over, they would fall out with him, and pollute other places.

I.e. it might make twitter worse and social media worse.

That would probably help lead towards a longer term realignment towards sanity, but that would not necessarily be in my lifetime.

 

[Kyriakos]

The good thing in Twitter (juxtaposed to Facebook or Youtube) is that, in theory, literally anyone can get a trending post.
This has significant market value for independent creators. Centralization would kill the platform.

 

[João III]

Twitter is a place for very left-wing people to express increasingly left-wing views to other left-wing people. Ultimately, it's an echo chamber for a puritanical mob and I can't imagine Musk making it worse than that

 

[Kaitzilla]

If?
It is a matter of when Musk owns Twitter.

He just offered like $50 billion in cash.
Something a peasant like Trump can only dream of doing.

 

[Remorseless1]

Hard to imagine Twitter being worse.

 

[Broken_Erika]

Twitter is for Twits

 

[Gorbles]

Twitter is a place for very left-wing people to express increasingly left-wing views to other left-wing people. Ultimately, it's an echo chamber for a puritanical mob and I can't imagine Musk making it worse than that

This isn't reflective of reality in the slightest, but okay

Voted worse. Dude can barely manage his Tesla product line, nevermind anything else. His greatest success seems to be with SpaceX, which he seems to meddle with the least, possibly because it's the least public-facing venture (compared).

Twitter being as public-facing as it is, I reckon it'll take no time at all for another court case involving Musk calling someone a paedophile.

 

[Snerk]

I like twitter a lot more than Musk so no please.

 

[João III]

This isn't reflective of reality in the slightest, but okay

Not like I support the right-wing politicians on Twitter but it'd be a denial of reality to think Twitter (as a website/app) doesn't skew towards left-wing politics

 

[The_J]

I don't think it's gonna change at all. He's too busy with his other stuff. Okay, we might get an edit button, that yes .

 

[Zelig]

Musk is a putz but Twitter is pretty bad and glacially slow at implementing anything new, so I'd imagine it gets better unless he manages to ruin it in some major way.

 

[Gorbles]

Not like I support the right-wing politicians on Twitter but it'd be a denial of reality to think Twitter (as a website/app) doesn't skew towards left-wing politics

Considering it was the primary platform for at least one major right-wing harassment campaign, which Twitter did very little about, and considering the large gender critical presence that's still happily on it . . . well. I'm not making this about the groups mentioned, I'm just demonstrating the right-of-centre presence that goes back years. All I'm saying is that your claims don't stack up.

I'd say they don't hold up to the evidence but . . . we don't even have any to discuss. Heck, Musk himself seems pretty firmly conservative. Economically at the very least.

Twitter can be, and often is, a cesspool. But there's no overarching political bias to the left. If anything, it's a perfect demonstration of capitalism as policy. The users are the data, the data is its (monetary) evaluation, and most of the things it implements are in service of increasing the value of that data. Which is why high-follower accounts are generally immune to permanent censure even as low-follower accounts are banned for pretty innocuous but technically-rulebreaking Tweets.

 

[Berzerker]

cant be any worse, better if he doesn't censor his critics

 

[João III]

All I'm saying is that your claims don't stack up.

there's no overarching political bias to the left.

Well if you agree with the bias, then you're not going to see the bias.

Per the Pew Research Center,

"The Center’s analysis finds that just 10% of users produced 92% of all tweets from U.S. adults since last November, and that 69% of these highly prolific users identify as Democrats or Democratic-leaning independents."

"Some 60% of Democrats on Twitter describe their political leanings as liberal (with 24% saying they are “very” liberal), compared with 43% among those who are not Twitter users (only 12% of whom say they are very liberal)."

"Minority of U.S. adults on Twitter create bulk of all tweets, and Democrats make up a majority of this highly active group."

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Hard to imagine Twitter being worse.

Or better

Not like I support the right-wing politicians on Twitter but it'd be a denial of reality to think Twitter (as a website/app) doesn't skew towards left-wing politics

Reality also has a left-wing bias.

 

[João III]

Reality also has a left-wing bias.

Not as much as Twitter it would seem:

"52% of U.S. adults identify as Democrats or lean toward the Democratic Party, while 60% of U.S. adult Twitter users say the same"

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Not as much as Twitter it would seem:

"52% of U.S. adults identify as Democrats or lean toward the Democratic Party, while 60% of U.S. adult Twitter users say the same"

Twitter users are younger, more likely to identify as Democrats, more highly educated ...

I rest my case.

 

[Gorbles]

Well if you agree with the bias, then you're not going to see the bias.

Per the Pew Research Center,

"The Center’s analysis finds that just 10% of users produced 92% of all tweets from U.S. adults since last November, and that 69% of these highly prolific users identify as Democrats or Democratic-leaning independents."

"Some 60% of Democrats on Twitter describe their political leanings as liberal (with 24% saying they are “very” liberal), compared with 43% among those who are not Twitter users (only 12% of whom say they are very liberal)."

"Minority of U.S. adults on Twitter create bulk of all tweets, and Democrats make up a majority of this highly active group."

Fun fact. The Democrats would be considered right-wing on a lot of positions here in the UK.

If that's your basis for left-wing bias, I'm afraid I still disagree

 

[Berzerker]

Twitter users are younger, more likely to identify as Democrats, more highly educated ...

I rest my case.

you rested his case