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Twitter Set to Lose 32 Million Users, as Musk’s Reign of Chaos Continues [1]

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Date: 2022-12-14

Elon Musk has been thought of as a genius for as long as he has been in the public consciousness. Blinded by his wealth, the media has largely ignored the very obvious flaws in this narrative. The media has ignored the fact that he does not have a physics degree, did not found Tesla, and that he has a history of lying . Perhaps the biggest lie is that he is a greater founder, or business leader. Yet, even Musk, in his text messages , admits to being a bad manager. He is not just a bad manager, he is a man without a plan. It is hard to believe, because we assume that he cannot possibly be an agent of chaos, if you like, and be the CEO of Tesla, SpaceX and now Twitter. Those of us who cautioned that his purchase of Twitter would descend into chaos have been proved right. A recent report warns that Twitter could lose as many as 32 million users globally, over the next two years. Musk’s fans continue to assert that he has a big plan -we’re just not smart enough to see it-. The truth is, Musk is killing Twitter.

Musk’s text messages should have warned his fans that he has absolutely no idea what he is doing. His messages show a man who flitters from one bad idea to another, constantly changes his mind, throws tantrums, and believes he is always right. Aided by other wealthy people, people who are invested in believing that wealth is a result of genius and hard work, he is constantly told that he is the g)word, a genius. Yet, his actions so far have pushed Twitter further into trouble.

The biggest decision he has taken is regarding the slashing of Twitter's staff. The narrative from fans is that he is gutting Twitter of all the lazy, liberal censors of free speech. With a smaller team of committed staff, he will be able to save Twitter. However, there is an obvious problem with this: the waferthin staff that remain cannot possibly cope with all the content moderation decisions that need to be made, and all the demands to keep the infrastructure working optimally. They can sleep at Twitter HQ all they like, but there is a hrd, biological limit to what they can do. Content moderation decisions can’t be delegated to AI, either. Here’s an example: a person could sarcastically say they love some policy, say, the killing of Martians. That may be in bad taste, but the person is not spreading hate speech, instead, they are using sarcasm to show their disapproval of a hateful policy. AI just isn’t good at figuring stuff like that out.

OK, I hear you, Musk is in it for “humanity”, and he wants to restore free speech. Well, that hits against another brick wall: users don’t want a free-for-all hellascape, something which he himself admitted. So if he can’t maintain content moderation standards, he will not just drive away users, he will drive away advertisers, advertisers who do not want to be associated with the free-for-all hellascape that he is intentionally or unintentionally creating. The result is, whether he likes it or not, he will lose more users and advertisers, further pushing Twitter toward bankruptcy.

Since he took over, he has not shown that he has any clue how to turn Twitter’s fortunes around. Instead, he has displayed a remarkable ability to make things worse. We should start asking if Twitter will be around five years from now.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/12/14/2141857/-Twitter-Set-to-Lose-32-Million-Users-as-Musk-s-Reign-of-Chaos-Continues

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