Image Credit Deborah on Twitter See @dvorahfr

From Thirst Pictures to Voice Tweets: Twitter Unleashes Creative Features

Gail AlfarLeave a comment

(Austin, Texas) While brewing hot coffee in the morning, I have an old habit of listening to newsradio.  Today, NPR (haha, I’m not endorsing NPR) proudly announced that “Elon Musk, American Billionaire” would interview Ron DeSantis today and DeSantis would announce his run for presidency on Twitter.  NPR bantered back and forth a bit, in the expected way, but there was no denying that they are intensely curious how this will go. I am confident that it will go great! 

In this article, I’ll highlight a range of Twitter improvements already here and on the way, from content quality and verification measures to exciting future developments in audio/video. Twitter continues to get better, offering you a unique space to engage and express yourself, whether you’re a gardener or a politician. 

PREVENTING AI MANIPULATION

This week, talking in an interview with the WSJ, Elon Musk underscored the importance of Subscriber Verification in combating AI-driven manipulation of public opinion on social media. 

He outlined the requirements to create a verified account, including a credible phone number from a reputable carrier, a credit card, and a small monthly payment. These safeguards aim to prevent the proliferation of fake accounts and ensure the integrity of information shared on the platform. Elon stressed that social media companies that fail to implement such verification measures would be overwhelmed by bots, undermining trust in their platforms.

MIKE SOLANA’S ENGAGING AUDIO INTERVIEW AND TWITTER’S VIDEO CONTROLS

Mike Solana’s captivating audio interview with artist Grimes, shared on Twitter, demonstrated the platform’s potential for podcast-style content. 

I listened to the interview and loved the integration of soundwaves and easy-to-read captions by Solana. Twitter’s ongoing rapid deployment of quality features continues to amaze me. 

ALGORITHMIC PREFERENCE AND THE RISE OF SUBSCRIPTIONS

Twitter’s algorithm prioritizes posts with the highest cumulative user-seconds, placing native content at the forefront and favoring it over external links. This makes sense, as you may notice, people rarely like to click on links that take them off the Twitter App.  

Author Tim Urban shared what he likes about subscriptions.  For Urban, they create a more casual and authentic space reminiscent of texting among friends. Tim (as of 5/24/23) subscribes to a great mix of people! Among them Liv Boree, Mike Solana, Billy Markus, Rainmaker, and A. James McKarthy.  

As of now, you can see who others subscribe to, which I find to be very helpful when looking for accounts I might also subscribe to. 

THIRST PICS AND VOICE TWEETS 

Twitter designer Andrea Conway urged users to share thirst pictures which are delightful gems often found on Instagram, to enhance visual appeal on the platform. Additionally, Conway encouraged the use of voice tweets, and did one of her own to showcase their potential to add a personal touch to interactions. I created a short voice tweet and was pleasantly surprised when Conway herself commented on my voice, saying “you have the most wonderful voice!!!!” Maybe we should all voice tweet more?

ENGINEERING UPDATE: PUSHSERVICE AND TWEETYPIE ENHANCEMENTS

Twitter’s engineering team highlights Pushservice as the primary recommendation service for surfacing relevant content through notifications. This service fetches candidates from multiple sources, ranks them based on relevance, and applies filters to deliver the best recommendations to users. 

Twitter also focuses on Tweetypie, the core tweet service responsible for handling the reading and writing of tweet data, ensuring a seamless user experience.

HOW WILL TWITTER EXPAND AND IMPROVE?

Twitter is the best place today for an electronic digital town square with maximum free speech,  expression, engagement, and the exchange of diverse perspectives. 

As the Bird App continues to thrive, it invites talented individuals to join the team and contribute to its success. Twitter’s no-nonsense careers page is simply a textured white background with the careers email address: careers@twitter.com. If you are interested in working for the bird app, that is the email to reach out to. 

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

Article by @GailAlfarATX please credit accordingly. Thank you for reading, sharing & subscribing if you can!  Image credit Dedorah. Referenced in this article are Elon Musk, Twitter Engineering, Tim Urban, Liv Boree, Mike Solana, Billy Markus, Rainmaker, and A. James McCarthy.  

Elon Musk shares meme about CBC

Keeping Up with Twitter: This Week’s Developments

Gail AlfarLeave a comment

Elon Musk shares meme about CBC
Elon Musk shares meme about CBC

               “A cybernetic collective mind for humanity.” – Elon Musk

In this article, we’ll look at some of twitter’s rapid improvement like encrypted conversations and the shift in leadership, 

The Everything App: Interaction and Information

Elon Musk, technologist and memelord, said, “On this platform, unlike the one-way street of broadcast, people are able to interact, critique, and refute whatever is said.” 

With Elon’s presence on Twitter, the possibilities are endless, and the community knows it. But, to be clear, there’s no special treatment here. Everyone, including Elon Musk, abides by the same rules and “rewards” of content creation.

Enhanced Features: DMs, Emojis, and Beyond

With each app update, Twitter takes a leap forward in enhancing user experiences. In the latest version, you can now reply to any message in a thread, regardless of its order. And who can resist the power FIRE emojis? You can now react with any emoji, giving your conversations an extra dose of fun. 

Encrypted direct messages are on the horizon. Your privacy is Twitter’s priority, and even if there were a gun to Elon’s head, he couldn’t peek into your DMs. Stay tuned for voice and video chat capabilities, connecting people worldwide without revealing your phone number.

Twitter Ad Campaigns: aka Comedy Club for Conversion

“Twitter has proven itself to be among the best, if not the best, platform for return on ad spend and conversion campaigns right now.” – Sean Frank, CEO, The Ridge Wallet. 

From hilarious brand campaigns to clever marketing strategies, Twitter is the place where ads come alive. Engage, entertain, and convert – that’s the magic formula Twitter offers to businesses, bringing them closer to their target audience and boosting their online presence.

CBC’s Twitter Resurgence

On Apr. 17, The Canadian Broadcasting Co.(CBC) said it would pause activities on Twitter in response to the “government-funded media” label given by the App.

 “Our journalism is impartial and independent. To suggest otherwise is untrue. That is why we are pausing our activities on Twitter,” said CBC. 

In  just 3 short weeks, CBC was right back on Twitter, and on May 9, they tweeted a story about  “threats to press freedom in Canada and the world.” CBC commented,

“Today, the CBC will resume some activity on a handful of Twitter accounts, including CBC News, but we will significantly reduce our overall Twitter footprint and continue to assess the platform against our social media strategy,” 

Elon Musk responded with the brokeback mountain meme (added below for humor!) 

The Power of Community Notes: Quality Over Quantity

“Contributors’ time is valuable, and best spent reviewing high-quality notes.” In an effort to prioritize valuable feedback, Twitter has made a significant update. The number of notes one can write within 24 hours is now proportional to their track record. The more helpful notes you’ve written, the more you can contribute. 

Verified Organizations: Strengthening Trust and Transparency

“Verified organization is one of the most important additions to Twitter.” At the bottom of this article, you’ll find a visual treat – a verified organization badge. Twitter recognizes the significance of trust and transparency, providing a platform for verified organizations to establish their presence and credibility. It’s a seal of authenticity that brings users closer to the content they can trust.

A Change in CEO: The Arrival of Linda Yaccarino

On May 11, Elon Musk announced the appointment of Linda Yaccarino as new CEO of Twitter. With Linda’s expertise in business operations, the stage is set for transforming Twitter into X, the everything app. Elon will shift his focus to product design and new technology, as more users join this ever-evolving platform. Keep an eye out for the upcoming Spaces session, where you can ask anything and participate first-hand in this new partnership between Elon and Linda. 

Encrypted Direct Messages: Privacy Redefined

Say goodbye to prying eyes and hello to secure conversations. Twitter is introducing Encrypted Direct Messages v1, offering early access to verified users. This groundbreaking feature prioritizes privacy, ensuring that your messages remain confidential. As the experience improves and expands, all users can look forward to enjoying the benefits of encrypted conversations on Twitter.

Twitter in Turkey: Upholding Freedom of Expression

In recent developments, Twitter found itself navigating a complex situation in Turkey. Negotiations with the Turkish Government revealed that Twitter was the only social media service not fully complying with existing court orders. To maintain availability during the election weekend, Twitter took action based on court orders, impacting four accounts and 409 Tweets. Despite these challenges, Twitter remains committed to freedom of expression and continues to object in court, standing up for users’ rights.

CONCLUSION

As we wrap up this week’s update on Twitter, it’s clear that everything App is continuously improving to meet the needs of its users. From enhanced privacy features like Encrypted Direct Messages to exciting announcements about a new CEO, Twitter is paving the way for a more secure and engaging social media experience.

With Elon Musk’s vision of turning Twitter into X, and the commitment to fostering open conversations, I’m noticing a sense of optimism and anticipation in the people I interact with. As users, we look forward to upcoming developments, voice and video chat capabilities, and a more streamlined and user-friendly platform, thanks to the amazing Twitter team!

Remember, Verified organization is one of the most important additions to Twitter! (related image at the bottom of this article.)

Keep tweeting, engaging, and spreading positivity on Twitter, and let’s make the most of this incredible platform.

                       ───※ ·❆· ※───

Article by Gail Alfar, please credit accordingly.  Courtesy @cb_doge  image and meme shared by @elonmusk 

Bird App

Three Ways Twitter is Becoming the Everything App

Gail AlfarLeave a comment

Meet Chad, a proud Tesla owner.  He met Bianca on TwitterDate. Chad and Bianca loved each others’ humorous, clever Twitter history and exchanged DMs, and enjoyed hours of TwitterVideo Chat late into the night.  They continued to use Twitter after they were married and had their lovely twins.  Encryption was what they relied on for all their secure financial and legal communication. X is their everything App. 

Life is about love, communication and security.  In this article we’ll look at how the everything app improves life for humans and creates a better user experience. 

SOLVING UNDERPOPULATION AND TWITTER DATING

Twitter may one day engineer TwitterDate, a way for people to meet.   I wrote about underpopulation last year in the article Elon Musk: Discussion About Underpopulation and noted that for years, Elon has been correcting the false perception that there are too many people.  

In an interview with Johnna Crider last year, Elon said,

“The population decline problem, I think is possibly the biggest risk to civilization or its certainly one of the biggest risks. 

First of all, a lot of people think that there are too many humans on the planet and the planet can’t sustain this number of humans.  This is absolutely not true. 

We could double the population without any meaningful damage to the environment. You can put all the humans on earth in the city of New York.  That’s the cross-sectional area of humans. They could literally fit in the city of New York on one floor, you don’t even need high-rises.  And if you’re on a plane flight and you look down and you say, “what percentage of the time, if I were to drop a ball, would that ball hit a person?”  Basically zero.

Even in a city like LA, where we think, “oh, that’s a crowded city,” looking at it from above, what’s the cross-sectional area of humans relative to the rest of the ground?”  It’s much less than 1%, even in LA. 

So if you’re in a big city environment and you see a lot of people you sort of extrapolate that to everywhere, but it’s actually very rare to see a concentration of humans. 

Earth is very sparsely populated with humans.  There’s not enough humans, far from being too many.  I think people are still sort of operating on the assumption that the population is growing like crazy when in fact the opposite is occurring.  These numbers are easy to look up, they’re just on the internet.  We had the lowest birthrate in recorded history last year.” – Elon Musk

Underpopulation is a very real problem.  Twitter may help solve it by helping people meet others and that may possibly lead to more happy families with kids who can say, “My mommy met my daddy on Twitter!”  

When Steven Mark Ryan suggested, “When Twitter dating app? Might save humanity from extinction, not even joking.  Very low hanging fruit.”  Elon Musk replied, “Interesting idea, maybe jobs too.”

DMs are important for dating and beyond. Twitter is improving DMs. 

TWITTER DMs

This is a small change but one that will save you time and help you communicate faster. 

Twitter quietly revealed a new feature so you may reply to a DM in a message thread and not just the most recent one. This feature just recently came to iPhones in 2022. 

Scroll back in your message thread and find the message you’d like to respond to, hold onto it, and reply. You can also use any emoji reaction (hearts are nice) to that message.  

TWITTER VOICE AND VIDEO CHAT

Sometimes text is not enough, and you need to do a voice or video chat. 

This feature is coming soon to Twitter. Imagine talking with new friends from around the world, without leaving the Bird App?

Voice capabilities on Twitter would mean it could save many people money because it would function as a phone service.  

WHY TWITTER ENCRYPTED MESSAGES ARE BETTER

What do Signal, WhatsApp, and Wire have in common? All three are popular encrypted messaging apps that require you to reveal your phone number, which puts you at a security risk.

Twitter encrypted DM‘s are, in my opinion, much more secure. You can talk to people anywhere in the world without revealing your phone number.  

In typical fast-moving Elon Musk-style, Version 1.0 of encryption is the first and will improve rapidly. 

Elon Musk said,

“The acid test is that I could not see your DMs even if there was a gun to my head.”

Everyday, Elon Musk builds a better, stronger, and more trusted team at Twitter.  The future is exciting for both Twitter users and the many dedicated people who are helping to build a better everything App – X.

Consider Cosmos and Mary L. Bender on the wedding day. They are both active Twitter Users.
Consider Cosmos and Mary L. Bender on the wedding day. They are both active Twitter Users.

Article by Gail Alfar, all rights reserved. Photo credits to Viv on Twitter, Consider Cosmos and Mary L.Bender.  Gratitude Elon Musk and all the Twitter team.  Mentioned in this article:  Johnna Steven Mark and Johnna Crider.

Twitter Operates Better with Elon Musk in Charge

Gail AlfarLeave a comment

I’ve been documenting Twitter’s great improvements since November 2022 and it’s amazing how much positive progress happens in real-time.  In this article, I’ll bring you up to date on the last few weeks’ great changes from my perspective! 

USERS LOVE TWITTER, EVEN THOSE WHO DON’T

This is ironic, I know, and honestly Twitter is a great place to come and interact in a positive way or a complaining way as well.  This funny observation was made by Twitter account BillyM2K when he noted how many people love to come to Twitter to complain about it, rather than take to another social site to complain about it.  

This elicited a hilarious reaction from Elon Musk, who replied, “lol they should keep doing it all day.”  

HUNDREDS OF PEOPLE WILL EARN A LIVING ON TWITTER…  SOON! 

Can you make a living being on Twitter all day?  Not really… yet!  And you may be able to soon! 

Being a creator of any sort on Twitter will take a lot of hard work just like any other successful endeavor.  This was emphasized by Elon Musk this week when he commented in a tweet under BillyM2K’s subscriptions, “Growing subscribers requires work. No way around it.”

I believe thousands of people will soon earn a living on Twitter, bringing opportunity to all corners of the world and giving creative people hope and an important sense of value. In the coming months, we will see many creative ways to use subscriptions.  

A good friend of mine, Johnna Crider came up with an idea I had not thought of for restaurants.  Owners could enable subscriptions allowing people discounts and special deals on dine-in or delivery.

When I think of making a living, something that comes to mind is security and this is another area that Twitter is working on, the enabling of secure messages when needed.

TWITTER’S VISION FOR SECURE MESSAGING

There are many reasons for secure messaging, such as protecting private information and sensitive data.  Encryption converts all data into a string of unreadable numbers before sending it over the internet, it protects you from a wide range of cyberattacks.  Elon Musk clearly intends to provide this for Twitter users in the future. 

In an interview with Tucker Carlson that aired in April, Elon said, “One of the things that we are about to release is the ability to encrypt your DM‘s. We’re moving to be able to have DM’s be optionally encrypted. You know there are a lot of DM conversations which are just chatting with friends.  Elon explained that end-to-end encryption will come out by the end of May and will give users the ability to toggle encryption on or off.”

“If you are in a conversation that you think is sensitive, you can just toggle the encryption on and then no one at Twitter can see what you’re talking about. They could put a gun to my head, and I couldn’t tell. Sort of, the gun test. If somebody puts a gun to my head, can I still not see your DM‘s? That should be the acid test. And that’s how it should be.” 

Our conversations should be private if we need them to be. 

Blending characteristic humor with the ability to make a strong point, Elon explained to Carlson, that if the US government were to ask him to do something unconstitutional, his reply would be to “send them a copy of the first amendment, and just say, what part of this are we getting wrong?” 

TWITTER’S ROLE IN ELECTIONS

Lately there has been a lot of talk about possible presidential debates being hosted on Twitter. My thought on that is it’s entirely up to the candidates. I think it is a wonderful idea. 

When Carlson asked Elon about Twitter‘s role in the upcoming presidential elections, Elon stated, “I think it will play a significant role, not just domestically, but internationally.  The goal of new Twitter is to be as fair and evenhanded as possible, so not favoring any political ideology, and being fair to all.”

TRUST AND TWITTER

Trust must be earned, and I believe Twitter is already the best place to get news and information. I think humanity will benefit from discovering, having conversations, and being exposed to different viewpoints in an open and fair way. Elon explains,

“We’re trying to make Twitter the most trusted place on the Internet, the least untrustworthy place on the Internet. I don’t think anybody should trust the Internet. But maybe we can make Twitter the least untrustworthy like I said, try to get the truth to the people as best we can.”

CONCLUSION

In December 1992, Marc Sautet started the idea of philosophy cafés in the Place de la Bastille neighborhood of Paris at the Café des Phares. Sautet would gather friends at his “café philo” each Sunday and have philosophical debates.  

I imagine this happening on Twitter and in Twitter Spaces.  

I’ll leave you with this quote from President George Washington, 

“If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.”

𝘈𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦 𝘣𝘺 @𝘨𝘢𝘪𝘭𝘢𝘭𝘧𝘢𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘹 𝘱𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘴𝘦 𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘥𝘪𝘵 𝘢𝘤𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘭𝘺. 𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘬𝘴 𝘵𝘰 @𝘦𝘭𝘰𝘯𝘮𝘶𝘴𝘬 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘊𝘌𝘖 𝘰𝘧 @𝘛𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘳𝘦𝘩𝘢𝘣𝘣𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘛𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘰 𝘤𝘳𝘦𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘢 𝘱𝘭𝘢𝘤𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘍𝘳𝘦𝘦 𝘚𝘱𝘦𝘦𝘤𝘩.  𝘐 𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘳𝘦𝘤𝘪𝘢𝘵𝘦 𝘮𝘺 𝘛𝘸𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘦𝘳 𝘴𝘶𝘣𝘴𝘤𝘳𝘪𝘣𝘦𝘳𝘴 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘪𝘳 𝘴𝘶𝘱𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘮𝘺 𝘸𝘳𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨. 𝘠𝘰𝘶 𝘮𝘢𝘺 𝘴𝘦𝘦 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘮𝘺 𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘶𝘨𝘩 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘭𝘢𝘯𝘥𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘱𝘢𝘨𝘦 𝘰𝘯 𝘮𝘺 𝘣𝘪𝘰. 𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘬𝘴 𝘵𝘰 @𝘫𝘰𝘩𝘯𝘯𝘢𝘊𝘳𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘳1 𝘢𝘯𝘥 @𝘉𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘺𝘮2𝘬 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘰𝘸𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘮𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘮𝘦𝘯𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘪𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦. 𝘈𝘳𝘵 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘳𝘵𝘦𝘴𝘺 @dvorahfr 

Elon Musk talks on Carlson Show.

ELON MUSK TALKS ON AI AND TWITTER. CARLSON INTERVIEW.

Gail AlfarLeave a comment
Elon Musk talks on Carlson Show.
Elon Musk talks on Carlson Show.

Will there come a time when A.I. is in control and can’t be turned off? 

                            “Absolutely.”  – Elon Musk

Elon Musk talked in an interview with Tucker Carlson and here are the highlights.  This was a short, engaging Part I (the 2nd part will air soon).  It’s significant that Elon considers Tesla and SpaceX much more complex than Twitter. The interview covers many areas.  Enjoy!

ADVANCED ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND THE SINGULARITY.

ELON MUSK AGREES HE’S A SPECIESIST.

OpenAI has transitioned from the non-profit Elon founded in order to ethically distribute the power of artificial intelligence, into a closed-source for-profit partnered with Microsoft.

Elon said,

“It is fundamentally profound that the smartest creatures on this earth are humans. It is our defining characteristic.  

Now what happens when something vastly smarter than the smartest person comes along in silicon form?

It’s very difficult to predict what will happen in that circumstance. It’s called the singularity.

Regulations are really only put into effect after something terrible has happened. 

If that’s the case for AI, and we only put in regulation after something terrible has happened, it may be too late to put the regulation in place.

The AI may be in control at that point.”

Elon explained that he and Google co-founder Larry Page were once close, and he would stay on Page’s couch.  They would talk about AI late into the night.  Elon said he was concerned about the dangers of AI.  Page called Elon a “Speciesist” when he said that “We need to make sure that humanity is okay.” Elon laughed and said he is one, and asked Page, “What are you?”

“My perception was that (Page) was not taking AI safety seriously enough. He really wanted a digital superintelligence. Basically, a digital god as soon as possible. He’s made many public statements that the whole goal of Google is artificial general intelligence.” – Elon Musk

TRUTH GPT.

Elon discussed creating an alternative to OpenAI, TruthGPT, because “Open AI” is being trained to be politically correct and to lie to people. Elon explained,

“What’s happening is they are training the AI to lie. It’s bad. To lie and to withhold information. To comment on some things, to not comment on other things.

But not to say what the data actually demands that it say.

In effect, Microsoft has a very strong say and, if not, directly controls OpenAI at this point.

You really have an OpenAI – Microsoft situation, and then Google DeepMind.  These are the two heavyweights in this arena.

I’m worried about the fact that it’s being trained to be politically correct, which is another way of saying untruthful things.  That’s a bad sign.

Certainly, the path to AI dystopia is to train an AI to be deceptive.”

Elon Musk explained the goal of TruthGPT,

“I’m going to start something which is called TruthGPT or a Maximum Truth Seeking AI that tries to understand the nature of the universe, and I think this might be the best path to safety in the sense that an AI that cares about understanding the universe is unlikely to annihilate humans because we are an interesting part of the universe.”

TWITTER PURCHASE.

Was it worth it to buy Twitter? Elon explains the Twitter purchase will greatly help ensure the strength of democracy and free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy.

“It remains to be seen as to whether this was financially smart.  Currently, it is not. You know we just revalued the company at less than half of the acquisition price.

But some things are priceless.

Lose money or not, that is a secondary issue compared to ensuring the strength of democracy, and free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy.”

NEXT PRESIDENT. 

NEW YORK TIMES.

FACEBOOK.

Elon confessed he voted for Biden in 2020, not Trump, and now he just wants a “normal person” with “common sense” to lead America.

He also disclosed what the media has been silent on.

“My understanding is that Zuckerberg spent $400 million in the last election nominally in a get-out-the-vote campaign but fundamentally in support of Democrats. Is that accurate or not accurate? Does that sound unbiased to you?”

As the most followed & interacted man on Twitter, Elon has useful advice on how to use Twitter. He explains, for example, that the New York Times’ Twitter account (and others) should choose only the top best articles to tweet. Otherwise, small insignificant articles clog people’s timelines, and relevant articles are missed.

COMMUNITY NOTES.

TRUTH.

“We got this Community Notes feature which is great. We put a lot of effort into ensuring that Community Notes does not get gamed or have biases.

It simply cares about what is the most accurate thing. The effect of Community Notes is more powerful than people realize because once people realize they can get Community Noted on Twitter, then they will think more carefully about what they say.

Basically, it’s an encouragement to be more truthful and less deceptive.”  – Elon Musk

DM’S WILL BE ENCRYPTED.

Tucker Carlson asked about Governmental Agencies having access to Twitter including Direct messages, “You were shocked to find out that various intel agencies were affecting [Twitter’s] operations?”  

Elon replied,  “The degree to which various Government Agencies had effectively full access to everything that was going on on Twitter blew my mind.” 

Elon added that direct messages will soon be encrypted (as an on/off toggle feature). 

TWITTER WAS OVERSTAFFED.

‘GLORIFIED ACTIVIST ORGANIZATION.’

Speaking about cutting staff at Twitter, Elon said,

“Turns out you don’t need all that many people to run Twitter.

If you’re not trying to run some sort of glorified activist organization and you don’t care that much about censorship, then it turns out you can let go of a lot of people.

What has been the product development over time with Twitter? So, years versus product improvement. You know, it’s a pretty flat line. 

So what were they doing?  It took a year to add an edit button that doesn’t work most of the time. It feels like a comedy situation over here.

The real question is how did it get so absurdly overstaffed?”

CONCLUSION.

I would call this a cautionary interview because Elon does much to explain how dangerous Advanced Artificial Intelligence is. The Good News is that the dire direction of AI today has managed to prompt Elon into moving forward with the creation of TruthGPT.  I am confident that humans will one day be very grateful to him for that!   

───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───── ───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───── ───── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ─────

Thanks to Tucker Carlson / FoxNews for Interviewing Elon Musk. You may watch the interview on Fox. This Article is by Gail Alfar, please credit accordingly and consider following and subscribing to my Twitter Account to support citizen writing. See @gailalfaratx on Twitter

1 day closer to AGI. Image credit @SmokeAwayyy on Twitter

Twitter is the Place to Be.

Gail AlfarLeave a comment
1 day closer to AGI, Image credit @SmokeAwayyy on Twitter

I have a lot of great news about Twitter (now legally known as X.corp on paper) to share with you this week.  The vibe on Twitter is energizing, happy, and powerful.  No other social media has as many positive changes and potential benefits for users on the web.  

What is new this week?  Subscriptions Have Opened Up to Include Millions of Accounts!

A fabulous program that will benefit many people was revealed around lunchtime on April 13th. 

Twitter users with at least 500 followers can, free of charge, apply to offer their followers a way to thank them for their efforts by simply activating “Subscriptions” for their account.  Previously, a user needed to have 10,000 followers.  

My take on this is that there are many accounts that provide valuable information daily and there are appreciative people who may like to Subscribe to them to show support.  

I’ll use my account as an example.  I use Twitter to share the articles I write for WhatsUpTesla and WhatsUpTwitter. I also use Twitter daily to share my enthusiasm for Tesla, Tesla AI, and Twitter 2.0.  The reason I offer Subscriptions on my account is mainly to allow a few of my followers to show appreciation for my efforts and to support this blog (Twitter Subscriptions is the main way I receive any currency to pay for part of the costs of the two publications I operate). Honestly, most of the content I exclusively provide for my followers are creative “Thank You” tweets and an occasional special article.  I am extremely grateful for this support and it means a lot to me.  

So if you are active on Twitter as a writer, artist or even a talented shitposter, I encourage you to go to “Monetization” in settings and activate Subscriptions. There are a few more details that make this an irresistible opportunity:

  • You’ll be able to offer your followers both longform text and hours long video.
  • Twitter will help promote your work.
  • At any point, you may leave Twitter and take your work with you, there’s no obligation or contract to stay.
  • Twitter generously agreed that (until April 2023), all profits will go to you. 

That last perk is HUGE for people who are already known creators (artists, writers, YouTubers, etc, etc), as it gives them an opportunity to prosper while being creative in their own way.  

I like being able to show appreciation to a few other people I know on Twitter.  I like being able to Subscribe to them because it shows I support them. One account I subscribe to, for example, gives all the proceeds to an organization that helps the homeless. The Providence House in Shreveport, Louisiana is a nonprofit that helped my friend Johnna Crider and her mother. When Johnna was only age 9-12 she formed good memories and relationships that last to this day because of the people at Providence House.  If you want to subscribe to Johnna you’ll also see her beautiful private tweets.  

There are also, in my opinion, going to be many people who, may want to Subscribe to someone they really like (examples might be Mr. Beast, and Marques Brownlee) and my hope is that citizen journalists will activate subscriptions.  

CONCLUSION

As you can see, there are many ways people are already being creative using the Subscription feature!  Here are some accounts I recommend trying out a Twitter subscription to:

Johnna Crider @JohnnaCrider1 (kind & thoughtful tweets with a saxophone flare and money goes to good use)

Elon Musk @elonmusk1 (who can resist?)

Shibetoshi Nakamoto @BillyM2k (best shitposter on Twitter)

Me @gailalfaratx (I had to put this here, haha)

“Life is full of beauty. Notice it. Notice the bumble bee, the small child, and the smiling faces. Smell the rain, and feel the wind. Live your life to the fullest potential, and fight for your dreams.” ― Ashley Smith
“Life is full of beauty. Notice it. Notice the bumble bee, the small child, and the smiling faces. Smell the rain, and feel the wind. Live your life to the fullest potential, and fight for your dreams.” ― Ashley Smith (image courtesy @dvorahfr on Twitter)

Gail Alfar, author. Exclusive to What’s Up Twitter – April 14, 2023. All Rights Reserved. My goal as an author is to support Twitter 2.0 (X.corp) and Elon Musk in both making lives better on Earth for humans and becoming a space-fairing civilization. I write these articles, I will not use AI of any form to write them, they are time-consuming and I appreciate the opportunity to do this.

Twitter for all Humanity. Image courtesy cb_doge.

Here’s What Really Happened With Elon Musk, A Copy 🐈 Twitter, and A Twitter Files Journalist

Gail AlfarLeave a comment
Twitter for all Humanity. Image courtesy cb_doge.
Twitter for all Humanity. Image courtesy cb_doge.

When Elon Musk accused journalist Matt Taibbi of being an employee of Substack, a publishing platform, and that same platform of stealing data from Twitter, my first reaction was that Elon would not have said any of this without evidence even though Taibbi and Substack’s CEO were both denying this. This led me to examine what happened more carefully.

I also think it’s critical for us to pause a moment and seek the truth. With this in mind, I asked Elon for context for the sake of this article. As you well know, I write articles that support the mission of Twitter 2.0 (X.corp.)  

My publication, “WhatsUpTwitter” was founded November 2022.  My goal is to “create a publication that strives to communicate accurate information about Twitter and leave the reader feeling hopeful and optimistic about the future.” 

This article is about an insidious attempt to destroy Twitter and sheds light on what really happened

As the first week of April rolled along, I watched what I think is one of the most insidious attacks so far on Twitter 2.0 since Elon Musk bought it. Even more so is the intensity of the sense of betrayal. A journalist who Elon Musk trusted not only stabbed him in the back, (in my opinion), but his actions showed that he wanted Twitter to fail. Again, this is my personal opinion.   

Substack’s copycat social media app looks almost identical to Twitter,  accompanies their blogging site, and is called “Substack Notes.”  This is alarming considering Elon Musk’s explanation that the platform was trying to download a large portion of the Twitter database.

“Substack was trying to download a massive portion of the Twitter database to bootstrap their Twitter clone, so their IP address is obviously untrusted.” – Elon Musk

Bootstrapping is a technique of loading a program into a computer by means of a few initial instructions which enable the introduction of the rest of the program from an input device, and this is what Substack was doing to create “Substack Notes,” so that is why it looks like a rip-off of Twitter because it is!

To further add salt to the open wound, a prominent writer of the Twitter Files announced that he was leaving Twitter for Substack Notes. It later came to light that he, by his own wording, is an employee of Substack. 

Matt Taibbi Declines Activating Twitter Subscriptions

It is well-known that Matt Taibbi released many Twitter Files threads. I wrote about that in many previous articles. 

With a large following and his notoriety on Twitter for releasing the Twitter Files (a generous gesture from Elon Musk), it seems it would make sense to take advantage of the Twitter subscription feature. I know that I would if it were me. I wrote in February about how writers with subscriptions activated will be able to publish directly on Twitter and get paid for it by adding essays as attachments to tweets.

An important context for this is that Taibbi declined Twitter subscriptions on the pretense that people would say he was an employee of Twitter. Why? And why would Substack choose this time to release their counterfeit version of Twitter?  Perhaps because of the gained fame of some of its leading writers with paid subs (on Substack) to raise free awareness through the use of Twitter.  And how did they gain in popularity?  Certainly, the release of the Twitter Files was a big factor.  

In my opinion, it feels like Substack wants to directly compete with and possibly ruin Twitter. And that prominent writer, Matt Taibbi, announced that he planned to leave Twitter and give up the opportunity to dual post his writing on both Twitter and Substack. 

Taibbi also declined to activate paid subscriptions on his Twitter account, which currently has 1.8 million followers. He could have many Twitter Subscribers and make a wonderful income as many people are already doing on Twitter. 

In a private email, Elon Musk shared some important context with me which made clear that Taibbi declined Twitter subscriptions on the pretense that people would say he was an employee of Twitter. Taibbi said that Twitter didn’t work for him professionally, questioned how he could market his work, and that if he were to post his articles to Twitter and enable subscription service, “people would say I’m essentially an employee of Twitter and both of us would never hear the end of it.”

Elon pointed out that Twitter isn’t giving Taibbi extra reach or any free advertising and rhetorically asked if the people using YouTube to post videos and earn money creating content were considered employees. He has an excellent point there. YouTube, TikTok, and other social media platforms pay users for content creation although they are not actual employees. 

In response to this, Taibbi said “The optics of that would be really bad journalistic ethics-wise.”

In my opinion, Taibbi is choosing to support Substack which wants to ruin Twitter. And the excuse of “journalistic ethics” is weak. Taibbi was, in his own words, a Substack employee. Keep reading for proof. 

Taibbi’s Work With Substack

Message thread with Elon Musk and Matt Taibbi. Used with permission. Image was also public on Twitter on April 10 for about 1 hour.
Message thread with Elon Musk and Matt Taibbi. Used with permission. Image was also public on Twitter on April 10 for about 1 hour.

In the above message thread, Taibbi himself admits that he was/is employed by Substack. 

What wasn’t apparent to most people was that Taibbi was, all along, part of the paid Substack Pro, or Substack Professionals program. Taibbi wrote about this in a newsletter that came to my inbox. Taibbi left out the details of just what his historical association was with Substack, and how much money he had gained and is currently receiving from Substack.

Substack was founded in 2017.  In 2018, founders Chris Best, Hamish McKenzie and Matt Taibbi, posted on Hacker News, 

“We’re Chris Best and Hamish McKenzie, the founders of Substack (YC W18), and Matt Taibbi, a journalist and author who has written four best-sellers and is a contributing editor to the Rolling Stone. Substack is a tool that makes it simple for a writer to start a paid newsletter – but we’re also experimenting with other models for online publishing. For instance, Matt is using Substack to serialize a novel called The Business Secrets of Drug Dealing: Adventures of the Unidentified Black Male, which you can see here.

Matt has so far published six chapters in the book. The serial is an experiment for him, too, but even when it’s done he intends to keep publishing his independent work through Substack. We thought it might be interesting to bring Matt into a Hacker News discussion about this model, other things that might be tried, and the state of online publishing generally.”

My firm belief is that Matt Taibbi was getting paid for and was working for Substack. I believe Elon Musk is correct when he asserted that Matt is employed by Substack.

Conclusion

The truth always has a way of coming to light. We will never truly know the motives of those journalists who took advantage of Elon’s generosity when releasing the Twitter Files. Yes, they performed a valuable service. However, Taibbi’s actions show that he was never on Twitter’s or Elon’s side. Running to the competitor, who he said was his employer, when given the opportunity to monetize his own Twitter account, is, in my opinion, proof of this. 

Those who want Elon Musk to fail, in my mind, are fine with humanity being doomed. Perhaps this seems an exaggeration but I fully believe that Elon’s heart is focused on helping all of humanity itself and this is why he bought Twitter. 

He purchased it with the solid intention of providing a digital town square for humanity.  Tesla and SpaceX are philanthropy and so is Twitter.  

Prior to Elon Musk, Twitter was raking in advertising profits based on the amount of likes advertising posts would get, but many of those likes turned out to be bots.  Twitter’s ad placement also had a net negative effect on companies as they were placed next to viral posts, and it is now widely known that some of those “viral posts” contained CSAM (child sexual abuse material). 

As Twitter, now officially X.corp, moves forward with the mission, it is clear that Substack Notes won’t be able to compete and their sad attempt to kill Twitter will one day be remembered only as a small glitch.  

Austin, Congress Street, and the Capitol. Image Courtesy Shane Ware.
Austin, Congress Street, and the Capitol. Image Courtesy Shane Ware.

Gail Alfar, author. Exclusive to What’s Up Twitter – April 11, 2023. All Rights Reserved. My goal as an author is to support Twitter 2.0 (X.corp) and Elon Musk in both making lives better on Earth for humans and becoming a space-fairing civilization. I write these articles, I will not use AI of any form to write them, they are time-consuming and I appreciate the opportunity to do this.

Elon Musk tweets a meme about Dogecoin and Twitter

Twitter is Transforming Fast: 5 Main Changes from the Past Week

Gail AlfarLeave a comment
Elon Musk tweets a meme about Dogecoin and Twitter
Elon Musk tweets a meme about Dogecoin and Twitter

Welcome back to my weekly blog! All my articles seek to document the ongoing story of how Elon Musk is transforming Twitter for the better.  There were a lot of exciting changes this past week and I’ll try to summarize all of them for you!  

  • Twitter Verified Organizations went Global
  • The Recommendation Algorithm AND Community Notes are open-source on GitHub
  • Elon Musk talked live on Twitter Spaces (transcript)
  • Dogecoin Logo Appears on Twitter! (update 4/7/23 doge logo disappeared)
  • Twitter sign Becomes Titter!

“If Twitter can be the least imperfect place to find the truth on the internet, then I will consider that we have done a good job.” – Elon Musk

Twitter Verified Organizations became available globally

Twitter Verified Organizations are how organizations and their affiliates can distinguish themselves on Twitter. Twitter allows the Verified Organization to fully control vetting and verifying accounts they’re affiliated with. 

To connect people with accounts affiliated with the organization, each account features an affiliate badge on its profile with the organization’s logo.  It is easy to find these accounts because they are featured on the organization’s Twitter profile.

Twitter’s beta program included sports teams, news organizations, financial firms, Fortune 500 companies, and nonprofits.  Now Verified Organizations is rolling out globally to all interested businesses, nonprofits, governments, and multilateral organizations. But there was one organization that loudly protested Twitter’s new offer, that was the New York Times.

New York Times 

The New York Times decided to forgo any type of verification leading to dramatic news stories across the internet and funny comments from Elon Musk.  The New York Times drama only served as free advertising for Twitter’s new Verified Organization program.

Twitter seeks to gain the trust of the people, and one way to do that is to open-source codes.

GitHub and Twitter Transparency

Now there are two source codes available to all on GitHub! 

  1. “Twitter recommendation”  open source code.  GitHub twitter / the-algorithm 
  2. Community Notes open source code. GitHub twitter / communitynotes 

Twitter Engineering said,

The goal of our open source endeavor is to provide full transparency to you, our users, about how our systems work. 
We’ve released the code powering our recommendations that you can view here (and here) to understand our algorithm in greater detail, and we are also working on several features to provide you greater transparency within our app. 
Some of the new developments we have planned include: 

- A better Twitter analytics platform for creators with more information on reach and engagement
- Greater transparency into any safety labels applied to your Tweets or account
- Greater visibility into why Tweets appear on your timeline

With so many changes happening, Elon Musk spoke on a LIVE Twitter space on April 1st.

Live Conversation with Elon Musk on Twitter Spaces

April Fool’s Day brought many pranks and also a delightful talk with Elon Musk LIVE on Twitter Spaces! 

Here is a transcript of the highlights of the conversation:

“We’ll be adding in the ability to do voice DM.  Through DMs, you’ll be able to speak to someone through a voice chat or a video chat.  So if you’ve got a DM group and you want to turn that into private Spaces or an audio chat or a video chat, you can do so. 
I think it would be kind of cool to have a conversation with someone else without having to give away your phone number. 
There’s some pretty insightful people at Twitter talking about Twitter being like “Trust” as a service and really that is kind of what we’re going for. 
It’s to try to be the most trusted place on the internet in a world where so many people and entities and governments are trying to influence you and in a lot of cases try to trick you with information that isn’t true. 
Where can you go that is the most trusted, or where is the information you can actually count on? Which is not to say that Twitter is perfect, but if Twitter can be the least imperfect place to find the truth on the internet, then I will consider that we have done a good job.” – Elon Musk

Dogecoin Logo Appears on Twitter!

Dogecoin logo appears on Twitter. Image courtesy @cb_doge on Twitter
Dogecoin logo appears on Twitter. Image courtesy @cb_doge on Twitter

On April 3, people started noticing a Dogecoin logo had replaced the blue bird logo in the top sidebar area of Twitter (and it appears in other places too).  Elon Musk has always liked Dogecoin, “the people’s currency.”  He has mentioned it is more fun because it has dogs and memes.  (update 4/7/23 the sneaky little doge disappeared and was replaced with the twitter bird logo)

The playful and sly-looking character of the Shiba Inu dog is delightful to many people, especially to children!  Artists and fans of Dogecoin (including Elon Musk) reacted with joy and celebrated with creating memes.  I’m sharing a few examples below!  Elon is always ready for humor, and the next day he pulled another prank!

Twitter sign Becomes Titter

On March 5, an image was shared by @softwarejameson on Twitter.  A photo (see below) showing the Official Twitter HQ Building was shared and the “W” in the sign was covered up!  This was verified by other videos.

Fans all over the internet began to meme and comment on how Elon was making good on a promise last year when he asked in a survey, “Delete the w in twitter?”

Fans create AI Art for Twitter and Dogecoin

Doge and Twitter are perfect for each other. Image Courtesy @itsALLrisky
Doge and Twitter are perfect for each other. Image Courtesy @itsALLrisky
One of the best collabs all year, Twitter and Doge. Image Courtesy @YSMAC
One of the best collabs all year, Twitter and Doge.
Twitter Bird over X. Unknown artist.
Twitter Bird over X. Unknown artist.
Image Courtesy @softwarejameson on Twitter
Image Twitter HQ with the W taken out. Courtesy @softwarejameson on Twitter

Gail Alfar, author. Exclusive to What’s Up Twitter – April 6, 2023. All Rights Reserved. My goal as an author is to support Twitter 2.0 and Elon Musk in both making lives better on earth for humans and becoming a space-fairing civilization. I write these articles, I will not use AI of any form to write them, they are time-consuming and I appreciate the opportunity to do this.
Elon Musk eats a donut every morning.

Eating a Donut Every Morning and Winning the Battle against Advanced AI Bot Swarms

Gail AlfarLeave a comment
Elon Musk eats a donut every morning.
Elon Musk eats a donut every morning.

One late starry evening a few months ago I watched in fascinating horror as a not-so-advanced bot swarm filled my Twitter account and others with hundreds of “follows” from fake created accounts. We know this happens to many accounts and it is a service that can be bought. Fake accounts still plague my Twitter account and with almost every tweet I do there is an instant message under it that directs people toward a scam. This is nothing compared to what’s next.

Advanced AI Bot Swarms

Imagine the same scenario happening to millions of accounts only the bots are multiplied and equipped with Advanced Artificial Intelligence? It is critical to stop this but not easy. Elon Musk warned us of this on the evening of March 27th while AI continues the make unchecked rapid advances into daily life.

“Starting April 15th, only verified accounts will be eligible to be in For You recommendations.

The is the only realistic way to address advanced AI bot swarms taking over.

It is otherwise a hopeless losing battle.

Voting in polls will require verification for same reason.

That said, it’s ok to have verified bot accounts if they follow terms of service & don’t impersonate a human.” Elon Musk

As a follow-up, Elon Musk added, “Forgot to mention that accounts you follow directly will also be in For You, since you have explicitly asked for them.”

When Future of Life Institute collaborated to create an Open Letter to protect humanity, Elon Musk joined other notable people in signing.

Elon Musk, tech leaders, and university professors sign Open Letter calling for an AI Summer with a pause on advanced AI systems

An Open Letter stating “AI systems with human-competitive intelligence can pose profound risks to society and humanity, as shown by extensive research and acknowledged by top AI labs.” was signed by tech leaders to raise awareness among the general population as to the huge risks of advanced artificial intelligence.

Here are a few of the highlights of the Open Letter and the recommendations:

  • Advanced AI could represent a profound change in the history of life on Earth, and should be planned for and managed with commensurate care and resources.
  • Recent months have seen AI labs locked in an out-of-control race to develop and deploy ever more powerful digital minds that no one – not even their creators – can understand, predict, or reliably control.
  • Powerful AI systems should be developed only once we are confident that their effects will be positive and their risks will be manageable.
  • ACTION: We call on all AI labs to immediately pause for at least 6 months the training of AI systems more powerful than GPT-4.
  • Use this pause to jointly develop and implement a set of shared safety protocols for advanced AI design and development that are rigorously audited and overseen by independent outside experts.
  • AI research and development should be refocused on making today’s powerful, state-of-the-art systems more accurate, safe, interpretable, transparent, robust, aligned, trustworthy, and loyal.
  • Work with policymakers to dramatically accelerate development of robust AI governance systems.
  • Society has hit pause on other technologies with potentially catastrophic effects on society. We can do so here. Let’s enjoy a long AI summer, not rush unprepared into a fall.

Read the OPEN LETTER on the Future of Life website.

A Stressful Situation

The intense level of stress in running Twitter is evident when Elon Musk explained Twitter’s financial situation on March 25th (2023), tweeting, “Yeah, generally correct. Titter was trending to lose ~$3B/year (revenue drop of ~$1.5B + debt servicing of ~$1.5B) and had $1B in cash, so only 4 months of money. Extremely dire situation. Now that advertisers are returning, it looks like we will break even in Q2.”

Sometimes the simple sweetness of good food relieves stress and in the early afternoon of March 28th, Elon Musk tweeted that he eats a donut every morning. Although this was in response to a post from Peter Diamandis stating “Sugar is poison,” Elon makes a wonderful point! Sugar is not poison.

I may just have a sweet Austin, Texas donut and cup of coffee while I read through Matt Taibbi’s compilation of the Twitter Files!

Twitter Files

For an updated capsule summary of all Twitter Files threads to date, with links and an expanded glossary, Matt Taibbi created a nice compilation of one-paragraph summaries of all the Twitter File threads by every reporter with links and notes on key revelations.

To access this click the link here for Racket News.

My thoughts

Artificial Intelligence will attempt to take over the digital world and likely succeed. The innocent days of the internet are over and it will be hard if not impossible to distinguish between what is truly human and AI. Sadly there will be casualties along the way.

We can prevail and continue to persist in awareness, promote the principles we read in the Open Letter, “Pause Giant AI Experiments: An Open Letter,” and be sure not to cancel the delight of sweet donuts!

Gail Alfar, author. Exclusive to What’s Up Twitter – March 30, 2023. All Rights Reserved. My goal as an author is to support Twitter 2.0 and Elon Musk in both making lives better on earth for humans and becoming a space-fairing civilization. I write these articles, I will not use AI of any form to write them, they are time-consuming and I appreciate the opportunity to do this.

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Comedy is legal on Twitter with an Automated Poo Poo Press Dept and more: 8 Updates

Gail AlfarLeave a comment
Twitter HQ

1. “Comedy is now legal on Twitter” – Elon Musk

Humor is one of the sweet things in life that shouldn’t be taken for granted. In late October 2022, after acquiring Twitter, Elon Musk tweeted “Comedy is now legal on Twitter.” The Twitter Press Department is now an automated response email that sends anyone back an instant poo poo emoji. You may try it for yourself at press@twitter.com

2. Rapid Product Improvement at Twitter

In a kind gesture to independent writers who have distanced themselves from mainstream media and their constant quest for clickbait, Elon Musk explained he would be, “Increasing long form to 10k characters soon, along with simple formatting tools, and making it much easier for writers to charge subscription fees for premium content.”

3. Helpful Community Notes arrives on scene

Apparently, I am not the only person who took joy in reading tweets with added helpful context. Within 24 hours of the announcement, the Twitter account for Helpful Community Notes went from almost no followers to 40K followers. The account description says, “Keep up-to-date with the Community Notes people are finding helpful.”

From deep fake photos of Trump in jail, corrections on historical dates to satire that could be misinterpreted and more – Helpful Community Notes fast became an addicting account to follow that shows the value of healthy skepticism.

UPDATE (4/5/2023) Elon Musk tweeted that, “Critically, Community Notes applies equally to every account on this platform without exception, including world leaders & our biggest advertisers.”

4. Twitter Will Avoid Being a Hellscape like Facebook, here’s how…

Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok and Reddit are where many people hang out daily. Bots and trolls are common on most social media and are hard to control and Elon Musk was never fearful of storming into the battle to eliminate them. He explained this on March 18, 2023:

“Any true human can get verified. It’s only $7/month if bought annually via web (without App Store 30% premium).

Yes, non-advertising revenue sources are important, so that this platform is not overly reliant on the whims of corporate America, but having a large number of verified accounts will also clean up the system.

A single desktop computer can create thousands of fake accounts for <1/10th of a penny and the latest AI can get past any “are you human?” checks.

The choices are either move to a verified system or social media becomes a bot/troll hellscape like FB.”

Elon Musk

5. “You are influential and smart!” – Elon Musk

Few people at Twitter in the days prior to Elon Musk’s ownership would have imagined Twitter usage would grow under Elon Musk’s ownership but it did.

My opinion is that the niche ideology of the San Francisco Bay area contributed to a narrow, weak platform heading rapidly into bankruptcy with out-of-control expenses and high salaries. Wine flowed freely from the taps for those that managed to saunter into work while most pretended to work from home, avoiding the office entirely. Just in case any former Twitter employees read this, know that I would be right there with you. The old Twitter sounds like it was a sweet place to work (I am guilty of being more of a slacker at times than you, typical Austin-style), and it was a business model that made profit with questionable placement of ads so it was not sustainable and it did not promote free speech. Enter, Elon Musk. Things changed for the better.

“This platform is growing fast! Just exceeded 8 billion user-minutes per day … of the most influential, smartest people on Earth ; )” Elon Musk

Deep in most people’s psyches, there’s a desire to be known as smart and influential. If you are told you are smart and influential you’ll likely feel pretty good. Elon Musk was raised by Maye Musk, known to be a positive, affirming person. It is not surprising that Elon would reflect this kindness in his treatment of others, both on and off Twitter. Both times I met Elon Musk in person, he radiated kindness. Both on and off Twitter, he can make you feel validated as a person. Freedom of speech and removal of suppression is important on Elon Musk’s Twitter. A not-so-calm sense of urgency permeates the air around Elon Musk. This would surely include the important task of getting Twitter up to speed.

6. There are two sides to every coin

Twitter user Bill Ackman said, “How about a feature that serves you the most-liked tweets that take the opposite side of the argument that you just viewed? We should always want to know the best case against a view we have come to believe. The truth is often revealed when the best advocates for opposing points of view are heard.” Elon Musk replied, “Good idea.”

Unencumbered by a sluggish Board of Directors, Twitter began evolving into what the people want in real-time from the beginning of Elon Musk’s ownership. Speed is the name of the game.

7. “You get what you pay for” – Elon Musk

Viral Tweets are usually laden with replies. How they are viewed varies and on March 18, Elon Musk announced,

In the coming weeks, Twitter will prioritize replies by:

1. People you follow

2. Verified accounts

3. Unverified accounts

Verified accounts are 1000X harder to game by bot & troll armies. There is great wisdom to the old saying: “You get what you pay for.”

8. Hate speech on Twitter is lower than expected

Elon Musk endeavored to identify hate speech and attack it head-on. He hired experts at Sprinklr to quantify hate speech.

Sprinklr’s model scored slur Tweets on “toxicity,” and the likelihood that they constituted hate speech.

Sprinklr defines hate speech more narrowly by evaluating slurs in the nuanced context of their use.
The old version of Twitter took a broader view of the potential toxicity of slur usage. The new Twitter is improved under Elon Musk.

Twitter safety explained, “Our focal metric is hate speech impressions, not the number of Tweets containing slurs. Most slur usage is not hate speech, but when it is, we work to reduce its reach. Sprinklr’s analysis found that hate speech receives 67% fewer impressions per Tweet than non-toxic slur Tweets.”

Elon Musk explained,

“This is a critical distinction. It’s obviously trivial for a single person to create 10k bot accounts on one computer, each of which is tweeting slurs that are written to avoid text string detection.

What matters is whether those tweets are actually shown to real users.” Elon Musk

Conclusion

Can Twitter move ahead any faster than under the ownership of Elon Musk? Probably not. Here’s this week’s updates.

  • The Twitter Press Department is an automated response email that sends anyone back an instant poo poo emoji
  • Writers will soon enjoy publishing on Twitter up to 10k characters soon, along with simple formatting tools so entire articles can be published on Twitter
  • Helpful Community Notes made a debut this week. There’s no better way to keep up to date with Community Notes that people find helpful
  • Removing bots/trolls is possible with Twitter’s paid verified system and without that feature, it could drift toward becoming a bot/troll hellscape like FB
  • Twitter usage is growing, exceeding 8 billion user-minutes per day as of March 2023
  • Actual impressions of tweets containing defined hate speech receive 67% fewer impressions. Elon Musk explained that though these tweets may exist, they are rarely shown to users.
A view of Twitter HQ as owned by Elon Musk. The setting March sun bathes the building.
A view of Twitter HQ as owned by Elon Musk. The setting March sun bathes the building.

Gail Alfar, author. Exclusive to What’s Up Twitter – March 22, 2023. All Rights Reserved. My goal as an author is to support Twitter 2.0 and Elon Musk in both making lives better on earth for humans and becoming a space-fairing civilization.

Your support is appreciated! Contribute to Gail’s “Coffee Fund”

Thank you, have a very lovely day!

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