The one reason why Elon Musk’s Twitter Blue plan will kill Twitter
Musk wants to monetize the value of “verification,” but in doing so he kills its value.
Twitter verification existed mainly to benefit all Twitter users.
By placing a blue badge on the profiles of people likely to be impersonated, every Twitter user could know, for example, which of the many “Mike Elgan” accounts using my picture and name was the real McCoy, so to speak.
They could converse with their representative in Congress and not a racist troll using that Congressperson’s name and photo.
They could express their opinion to a journalist about her story and not mistakenly interact with a paid Russian disinformation sock puppet.
And they could praise their favorite celebrity instead of the criminal stealing that celebrity’s identity to run a scam.
Twitter verification ends Saturday. That’s the day Musk says “notable” verified users will lose their badge. After Saturday, the mini icon formerly used to show verification will now signify a paid subscription to Twitter Blue.
In addition to getting a fake verification badge, Twitter Blue paid accounts will appear exclusively on Twitter’s “For You” recommended page, making it nearly impossible to go viral unless you pay.
Only paid accounts can vote in polls, shrinking poll participants and making them even more worthless. (I predict the average poll will have fewer than 10 respondents.)
And paid Twitter Blue accounts will see their tweets and comments prioritized over non-paying users. Tweets by the majority of users will never be seen by anyone.
The vast majority of users will be rendered voiceless.
Twitter Blue creates inequality
Celebrities like William Shatner, Stephen King, Josh Gad and Lynda Carter recently slammed Musk for charging for Twitter Blue, suggesting that many celebrities may not pay. (Or, they’ll join fellow celebrities like Adam McKay, Jim Carrey, Shona Rhimes and Elton John in quitting the platform.)
When Shatner complained on Twitter about having to pay, Musk replied: “It’s more about treating everyone equally. There shouldn’t be a different standard for celebrities.”
Except everyone isn’t being treated equally. Users like Musk have to work a millisecond to earn the $8 monthly fee; farmers in El Salvador (where I am now) have to work a half day for the $8. In several African countries, the average person would have to work several days per month and give those days’ wages to the world’s riches man in order to have a voice on Twitter.
Half the world’s population lives on a daily wage that’s less than the monthly fee for Twitter Blue. That’s a less-than-subsistence wage — not enough to live on. Probably 90 percent of the world’s population would consider the Twitter Blue fee to be an unacceptable extravagance.
Musk has turned Twitter from a somewhat egalitarian town square to yet another place where people with money are heard and the rest are silenced.
Also: Musk’s “treating everyone equally” lie was laid bare this week by Plaformer, which reported that Twitter now maintains a list of some 35 users who get super special treatment, and whose tweets are boosted above even paid Twitter Blue subscribers. This list includes some Republican political influencers, a few celebrities and, of course, Elon Musk himself.
The numbers don’t add up
Advertisers fled Musk’s chaotic and troll-friendly “policies,” often dreamed up on a whim to benefit Musk, personally — the advertisers are not coming back.
As a result, Musk secretly valued the company this week at $20 billion — less than half the $44 billion he paid for it.
Musk fired thousands of employees, leaving the company with overworked skeleton crews unable to keep up with harassment and trolling, further alienating ordinary users.
Musk even stopped paying the rent.
Twitter is dying, according to journalist Natasha Lomas. And Musk is killing it (in a bad way). She wrote:
“Since Musk took over he has set about dismantling everything that made Twitter valuable — making it his mission to drive out expertise, scare away celebrities, bully reporters and — on the flip side — reward the bad actors, spammers and sycophants who thrive in the opposite environment: An information vacuum.”
Musk also started charging researchers a fee for accessing data they used to get for free — between $42,000 ad $210,000 per month. That’s far too much money for nearly every university and organization that used to use Twitter data for public benefit.
Musk seems bent on making up for lost ad revenue by coercing everyone to pay. But subscriptions can never get anywhere near the billions lost from advertising. In other words, the fee that’s killing Twitter is bringing in pocket change.
Here’s the one fatal flaw in Musk’s plan
As I’ve said before in this space, Elon Musk (who is a genius in some realms) is an idiot when it comes to media, social and otherwise.
What he doesn’t understand is social content dynamics:
Selling “verification” to extract value erases the value. People are expected to pay for something with little value.
Paid “verification” creates uncertainty about who you’re talking to on Twitter.
Silencing the majority changes the content users find on Twitter and frustrates that majority.
Firing employees and losing control of moderation drives people away from Twitter.
Alienating celebrities drives celebrities — and their fans — off Twitter.
Shitting all over journalists is like shooting the messenger. It’s journalists above all who used to drive people to Twitter.
The one fatal flaw in Musk’s plan is that he assumes all his anti-user policies won’t affect the value that ordinary users find in Twitter.
The opposite is true.
Starting Saturday, Musk will change Twitter into something that isn’t Twitter as we knew it. It will be a smaller, uglier, poorer, more confusing place where the people who made Twitter valuable (that small minority responsible for nearly all posts and conversations) won’t want to engage.
Above all, silencing the majority and amplifying anyone who pays will alienate that majority. And without the majority of users, there’ll be few left to influence. So why pay?
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