sensible guess, isn't it?
Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
141–150 of 585 posts
Re: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
#142TL;DR:
> Specifically, Musk used "an Internet application called the 'Botometer'—which applies different standards than Twitter does and which earlier this year designated Musk himself as highly likely to be a bot," Twitter said.
Note the “Earlier this year”. Article continues:
> This morning, Botometer gave Musk's account a rating of 1.2 out of 5, indicating that Musk is more "human-like" than bot-like as of today.
The legal brief continues:
> The Botometer thus does not even purport to apply Twitter's definition of a false or spam account. In fact, some bots (like those that report earthquakes as they happen or updates on the weather) are often helpful and permissible under Twitter’s platform manipulation and spam policy, to which Twitter respectfully refers the Court.
The latter, in my estimate, is irrelevant to the question here. Because the metric in question is “monetizable daily active “. If one person runs, besides their personal profile, 10 bots, it doesn’t matter if those bots are all “permissible“ according to Twitter‘s terms of service. These accounts still constitute, from the point of an advertiser as well as from the point of investors, just one monetizable daily active user, and not eleven.
Re: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
#143I'm still convinced he's just gonna use it to suggest that a judge should meet him in the middle; make him buy the company, but use the allegations of large numbers of bots to reduce the price.
I don’t think there’s any world where that happens. I think a judge would either order specific performance (e.g. do the thing the contract says, as specified in the contract), or we’re talking about damages (e.g. pay Twitter $X, but you don’t get anything in return). I think a purchase at a lower price would probably only come from a settlement between the parties, and… I think that’s likely. Twitter didn’t want to…
> I think Twitter is going to use the threat of specific performance to try and extract a damages settlement greater than the contractual $1B from Musk.
Yeah that's what makes the most sense. Musk doesn't want to buy Twitter anymore, forcing him to buy it is not a very good solution. It's possible to do, and certainly enforceable, but not a desirable outcome for anyone.
But, having him pay $10 or even $15 billions as a price to renege on his word, on the contrary, is an excellent outcome.
Re: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
#144Imagine this whole ordeal playing out on a house that was not listed for sale. The buyer starts harassing the homeowner to sell to them, they say no, so he buys up the mortgage lender and tries to force a sale. His antics are hurting the home's value so you relent to selling and give him an as-is sale contract, which he signs and gives you 24 hrs to respond or he will try to force a sale. All the while, this is of co…
> Who could possibly be on the side of the buyer?
The buyer is rich and if I side with the buyer maybe one day I'll be rich too!
Re: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
#145Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Twitter committed fraud by lying to the SEC about the mDAU numbers with the intent of inducing Musk to buy Twitter at an inflated price. What is that commonly-used aphorism? "One man's trash is another man's treasure"? Like, even if this is true , Musk didn't do (and subsequently waived) due diligence. > No, really, this is the allegation No further comment on it. > Count 2 is that Twitter committed [Texas fraud st…
> Musk didn't do (and subsequently waived) due diligence. Wasn't him collecting all of this MAU stuff to analyze it part of the due diligence needed in order to close the deal?
No. He signed the merger agreement without doing DD into mDAU, and didn’t write any contingencies around mDAU onto the contract.
You do your diligence BEFORE signing the merger agreement.
Re: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
#146Imagine this whole ordeal playing out on a house that was not listed for sale. The buyer starts harassing the homeowner to sell to them, they say no, so he buys up the mortgage lender and tries to force a sale. His antics are hurting the home's value so you relent to selling and give him an as-is sale contract, which he signs and gives you 24 hrs to respond or he will try to force a sale. All the while, this is of co…
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Even if we grant the accusations of enforcing a leftist orthodoxy, that's twitter's prerogative, you may not like left wing people but they are allowed to have a website that caters to a left wing audience.
Re: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
#147Imagine this whole ordeal playing out on a house that was not listed for sale. The buyer starts harassing the homeowner to sell to them, they say no, so he buys up the mortgage lender and tries to force a sale. His antics are hurting the home's value so you relent to selling and give him an as-is sale contract, which he signs and gives you 24 hrs to respond or he will try to force a sale. All the while, this is of co…
[flagged]
>They repeatedly demonstrate that they are a company of bullies, with how they ban people from their service that don't conform to the left orthodoxy.
So the manner in which they conduct their private business, which is well within the rule of law, makes them ineligible for protection from those violating securities and contract law?
Re: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
#148Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Who could possibly be on the side of the buyer? Except you can just buy up supporters by gaslighting huge masses of people on Twitter. The house in question. Its so ridiculous. Musk's popularity is largely *BECAUSE* of his Twitter antics. So this "buyer" is basically someone who has come to house-parties / benefited from the house in question for the last decade. And the people arguing against the (current owners)…
If his popularity is due to what he posts on twitter it would appear that a large proportion of the human race are deranged morons.
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Re: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's insane because Twitter has been very careful to explain that the 5% number is not some sort of "promise". > Additionally, our calculation of mDAU is not based on any standardized industry methodology and is not necessarily calculated in the same manner or comparable to similarly titled measures presented by other companies. Similarly, our measures of mDAU growth and engagement may differ from estimates published…
Twitter added a loop hole saying that their data might be incorrect. It seems disingenuous to absolve them of all sins if their data is hugely incorrect to the point where it's fraudulent just because they added that loop hole.
> It seems disingenuous to absolve them of all sins if their data is hugely incorrect to the point where it's fraudulent just because they added that loop hole.
If there's an actual industry standard then you could argue that Twitter is lying. However as everyone in the legal community knows there are two important concepts here: wilfulness and negligence. Did Twitter willfully do this or is this just because there isn't an actual standard methodology but tried to do their best-effort anyways? Is Twitter aware of problems in its methodology that can be solved but were left as-is? Conversely, did an external party intentionally misinterpreted those numbers so that that party can paint a different picture that what Twitter actually claims?
Re: Twitter says Musk’s spam analysis used tool that called his own account a bot
#150Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Who could possibly be on the side of the buyer? Except you can just buy up supporters by gaslighting huge masses of people on Twitter. The house in question. Its so ridiculous. Musk's popularity is largely *BECAUSE* of his Twitter antics. So this "buyer" is basically someone who has come to house-parties / benefited from the house in question for the last decade. And the people arguing against the (current owners)…
If his popularity is due to what he posts on twitter it would appear that a large proportion of the human race are deranged morons.
He can be popular due to Twitter and people can also not be deranged morons.
Twitter is very popular with a few niche groups: Journalists and people in tech for example. The former is influenced by Elon's antics on Twitter and end up writing news stories or making documentaries [1] about him. People learn about Musk through these respectable publications. The latter group spreads the gospel of Elon's TED talks and press conferences to their friends and family. Being subject matter experts, they're more likely to be believed.
Previously the coverage was mostly positive, but Musk's antics on Twitter have caused both the former and some of the latter to turn slightly negative from what I can tell. For example, it's now a common joke that Elon's wealth is partially due to being born wealthy. His family owned emerald mines. I didn't notice that in the popular consciousness until very recently. Phoney Starks is also making it's way into popular usage.
1 - https://www.nytimes.com/video/NYT-Presents/100000008464087/t...