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Twitter Blue for $8/Month

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Re: Twitter Blue for $8/Month

#671

Post by over_bridge »

koonsolo wrote: post #496
causality0 wrote: post #428

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, if you got famous exclusively on Twitter it's because you're a demagogue, not a content creator.

Can you name the MrBeast or PewDiePie of twitter?

Elon Musk.

Sure he's successful in the real world but having money doesn't make you a celebrity. I wouldn't recognize most of the Forbes list if I passed them in the street. He's actual famous, instead of Wikipedia famous, because of how he's engaged his supporters through Twitter. The chance to interact with him or have him like your meme is the content.

Re: Twitter Blue for $8/Month

#672

Post by dahfizz »

xtracto wrote: post #335
paxys wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's the core problem with this approach. Elon and others have the idea in their head that Twitter is a social graph where people come to interact with each other, and everyone is relatively equal. So every user paying $X/mo to solidify their place in the graph makes some conceptual sense. In reality Twitter is more akin to YouTube than Facebook. A tiny percentage of users are creators while the vast majority are c…

I always felt Twitter as "old man yells at cloud" kind of communication. I've never seen proper "content" created (like pinterest, tik tok, etc). Most of the "content" I see are the asinine multi-post threads and text-pictures notices from angry people/companies.

Yeah, Twitter is not about "content". It's a service that lets users scream into the void

Re: Twitter Blue for $8/Month

#673

Post by codq »

UncleMeat wrote: post #159
Waterluvian wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the things I admire about Elon (which is saying a lot...) is that for whatever reason, he's ready to bet the farm over and over. Whether he's some genius tactician or an impulsive moron, he just bought Twitter and is poised to drastically alter it. "flies in the face of everything I understand about complex systems" indeed! Forgive me for this analogy but it's in the news: Imagine if NATO just said one day, "y…

I don't quite think it is luck - but a weird second thing. Musk has a reality distortion field. I think he is a bloviating jerk but I know a lot of really really smart and dedicated engineers in software and in more traditional fields like mech-e and aerospace who would rather work for Musk than any other person and are willing to take pay cuts to work for him. This means he really can surround himself with very skil…

Reminds me of Bill Burr's classic take on Steve Jobs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ew6fv9UUlQ8

Re: Twitter Blue for $8/Month

#674

Post by matthewdgreen »

lamontcg wrote: post #343
conductr wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't think $8-20/month of book sales are generated by King's twitter presence?

He can still tweet without a blue checkmark and people will still know who he is.

And if Twitter’s user experience degrades to the point where King can’t Tweet effectively without a blue checkmark, then the platform is deeply screwed.

Re: Twitter Blue for $8/Month

#675

Post by simondotau »

BurningFrog wrote: post #118
Waterluvian wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the things I admire about Elon (which is saying a lot...) is that for whatever reason, he's ready to bet the farm over and over. Whether he's some genius tactician or an impulsive moron, he just bought Twitter and is poised to drastically alter it. "flies in the face of everything I understand about complex systems" indeed! Forgive me for this analogy but it's in the news: Imagine if NATO just said one day, "y…

I don't understand Elon either, but I'm certain that he's not an impulsive moron who doesn't understand complex system, or that he's financing all this with his dad's emerald mine money. For me, there is enough track record to prove he has some very unique business skills, and often succeeds by doing things that conventionally looks crazy. That said, Elon's Twitter may well be a failure regardless. Pretty sure it won…

The emerald mine claim comes from statements made by Errol Musk (Elon's father) who described it as a part share in an Zambian mine which resulted in a total lifetime revenues in the order of a few hundred thousand dollars. None of what Errol has said has been corroborated by anyone. No independent sources exist. It's also worth noting that Zambia is not a conflict gem country and an emerald mine in Zambia would not be morally problematic absent any specific evidence.

(And regardless of any of the above, I've never been particularly enamoured of criticism of a person because of who their parents are or what their parents did. Blaming Elon for being the son of white people in South Africa is kinda gross, actually.)

Re: Twitter Blue for $8/Month

#677

Post by drstewart »

freejazz wrote: post #552
oska wrote: post #475

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Be kind. Don't be snarky. Have curious conversation; don't cross-examine. Please don't fulminate. Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community. Edit out swipes. > Eschew flamebait. Avoid generic tangents. Omit internet tropes. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

It's just the simplest explanation, I wouldn't overthink it.

True. I for one thought it was pretty clear it was a simpleton comment you didn't think through.

Re: Twitter Blue for $8/Month

#679

Post by ALittleLight »

ProfessorLayton wrote: post #165
DeRock wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> $8 is way more than the profitability of an ad supported user. There's no excuse for "half the ads", it should be none at all. Adverse selection. The people willing to pay to remove ads are probably your most profitable users to show ads to.

The people willing to pay, the heavy users, are also the people most engaged and posting content on the platform. Content that twitter needs for less heavy users to consume, bringing in eyeballs for advertisers. Continuing to show ads to paying content creators is double-dipping.

With this model you may be able to target ads to people willing to pay. I assume the "half-ads" slots will be more valuable.

Re: Twitter Blue for $8/Month

#680

Post by TuringNYC »

tptacek wrote: post #530
memish wrote: post #508

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that someone who is addicted to Twitter and worth $500M would leave because they lose their special Blue Check over $20 is hilarious. He's just butt hurt because the VIP room and symbol is being opened to the proles. Now any schlub with $8 can have the once exclusive symbol.

Anywhere Stephen King writes, he'll have an audience. That's what's so funny about this particular example. There are indeed Twitter celebrities who depend on Twitter for their audience, but King isn't one of them: he's pumping more credibility into Twitter than he's extracting from it, and the platform (and all the Twitter celebrity remora attached to it) depend on people like him to keep doing it. He's right: Twitt…

>> Anywhere Stephen King writes, he'll have an audience.

Is that really true? Suppose King goes to a new social platform. Sure, I might install that app, but without a critical mass or others on that platform, what are the chances I actually check that app frequently?

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