Live data from Hacker News

I'll be stepping back from leading product for X

twitter.com

41–50 of 323 posts

Re: I'll be stepping back from leading product for X

#41
There's a lot of negative about twitter here, especially related to timeline being shit.

I'd like to give a different perspective - it's an algorithmic feed like anything else, it surfaces what you engage with. There are good niches on it. My feed is a mix of designers and AI engineers - not leaders, but people on the ground making things.

There's definitely been weird things politically with it, but content wise it really isn't as bad as people demonize it to be.

Re: I'll be stepping back from leading product for X

#42

imho Nikita did a good job and I wish he stayed on. Twitter is 100% better now than a year ago. For one, I haven't gotten a single bullshit click-farm fake-ass sock-puppet follower in months. Secondly, I see very few low-effort reply guys lately, human or otherwise.

I'm a supporter of X but even I admit I see non-stop AI bot comments

Re: I'll be stepping back from leading product for X

#44
post #29

In 2022, Twitter / X was supposed to have completely shut down according to many doomsters at the time. It is clear that many in [0], [1] and [2] also would like to ask the same question why Twitter / X still hasn't shut down. Turns out almost 4 years later, we are going to waiting even longer for the collapse. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33984823 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34214903 [2] htt…

He had the good fortune to cut just as AI was beginning to mean you needed fewer software engineers for the same level of output. And yes, software companies across the industry had accumulated in many instances people whose business was not, and was sometimes orthogonal to, building software.

How is this guy who keeps starting or taking over and fixing wildly successful companies always this lucky?

Re: I'll be stepping back from leading product for X

#45
post #29

In 2022, Twitter / X was supposed to have completely shut down according to many doomsters at the time. It is clear that many in [0], [1] and [2] also would like to ask the same question why Twitter / X still hasn't shut down. Turns out almost 4 years later, we are going to waiting even longer for the collapse. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33984823 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34214903 [2] htt…

It has collapsed. It is just bots and racism that have collapsed it, not a technical failure.

It has also collapsed on a business front. There are rumors that it has 1/10th the revenue that it did before.

Re: I'll be stepping back from leading product for X

#46

imho Nikita did a good job and I wish he stayed on. Twitter is 100% better now than a year ago. For one, I haven't gotten a single bullshit click-farm fake-ass sock-puppet follower in months. Secondly, I see very few low-effort reply guys lately, human or otherwise.

[flagged]

Re: I'll be stepping back from leading product for X

#47

imho Nikita did a good job and I wish he stayed on. Twitter is 100% better now than a year ago. For one, I haven't gotten a single bullshit click-farm fake-ass sock-puppet follower in months. Secondly, I see very few low-effort reply guys lately, human or otherwise.

That's been my experience too. I left twitter a few years ago, but when I created a new account (only following AI and startups and people MAKING things, and movie and show clip accounts), it's been so awesome to keep track of all the stuff going on.

Re: I'll be stepping back from leading product for X

#48

I guess he decided he had ruined the platform enough. Before he joined X had already implemented the login wall stuff that only let you view a single post, by the time he left it would show a tapping animation trying to beg you to install the app, open the App Store immediately if you interacted with anything, and put up a bunch of popovers. I hope that his changes increased engagement in the way he had hoped.

[dead]

Re: I'll be stepping back from leading product for X

#49

I guess he decided he had ruined the platform enough. Before he joined X had already implemented the login wall stuff that only let you view a single post, by the time he left it would show a tapping animation trying to beg you to install the app, open the App Store immediately if you interacted with anything, and put up a bunch of popovers. I hope that his changes increased engagement in the way he had hoped.

Nikita was always a bad hire.

If you look at his history, he’s really good at growth hacking apps to pump-and-dump into acquisitions. He hasn’t proven himself in building lasting products.

His last app, Gas, saw meteoric growth from some truly impressive growth hacking on children, but then got acquired by Discord and very soon after tanked. Same with whatever he’d sold to Facebook.

His (and others’ defense) to criticism has always been, “I made a lot of money on an exit,” which, sure, whatever. Personally, I don’t find that very interesting or compelling.

He fit Musk’s profile (brash, extremely online Take Haver), but not the kind of person you want leading product.

Post reply on HN