Elon Musk watch (was Elon Muskrat watch)

Where to start with this? This blue tick with 600k+ followers was recently suspended for, according to Musk, child sex abuse images. He was then reinstated and apparently given an ad-sharing payout. His reaction is... interesting.
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I admire the acute pettiness here. WP will be next on the list after this article. :lol:

Elon Musk’s X is throttling traffic to websites he dislikes​

The site formerly known as Twitter added a five-second delay when a user clicked on a shortened link to the New York Times, Facebook and other sites Musk commonly attacks, a Washington Post analysis found​

The delayed websites included X’s online rivals Facebook, Instagram, Bluesky and Substack, as well as the Reuters wire service and the Times. All of them have previously been singled out by Musk for ridicule or attack.
 
Robert said:
I admire the acute pettiness here. WP will be next on the list after this article. :lol:

Elon Musk’s X is throttling traffic to websites he dislikes​

The site formerly known as Twitter added a five-second delay when a user clicked on a shortened link to the New York Times, Facebook and other sites Musk commonly attacks, a Washington Post analysis found​

The delayed websites included X’s online rivals Facebook, Instagram, Bluesky and Substack, as well as the Reuters wire service and the Times. All of them have previously been singled out by Musk for ridicule or attack.
Click to expand...
He's throttling links because he wants to, not because the government asked him to? Who does he think he is?
I would be interested in seeing their data though. Times are back to normal now according to the story and it would be hard to prove that it wasn't just a technical issue with certain domains without seeing code.
While 5 seconds may be enough to discourage some traffic, I can usually wait for the link but I tend to get discouraged by paywalls.
On a related but different note, since the latest bit of internet legislative tomfoolery that passed in the Canadian House of Commons to require sites hosting links to Canadian media content, particularly news sites, to share their profits - links to Canadian sites on all sorts of social media are being blocked. Quelle surprise!
 
Robert said:
Removing the ability to block abusive accounts. Another sparkling glint of genius. :confused:
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-edit-
Potential plot twist:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1692592664493904354
Click to expand...
I kind of like the idea of getting rid of the block. Block is kind of broken. If you post something people should be allowed to disagree - and dissent seems to be the thing that is usually blocked. Actual abusers should be handled in a more systemic way. Some sort of tweet novelty value could help. Tweets like "you suck" and such could be marked low quality and grouped into like tweets sections so you see just an example tweet but the rest are grouped into just a count - "you suck"(189 similar) for example - low word count tweets in general can be considered low quality.
Cut an pastes could be particularly penalized. This should all be reflected back to the poster too.
And brigading needs to be curtailed. It is likely already possible to identify accounts that act in unison to mass report posts or join enmasse in hurling abuse at whoever your friends are piling on. Letting accounts know they have been noted joining in on a dogpile, that someone else has already said that, and instituting a cool down timer on bad posters posting and posts to dogpile targets would moderate much of the bad behaviour. This would also mess with trolls who are being deliberately provocative to generate "engagement".
 
FluffyMcDeath said:
If you post something people should be allowed to disagree - and dissent seems to be the thing that is usually blocked. Actual abusers should be handled in a more systemic way. Some sort of tweet novelty value could help. Tweets like "you suck" and such could be marked low quality and grouped into like tweets sections so you see just an example tweet but the rest are grouped into just a count - "you suck"(189 similar) for example - low word count tweets in general can be considered low quality.
Cut an pastes could be particularly penalized. This should all be reflected back to the poster too.
And brigading needs to be curtailed. It is likely already possible to identify accounts that act in unison to mass report posts or join enmasse in hurling abuse at whoever your friends are piling on. Letting accounts know they have been noted joining in on a dogpile, that someone else has already said that, and instituting a cool down timer on bad posters posting and posts to dogpile targets would moderate much of the bad behaviour. This would also mess with trolls who are being deliberately provocative to generate "engagement".
Click to expand...
Generally reasonable suggestions but Musk isn't proposing any of that. (I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and add "yet".)
Personally, I enjoy the block facility (it allows me to have a timeline with less idiotic clutter) but I'm happy to accept that my selfish preference is irrelevant. That said, Musk's idea as currently presented strikes me as almost as ridiculously counter-productive as changing the name - assuming he actually wants his investment to succeed, which I've never been convinced of.
 
Robert said:
Generally reasonable suggestions but Musk isn't proposing any of that. (I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and add "yet".)
Personally, I enjoy the block facility (it allows me to have a timeline with less idiotic clutter) but I'm happy to accept that my selfish preference is irrelevant. That said, Musk's idea as currently presented strikes me as almost as ridiculously counter-productive as changing the name - assuming he actually wants his investment to succeed, which I've never been convinced of.
Click to expand...
Also - I am not sure why feature was in quotes.

In June he said:
https://twitter.com/x/status/1666594707621773312

Which tracks, but I'm not sure what he means by a stronger mute.
He also complained block lists mess with recommendations.
https://twitter.com/x/status/1624678792550846464

It seems lie what he's getting at is when you post publicly you shouldn't expect that you can block the right of anyone that sees your post to respond, but where there would be an expectation of non-public interaction such as DM then block makes sense.
Personally I would like to see ONLY tweets (or Xs) that I can respond to. I want a feature where I can blanket block all read-only tweets.
 
FluffyMcDeath said:
Personally I would like to see ONLY tweets (or Xs) that I can respond to. I want a feature where I can blanket block all read-only tweets.
Click to expand...
Me too, no argument there. Whether Musk agrees remains to be seen but I doubt it.

-edit-
It seems he does not. Then again, it also seems that even he hasn't a clue which idiotic thing he's going to announce next.
https://twitter.com/x/status/1693219734001500381
 
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