back to article Twitter will lose 32 million users by end of 2024, Insider Intelligence predicts

More than 32 million Twitter users are forecast to ditch the social media platform within the next two years as they become "frustrated" by technical matters and the rise in post they deem offensive. This is according to Insider Intelligence, a market research agency that has tracked San Francisco-based Twitter since 2008, …

  1. Sean OConnor
    Thumb Up

    So Elon has halved the headcount but users will only drop by 5%? Sounds like sound business to me.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      And most likely the 5% most tediously lefty twitter users. Double win!

      1. Disgusted Of Tunbridge Wells

        Pre-Musk, Twitter was a an antisemitic platform that allowed child porn and intentionally interfered in elections.

        But Musk is the problem...

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          You forgot, their guy won so it isn't interfering.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          > Pre-Musk, Twitter was

          I don't know if you're serious about your specific accusations or merely using them as placeholders.

          If it's the latter case, it's indeed a good point that Twitter (like Facebook) were not exactly poster children *before* the acquisition.

          Whether it will be better once the dust settles, it remains to be seen. I'd give it one year or so before passing judgement.

          (Yes, I know some fanatic is going to shout at me because [insert accusation of something terrible here]. If it makes you feel better, go ahead.)

          1. Disgusted Of Tunbridge Wells

            Given what's come out recently about Musk having to change the policy on child porn to actively trying to remove it, I think that anybody opposed to Musk's ownership needs to have a good look in the mirror.

            1. genghis_uk

              Musk has been known to spout BS though... on the odd occasion.

              Meanwhile in real-land:

              The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), the organization tasked by the U.S. government with tracking reports of child sexual abuse material online, said little has changed under Musk’s leadership in terms of Twitter’s reporting practices so far.

              “Despite the rhetoric and some of what we’ve seen people posting online, their CyberTipline numbers are almost identical to what they were prior to Musk coming on board,” said NCMEC representative Gavin Portnoy, referring to the organization’s centralized CSAM reporting system.

              Portnoy noted that one change the group did notice was that Twitter didn’t send a representative to the organization’s annual social media roundtable.

              “The previous person was one of the folks who resigned,” Portnoy said. When asked if Twitter wanted to send a proxy, Portnoy said that Twitter declined.

              Removing a few hashtags does not fix the problem, it's just performance. Sacking or forcing the people who deal with this out is not a step in the right direction either

            2. Ace2 Silver badge

              You know what, I really hate roadside litter. Around here they have Dept of Transportation teams that come through every once in a while and clean up, but it’s not enough.

              I have a solution though - when I take over, I’m going to fire the litter crews for not solving the problem. Then I’ll just stay at home, where the roadside is nice and clean. Problem solved! Brilliant!

        3. Ace2 Silver badge

          Are you ill?

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        RE: lefty twitter users

        Poor thing. How can you exist in the same sphere of influence as your hated lefties??

        I suggest Iran, they are very welcoming.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: RE: lefty twitter users

          We feel sorry for them as they do not know any better. The hatred is coming from them.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: RE: lefty twitter users

            If your comment is regarding lefties hating...

            I suggest you do some actual research on how many lives have been lost to right-wing political activities versus left-wing, at least in the United States.

            Get back to me after you do...and get a clue.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: RE: lefty twitter users

              https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/10/27/in-america-far-right-terrorist-plots-have-outnumbered-far-left-ones-in-2020

              https://www.adl.org/news/op-ed/right-wing-extremist-violence-is-our-biggest-threat-the-numbers-dont-lie

              1. MrDamage

                Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                You can't post well researched sources! It completely derails their bollocks points.

                1. Anonymous Coward
                  Anonymous Coward

                  Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                  Odd how their only real metric to classify things as 'right wing' is if they can find some incredibly tenuous link that lets them call it 'antisemitic'. Also odd how the most antisemitic people are found on the left. For example the squad are notorious for their anti-Israel rhetoric.

                  Calling George Soros an evil man for profiteering off others suffering = far right terrorism!!!1

                  Supporting a terrorist organisation that attacks Israel or calling for the destruction of Israel as a country = just fine, nothing to see here

                  1. Triggerfish

                    Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                    You can criticise Isreal the goverments policies and not be anti-semetic.

                    1. Anonymous Coward
                      Anonymous Coward

                      Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                      How convenient. I suppose that exclusion doesn't apply if the person making comments is someone you dislike?

                  2. Anonymous Coward
                    Anonymous Coward

                    Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                    > notorious for their anti-Israel rhetoric

                    Please understand that antisemitism means hatred of Jewish people. The word you're looking for is antizionism.

                    1. Anonymous Coward
                      Anonymous Coward

                      Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                      https://www.adl.org/resources/glossary-term/anti-zionism

                      "Anti-Zionism is antisemitic"

                      1. Anonymous Coward
                        Anonymous Coward

                        Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                        > "Anti-Zionism is antisemitic"

                        Says the "anti defamation league" (rolls eyes).

                        For the record, I am an Israelite (an atheist jew if you prefer). My grandparents were sabras. I lived there for a short while as a child and visited many times since, while I still had relatives.

                        My entire family, *especially* the sabras opposed Zionism (aka bunch of Eastern European communist zealots) and I can no longer bear to visit that wretched place, despite there being some wonderful people and places that I miss.

                        The ADL are in the same basket: far right opportunists. There are plenty other Jewish and/or Israeli organisations that you can support if you want to. Mine is B'Tselem.

                        1. Anonymous Coward
                          Anonymous Coward

                          Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                          The ADL jump on any <current thing> to whip up funding.

                          Looks like I struck a sore nerve using an ADL article to prove that their whole argument is bogus.

            2. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: RE: lefty twitter users

              Only when you class everything that doesn't fit your ideology as 'far right'. Walking up behind someone and blowing their brains out or running someone over as you think they might be right wing is pretty bad. And the lies about Jan 6th to make a legitimate protest seem worse than the BLM protests.... How many people were murdered during the BLM protests and the whole CHAZ/CHOP thing?

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                BLM: not a lot, it was mostly property damage.

                See, you are trying to justify a stance without factual evidence. BLM was mostly riots, versus right-wing terrorist actions. Read, and learn.

                1. Anonymous Coward
                  Anonymous Coward

                  Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                  I think you need to do the learning. Terrorism is:

                  "The use of violence or the threat of violence, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political goals".

                  "Resort to terrorizing methods as a means of coercion, or the state of fear and submission produced by the prevalence of such methods."

                  That is BLM and antifa summed up perfectly. Do as we say or we will do bad things.

                  The factual evidence is someone with a bad case of TDS walked up behind someone and shot them. Another person, again with TDS, ran over someone as they thought that person didn't share their political ideology. A car was shot up in the CHAZ and at least one occupant killed while they filmed it and congratulated themselves about it. At least 2 other black people killed by others in the CHAZ/CHOP. Numerous people have been shot at or shot by far left protesters. David Dorn was murdered by BLM protesters while looting.

                  The left is the side of hated and destruction.

                  1. werdsmith Silver badge

                    Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                    Two AC accounts providing an excellent demonstration of what is wrong with twitter.

                    1. Ace2 Silver badge

                      Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                      Two accounts? Or just one giant stinky sockpuppet.

                  2. beast666 Silver badge

                    Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                    Good summary.

                  3. cmdrklarg

                    Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                    *** The left is the side of hated and destruction. ***

                    The right is the side of lies and projection.

                  4. MrDamage

                    Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                    And just what, would you call the events of January 6? Terrorism? Traitorous Insurrection?

                    While we're on the subject, where is all the proof of the election being stolen? We're still waiting.

                    1. Anonymous Coward
                      Anonymous Coward

                      Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                      Legitimate 1st amendment protest to petition the government for a redress of grievances. Unfortunately the glowies got involved.

                      BLM and antifa targeted random people and businesses.

                      1. Blank Reg

                        Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                        I can see why you posted as AC, wouldn't want people to know you're stupid enough to believe that crap.

              2. veti Silver badge

                Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                In 9000 protests during 2020, 25 people died. About half of them were protesters. That figure includes the total of zero police officers.

                In *one* "protest" in 2021, five people died and four later police suicides have been linked to the event.

                False equivalence. Especially when you consider that one of these events was purposely inspired by the president.

                1. Anonymous Coward
                  Anonymous Coward

                  Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                  Lets not forget that the BLM protests were encouraged by the democrats who also funded bailing out the protesters.

              3. Blank Reg

                Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                Anyone delusional enough to claim Jan 6 was a legitimate protest isn't worth listening to.

                1. Anonymous Coward
                  Anonymous Coward

                  Re: RE: lefty twitter users

                  Same goes for the BLM grifters. How much money did they raise through BLM and how much has disapeared into the pockets of the leaders?

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: RE: lefty twitter users

          > I suggest Iran, they are very welcoming.

          Actually, they are. By far some of the most welcoming, polite and approachable people I have ever met.

          I cannot speak as to their government, but Iranians are a great bunch.

      3. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        > And most likely the 5% most tediously lefty twitter users.

        I'm sorry but I take issue with calling anyone "leftie" in this context.

        The pro Trump bunch certainly aren't.

        The anti Trump bunch certainly aren't either.

        Take those who supported the "BLM" thing. Where are they when it comes to Palestinian lives? Or to the 3,000+ lives senselessly lost in the Mediterranean every year? Or to actually stopping the war in Ukraine? Or in Yemen? Or to caring about the people of the Central African Republic or the DRC? Those people not "black" enough?

        They're not leftists. They're not fighting for a better world. They're not fighting injustice. In fact, they're not fighting at all, just hating. That is not the left.

        (Rant over)

        1. DS999 Silver badge

          Idiots like the one you are responding to call anyone who doesn't worship Trump a "leftie".

    2. alain williams Silver badge

      Twitter costs

      Payroll may be halved, but how does that compare to other costs such as data centres and network, presumably they will not change ?

      1. Dinanziame Silver badge

        Re: Twitter costs

        The biggest difference compared to before is that Twitter borrowed $13B in order to buy itself from shareholders. This is now costing $1B in interest per year. Which is a bit more than what Twitter is saving by having fired 5k employees.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Twitter costs

          > Twitter borrowed $13B

          Nope, the group of investors (led by Musk) who bought Twitter did.

          1. werdsmith Silver badge

            Re: Twitter costs

            A leveraged buyout places the debt on the bought out company.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: Twitter costs

              Thank you for the correction. I didn't know it was a leveraged buyout.

            2. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: Twitter costs

              How does that work?

              If it is possible to saddle the company bought with the debt of the funds used to buy the company anyone could have bought Twitter?

              1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

                Re: Twitter costs

                Not only is it possible, it has been common practice ever since the first "junk" bonds were issued.

              2. Sweskie

                Re: Twitter costs

                It's an infamous practice - mortgaging the company in order to buy it. There's a great old movie called Barbarians at the Gate that quite hilariously outlines one of LBO's high-profile failures.

          2. Dinanziame Silver badge

            Re: Twitter costs

            Nope, the group of investors (led by Musk) who bought Twitter did.

            No. The debt falls on Twitter. Another way to see it is that Twitter borrowed money to give it to its shareholders, which instantly reduced its own worth by the same amount, becoming cheap enough to be bought by the group of investors with a smaller amount of money. That's why Elon said that the company was losing $4M a day, that's the debt interest Twitter has to pay.

      2. Mister Dubious
        Facepalm

        Re: Twitter costs

        According to a story in the New York Times, Musk has directed his people not to pay its vendors nor its landlords. That ought to produce a noticeable savings, I'd think.

        There may, of course, be some slight service disruptions when landlords padlock the offices and vendors cease delivering goods and services. How well does a Twitter server room run when the electricity is shut off for non-payment?

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      The engine on your car will continue to run even if you don't change the oil filter. Up until the point it doesn't.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        > The engine on your car will continue to run even if you don't change the oil filter

        Which oil filter? :)

        In fact, which engine? :o)

    4. jollyboyspecial

      Revenue comes from advertisers, not users. So from a financial point of view the number of users is largely irrelevant.

      1. MrDamage

        When was the last time you saw Coca-Cola put a billboard in the middle of the desert where noone can see it?

        Yeah, user numbers matter to advertisers.

  2. Steve Kerr

    Virtual users

    Is that 32 million actual users or 32 million bots?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Virtual users

      The bots will stay. They don't cause him any trouble, they just piss people off. I think twitter has bigger problems right now!

    2. Howard Sway Silver badge

      Re: Virtual users

      Musk was complaining about the number of bots when trying to back out of the purchase deal.

      Now he's boasted about getting the user count up to a billion, the software team are probably doing little else than writing the bots that he will count as users to enable him to claim that the target has been reached.

  3. Marty McFly Silver badge
    FAIL

    Non-issue

    In order to leave Twitter, one must first be a Twitter user. I don't use Twitter, I have never used Twitter, and to the best of my knowledge no one I associate with uses Twitter.

    I do see news articles about <important person> said <blah> on Twitter. It really seems Twitter is a platform for <important person> to get an audience they would not otherwise have. I wonder how many live humans have Twitter on their devices, actively monitor it, and actively post to it.

    Or maybe I live in a bubble and my personal experience does not represent Twitter's actual user base....?

    1. Steve Button Silver badge

      Re: Non-issue

      Why the hell would you read an article about Twitter and then come on here to post that you don't use it and you don't know anyone who uses it? Truly bizarre. Not just that, but you keep doing it. There's several like this from a month ago.

      It's a bit like someone writing to their local paper to complain about what goes on in the local pub, which they have never been to and don't know anyone who goes to... but they can only imagine the shenanigans that they must get up to in there?

      1. Marty McFly Silver badge
        Coat

        Re: Non-issue

        Hehehe, good point. Maybe it is because people like you will follow me here. And you wouldn't know I existed on a different platform....like Twitter.

        1. Steve Button Silver badge

          Re: Non-issue

          There are no "people like me". I'm a unique little snowflake.

          1. cmdrklarg

            Re: Non-issue

            Just like everyone else.

            1. Michael Wojcik Silver badge

              Re: Non-issue

              [Obligatory Life of Brian reference.]

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Non-issue

        > Why the hell would you read an article about Twitter and then come on here to post that you don't use it and you don't know anyone who uses it?

        For better or worse, it's clearly an influential platform worth discussing about whether or not you're a user (I'm not either).

        1. werdsmith Silver badge

          Re: Non-issue

          Unfortunately, regardless of whether we use it or not, it still has a negative effect on all of us.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Non-issue

            > Unfortunately, regardless of whether we use it or not, it still has a negative effect on all of us.

            That is my feeling as well. Career diplomats aren't crazy about it either.

            I'm sure it has some advantages, but I wish it hadn't been monopolised by one company.

      3. MrDamage

        Re: Non-issue

        >> Why the hell would you read an article about Twitter and then come on here to post that you don't use it and you don't know anyone who uses it?

        The same reason you waste your breath ranting at someone who admits they don't use Twatter.

      4. NXM

        Re: Non-issue

        Mary Whitehouse used to complain all the time about stuff she hadn't seen.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Non-issue

      > I don't use Twitter, I have never used Twitter, and to the best of my knowledge no one I associate with uses Twitter.

      That's two of us. :)

      If it ever did become a platform for balanced and civilised debate, then I might consider it, but it would need to come with strong privacy safeguards, which I see as unlikely.

  4. theAltoid

    Event Horizon

    "There won't be one catastrophic event that ends Twitter,..."

    Musk was the one catastrophic event.

    Liberate tutemet ex inferis (Save yourself from hell).

    1. Steve Button Silver badge

      Re: Event Horizon

      I'm not sure if that's true or not, but it's certainly been *fun* watching it happen these last couple of months.

      I'm mainlining Twitter several times a day, like it's a white powder. (I'm probably mixing my drug metaphors here - don't do drugs kids, it addles your brain).

      May you live in interesting times.

  5. Spanners
    Alien

    I hope to stick around.

    I am a less profitable Twitterer. I rarely originate a tweet but I comment on other peoples ones. Does that make me less profitable to him?

    I opened a Mastodon account in the spring but didn't do much with it until a month ago. I have tried to put people on it that I follow on Twitter. I will do my online debates there more often but I will hang onto both and see. Perhaps Musk will drop it before completely destroying it. There's only 8,432,428 accounts on mastodon at present anyway (15:00 14/12).

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I hope to stick around.

      > There's only 8,432,428 accounts on mastodon at present anyway

      The number of active users is much, much less, and because of its fragmentation you cannot see much of what goes on in other servers than yours unless you have multiple accounts (and even so).

      Also, there is some very sick people in there and no mechanism to encourage a healthy exchange of views. The whole platform is designed to exclude those who don't think like you (via multiple blocking mechanisms) rather than to find points in common.

      Lastly, by the third time your account is deleted because you posted something (perfectly civil) that your server admin does not agree with, you start to realise that that's not really the place to be (if you run your own instance, you'll find an admin that doesn't agree with you and he's going to block his users from reaching you, without asking them of course, and try to get your server added to their version of Spamhaus. Very sad altogether.)

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Why do you hope to stick around?

      Genuinely, why?

      While parts of the world have inadvisably decided to rely on Twitter for various public functions, despite the fact they have next to no control over the platform or it's operation, that most of world isn't on Twitter, and despite the platform fueling misinformation and political strife that have resulted in hate crimes, murders, and help fuel hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths.

      The world got along OK before modern social media, why are we sticking around. Why try to fix a broken system, or re-invent it? Mass communication worked fine before Twitter and Facebook. The only people that benefited from it did so at the expense of their users and public at large, despite fueling literal ethnic cleansing and genocide.

      As Twitter clearly demonstrates, even a company that is trying to suppress the worst of those effects can suddenly find itself under new management, and heading the wrong direction in a hurry.

      I feel like shutting Twitter down is the only sane and responsible solution to the problems it keeps creating. On finding a 1000lb bomb in their living room, the last thing I expect someone to do after the bomb squad removes it is to start shopping for another bomb.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Why do you hope to stick around?

        > While parts of the world have inadvisably decided to rely on Twitter for various public functions, despite the fact they have next to no control over the platform or it's operation, that most of world isn't on Twitter, and despite the platform fueling misinformation and political strife that have resulted in hate crimes, murders, and help fuel hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths.

        Yeah I don't understand it either. However, I fear that we just cannot go back to the pre Facebook days now (Facebook being the first successful so-called social media, though the idea had been around since the late 90s, cf. The Globe, at one point the world's most valuable company IIRC).

        Some countries do a good job of prosecuting harassment and other serious stuff done on the internet, but needless to say that's a double edged sword.

      2. Michael Wojcik Silver badge

        Re: Why do you hope to stick around?

        It's a question we can debate, but in practical terms it doesn't matter. Online social media have proven sufficiently popular with the wealthy1 that they're not going to go away.

        Reg forums aside, I essentially don't use social media either. I never post or comment or "like" someone else's post, and while I do a quick check of Facebook every few days to see what family members might be up to, I wouldn't miss it if it went away. I'm only looking to maintain some awareness of what's going on in their lives. I don't look at other social-media sites at all.

        But social media care not at all that I don't participate. I'm a drop in the ocean.

        1"Wealthy" relative to the global average, that is. People with sufficient access to resources that they can indulge the habit.

  6. Elongated Muskrat Silver badge

    This assumes Twitter will still exist in a year's time.

    Given the number of law-suits Musk is currently attracting for doing things like failing to pay severance pay, trying to turn offices into dormitories, and getting rid of legally mandated mechanisms for tackling abuse, and the fact that advertisers, the only source of income apart from trying to charge people for coloured ticks, are fleeing like rats from a sinking ship that is also on fire, I'd be very surprised if Twitter doesn't file for bankruptcy well before then.

    1. Elongated Muskrat Silver badge

      I see the angry Muskovites are here to readily downvote anything remotely critical of their messiah.

      “Good. I can feel your anger. I am defenseless. Take your weapon. Strike me down with all your hatred, and your journey towards the dark side will be complete.”

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        So out of the millions or billions of twitter users ONE single tweet is your argument.

        You could be mistaken for a modern journalist at any rag today quoting a handful of tweets as if it maters

        ... or ...

        Grow Up & Get Real !

        1. Elongated Muskrat Silver badge

          What the fuck are you talking about? The quote is from a rather well-known film. I didn't think it needed attribution, because to the vast majority of people, it would be immediately obvious. Silly me, I forgot exactly how much stupid there is on the internet.

          Not everything has to be a "tweet," you know.

      2. Jellied Eel Silver badge

        I see the angry Muskovites are here to readily downvote anything remotely critical of their messiah.

        This has been one of the most entertaining aspects, watching just how quickly the worm's turn. Only a short while ago, he was the darling of the liberal left. What better way to signal your virtue than buying a Tesla, a Powerwall, and solar panels. Then, he revolutionised transport by announcing the Hypeloop, and the media did a lot of free PR for the world's richest man. It's like an airhockey table in a vacuum tube, it's really not that hard. Then he hit Vegas, and the media was there to promote his exciting and thrilling adventure of Tesla's driving slowly through a drain pipe.

        And then he bought Twitter.

        So now people can get to see how quickly those caring, sharing liberals turn into fascist authoritarians because they can no longer censor people's speech. How dare he! He's also been exposed to a lot of agression from those liberals because they may now be exposed to unwanted microagressions. And only today, he triggered a lot of liberals by posting an emoji of a rabbit.

        It's strange really. Conservatives are now the most liberal, and liberals the most fascist. The reality inversion is almost complete.

        1. Elongated Muskrat Silver badge

          I can't think of one person I know, many of whom are what you so charmingly describe as "the liberal left", who has ever though that Musk was anything other than an overprivileged arsehole.

          For reference, lefties don't tend to approve of billionaires, the wealth of whom is derived from unfettered and unregulated capitalism, at the expense of the workers. Whether you lean to the left, or to the right, trying to cast neoliberal* economics, which are very right-ring, as leftism is a category error.

          *Don't be fooled by the "liberal" bit in there, I know it's a trigger word for a lot of the hard-of-thinking.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            "derived from unfettered and unregulated capitalism"

            More accurately derived from unregulated crony capitalism and rampant government sanctioned corruption. This is not exclusive to the left or the right. Once the ruling class get a taste for the good life they just want more.

            1. Elongated Muskrat Silver badge

              Yes, this is true. The problem being that those who rise to the top have a tendency towards being psychopaths, because the ability to tread on others is advantageous in gaining such power.

              It's worth noting the adage that the extreme left and extreme right are pretty much indistinguishable (cf Stalin and Hitler), but this isn't necessarily a problem with leftism as such, but more the failing of the ideology, and the fact that if there is an opportunity for someone to abuse the system, someone will. I'd say that Stalin, himself, was a right-wing authoritarian (much like Putin) and that he "gamed the system" to gain power under the pretence of communism. Actual soviet communism didn't really last very long at all after the October Revolution, and gave way to authoritarianism very quickly.

              Anyway, tl;dr: eat the rich.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            > For reference, lefties don't tend to approve of billionaires

            Speaking as, I suppose, a "leftie", I don't judge people by their station in life.

            I had the privilege of working in the emergency services, and that's taught me that everyone, rich and poor, the educated and the illiterate, aristocrats and factory workers, have the same feelings and emotions. They can all be kind or arseholes, funny or boring, generous or miserly.

            If you're talking about dogmatic people who quote Marx (when it's to their advantage), then I suppose you're right though.

            PS: sorry about the down vote, finger error.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Once again, kudos to the author

    I'm pleased to see another sober, balanced article on the subject, following the recent one from Richard Curie.

    Contrary to what Williams claimed in a now hidden comment accompanying the other article, I don't really care whose side you take (if any) as long as the information is factual and balanced and opinions are clearly marked as such.

    Thanks.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

    .. by not paying his dues, like the salaries and severance payments of the people he threw out and the rent for Twitter offices around the world.

    According to the New York Times, staff has been instructed not to pay vendors in anticipation of lawsuits.

    Quote: "Twitter’s leaders have also discussed the consequences of denying severance payments to thousands of people who have been laid off since the takeover, two people familiar with the talks said. And Mr. Musk has threatened employees with lawsuits if they talk to the media and “act in a manner contrary to the company’s interest,” according to an internal email sent last Friday."

    Add to that that the changes at Twitter has drawn the attention of regulators, in the US because there is an FTC consent decree in place and in the EU because pretty much disabling content management will break new EU laws aimed at reducing exposure to the resulting online junk and I really cannot see this last much longer.

    What's more, it is possible that the other companies also start taking direct hits. Musk has taken people from Space X to fill the vacancies of lawyers he threw out, and ditto for Tesla IT staff. Given that he wants those companies to run as lean as possible it logically follows that he has thus been removing people that actually cannot be missed there (the price you pay for (too) lean tends to be a massive lack of resilience).

    As I have said before, maybe it's time someone educated the man about the concept of "consequences"..

    1. Andy 73 Silver badge

      Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

      Why educate him? If it turns out he's right, then it's not really education.

      If it turns out he's wrong, then just think of the benefit of him really, truly being seen as wrong.

      There are those who will defend his every fart - despite some very high profile screw-ups. A few are doing the five stages of grief thing as he comes under more critical public scrutiny. Then there is the cohort that only care about the politics and just want someone "like them" to be in charge, and who will accept any amount of poor behaviour and even outright fraud to get that.

      In no cases does education make things better.

    2. Arthur the cat Silver badge

      Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

      According to the New York Times, staff has been instructed not to pay vendors in anticipation of lawsuits.

      Rather a self fulfilling prophecy. If you don't pay your suppliers you can usually expect law suits.

      1. Elongated Muskrat Silver badge

        Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

        ...unless you're one of their major customers, and the lack of liquidity from you not paying them means they can't afford lawyers...

        It wouldn't be the first time that people have been put out of business by this sort of tactic, and it should be stamped on a lot harder.

        If I had any sort of commercial relationship with Twitter, right now I'd be demanding cash up front, like utilities do with people who have bad credit ratings.

      2. Jellied Eel Silver badge

        Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

        Rather a self fulfilling prophecy. If you don't pay your suppliers you can usually expect law suits.

        I get the feeling litigation's going to be Twitters undoing. As the censorship's been exposed, more people harmed by those actions are threatening to sue. If they sue Twitter, and cases end up before a friendly judge, Twitter may end up on the hook for the actions of it's ex-employees.

        1. Ace2 Silver badge

          Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

          There was no censorship on twitter.

          Repeating that lie a million times will not make it true.

          1. Jellied Eel Silver badge

            Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

            There was no censorship on twitter.

            Repeating that lie a million times will not make it true.

            Err.. really? Twitter didn't ban accounts, delete tweets, edit tweets to add trigger warnings? The NYP was always free to tweet about the Biden laptop, doctors were free to discuss Covid.

            Sure, if you believe some sections of the media, that never happened, or was old news and a big nothingburger. But that doesn't make their lies true either. The EU also isn't proposing legislation to ban 'misinformation', presumably that'll include anything mentioning corruption and large suitcases stuffed with euros.

            This-

            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Woods#Twitter_account

            In December 2022, Woods announced his intentions to sue the Democratic National Committee following Elon Musk's release of the Twitter Files. Journalist Matt Taibbi reported that the Democratic National Committee requested a tweet made by Woods, related to Hunter Biden, be removed from Twitter.

            Never happened. Nor did the actions that lead to any of the other lawsuits filed as a result of Musk & Taibbi's revelations.

            1. Ace2 Silver badge

              Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

              James Woods posted a stolen, non consensual dick pic of Hunter Biden! What planet do you live on? What the fuck is the matter with you? That will get you banned anywhere, including here.

              Which, please, go ahead, do us all a favor…

          2. codejunky Silver badge

            Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

            @Ace2

            To give you the benefit of the doubt I think your post was unclear-

            "There was no censorship on twitter." <- Repeating that lie a million times will not make it true.

            FIFY

            1. Ace2 Silver badge

              Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

              Content moderation is not censorship, moron. ALL SOCIAL NETWORKS, including this one, moderate content. Gab, GETTR, Truth Social, Parler, same same same.

              Would you people stop posting the same stupid shit over and over and go learn something?

              https://www.techdirt.com/2022/11/02/hey-elon-let-me-help-you-speed-run-the-content-moderation-learning-curve/

              1. codejunky Silver badge

                Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

                @Ace2

                "Content moderation is not censorship, moron. ALL SOCIAL NETWORKS, including this one, moderate content. Gab, GETTR, Truth Social, Parler, same same same."

                Awesome so you are smart enough to know the difference between moderation and censorship. And twitter has been caught out performing censorship.

                "Would you people stop posting the same stupid shit over and over and go learn something?"

                Self reflection please. Maybe a little time with a mirror.

                1. genghis_uk
                  FAIL

                  Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

                  No Twitter was caught out doing moderation. At no point did they attempt to stop anyone posting the same thing on another site. They did not stop anyone going on Fox News to complain and repeat what Twitter removed.

                  Moderation = removing stuff Twitter did not want to see on their site

                  Censorship = preventing someone from mentioning something anywhere (usually a Government move as they have the legal power)

                  Saying Facebook / Twitter / YouTube etc. censored something is usually a very good pointer that you don't know what you are talking about (along with the Fire in a Theatre thing and the election was stolen!)

                  1. codejunky Silver badge

                    Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

                    @genghis_uk

                    "No Twitter was caught out doing moderation. At no point did they attempt to stop anyone posting the same thing on another site."

                    So because twitter did censorship only on their website its called moderation? And in that case since it was the FBI contacting social media, not just twitter, are you saying its the FBI that was performing censorship?

                    "Moderation = removing stuff Twitter did not want to see on their site

                    Censorship = preventing someone from mentioning something anywhere (usually a Government move as they have the legal power)"

                    It does seem that is what you are saying, I just want to be clear. And it was political bias 'moderating' with what appears to be direct violation of company policy and potentially legal violation of the federal law (so their concerned legal council advised). Moderating doesnt seem to be the right word for that.

                    1. genghis_uk

                      Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

                      I agree it's not a good look that the feds were contacting twitter with lists of accounts. However, the twitter moderators worked in the same way as if you or I contacted them to flag abuse - they checked first and only deactivated some of the accounts. This was not a case where the government told them they had to remove the accounts, they were flagged for potential TOS violations. It may be questionable but its not censorship.

                      Political bias is perfectly acceptable. If twitter wanted to bias their moderation that is their right. They don't have to be unbiased, they are a private company. What makes you think that they have to host speech they don't like? Musk certainly has a major bias but that's his right too.

                      Here's a thing.. go onto Truth and post that Trump lost. See how long that post lasts before it is removed. Perfectly within their rights to remove it but are they unbiased? Or Gab? or Parler?

              2. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: Musk is apparently considering doing a Trump thing ..

                There is a big difference between content moderation and the government asking for stuff that does not break any laws or terms of service to be removed.

  9. tiggity Silver badge

    I'm confused

    It says "proliferation of hateful or other unsavory content"

    I thought, from what I have read *, that Twitter has supposedly been like that for ages - that offensive content could easily be found - if so would anyone notice a difference?

    I know when I do periodic inspections of what dross is caught by my email spam tools (just in case any false positives, there sometimes are - but the false positives are mainly recruiter emails which, TBF, do strongly resemble spam in some of their language use) I have noticed some junk mails with links to FB or twitter URLs, so have long assumed a fair amount of crap / suspect content hosted on social media sites.

    *Unsurprisingly not really a social media user (things such as comments in El Reg & other forums about as close as I get) so social media knowledge mainly reliant on what I read online / in the press, but have read plenty of Twitter cesspit type of stories over the years

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: I'm confused

      It says "proliferation of hateful or other unsavory content"

      Your confusion may stem from the fact that there's a word missing. If you add "more" to that line it will make perfect sense.

  10. Kimo

    Another option...

    How many of those unpaid bills cover data centers? Losing one won't kill Twitter, but it makes it less stable and slower. Losing one and then having an outage?

  11. Slx

    The question is definitely which type of users leave. If they’re active content generating accounts or the accounts that are the accidental editors of Twitter, finding and. aggregating content by retweeting frequently, then it will suffer very badly.

    I notice my Twitter feed became a lot less busy and has been mostly full of people sniping at each other about mostly American style ‘culture war’ politics, which frankly bores me to the point I stop being interested at the feeds anymore.

    My other observation is the tone / vibe has deteriorated. I’m just noticing a lot more of the ‘standing on street corners looking for a fight’ style of posting some statement and waiting for an argument.

    It’s just my personal prediction, but I think Twitter will fade faster than a lot of commentators think. It’s not *all that* long ago people were wondering about MySpace’s stranglehold monopoly…

    An article from 2007:

    https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2007/feb/08/business.comment

    None of these platforms are as indispensable as they seem in the moment. The internet keeps on churning.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      We, as a business, are currently getting some help & advice about marketing, etc, and the person who is advising us is already talking about Twitter in the past tense really, more or less written off as a platform to start using for promotion.

      I don't know how significant or representative their view is, but it kind of resonates with the majority of comentards here as well as the big-name companies pulling back due to concerns of it descending in to a site that folks become unwilling to associate with in polite company. For example, which serious company would buy adverts on 8chan or the likes?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Yeah, such a myspace/geocites/slashdot lesson

      just like IRC lead to ICQ to AIM to Google and Slack and now everyones on Discord.

      Twitter and Metafacebitch have tried to Jedi mind trick the world into thinking they were somehow different, eternal. They were taking a page from Google on that point I think. But in reality, the decline started when people started piling onto Snapchat. Facebook was for the olds, and Twitter went corporate, the cool kids already left. That was well before the platform was take over by trolls and rage politics, and where everyone has to wear a carefully manicured mask to avoid stalking, trolling, hate crimes, and cancel culture. Where too much of the chatter is bots or scumbag "Influencers" selling bad advice and snake oil.

      Now will see if Twitter will lurch on for years as a zombie corpse, spreading lies, hate, and misinformation, or if in bankruptcy they will pull the plug and let it die. Either way, it's a mark on anyone that chooses to stay at this point.

    3. jockmcthingiemibobb

      Spot on. I was a very active user. I gave Musk the benefit of the doubt & hung around for a few weeks but the tone of the whole site deteriorated. My twitter addiction is now cured. I can't ever see myself indulging in it again & I can't be the only one

  12. Winkypop Silver badge
    Stop

    By all accounts

    Why would respectable business and government agencies remain on the platform?

    Most business, and I would hope, all government agencies will denounce hate, treason, violence and disrespect.

    Unsubscribe now, avoid the rush.

  13. Blackjack Silver badge

    ['Technical issues and proliferation of hateful content' blamed]

    What a polite way to say "Elon Musk".

  14. Charles Smith

    Employment prospects

    I keep getting messages from a guy called Winston Smith. He's recently become available and is looking for a job.

  15. Intractable Potsherd

    I like the new Twitter. Fewer gender-critical accounts are getting banned due to false allegations of "hatred", and many are getti g their accounts back. Truth is not hatred.

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