Lefsetz Letters » Blog Archive » Twitter

It’s a tidbit on social media. It’s a self-selecting group for a hater who needs to keep up with the news, prove their point, and want to undercut anyone involved.

In other words, the story of Elon Musk buying Twitter is more important than the platform itself, because almost no one uses it.

Really, it’s all about TikTok. We’re told that the internet will be filled with countless neglected acts of music. The concept is right, the type is wrong. In other words, creativity is on a rampage. It comes from the grassroots. But this has nothing to do with music.

You’ll see TikTok unleashing American creativity.

This is not Instagram where you can post beautiful photos to show how trendy and privileged you are. Nor is it YouTube, where influencers peddled their brands indefinitely, with no soul.

First, TikTok is different because you don’t have to be a winner to play. You can be anyone and your posts can be promoted to everyone. I would say it’s like a lottery, but it’s not. Because it all depends on your creativity. And you can’t buy it, unlike online beats. You can’t fake it. Everything is you, from your brain, and the less perfect it is, the more real it is. Reality is everything. In the millions of short-film endeavors, this boost in the creative side of the brain has been ignored by the mainstream for two reasons… first, they don’t fit into traditional, established, anointed verticals, and second, The mainstream condemns TikTok, they don’t even look into it, they just treat it as a backwater for young amateurs that deserves no attention, like a toddler playing in a sandbox. but it is not the truth.

So Trump’s Twitter story is purely about the visit. to a large group of people. When the stodgy establishment isn’t, Trump’s in. In an age when all news junkies, especially journalists and commentators, are obsessed with Twitter, his influence on the messaging service is overstated. Trust me, if Trump returns to Twitter, the impact will be minimal, although never underestimate the media’s ability to make small stories bigger by amplifying them. The media complicit in Trump’s 2016 election gave him all his oxygen. Something similar happened with the interim report. The establishment media has decided Republicans are going to win and that’s the story, even though the underpinnings of that opinion are slim, just some polls that have been notoriously inaccurate since Trump’s election. The media is very afraid of missing out on big stories outside the realm of its members’ freedom , to the point of overemphasizing stories about the unknown on the right.

So, for the past few months, the story has not been about Twitter, but about Musk. Musk felt his oatmeal on Twitter, and he had so many followers that he decided to buy it. Like you go to a carnival, ride the Ferris wheel and have a blast, all your friends are captivated by your experience. Most people didn’t even go to the carnival! Most people never touch it!

It’s Twitter’s dirty little secret, most people will never see your tweets. The number of followers is almost irrelevant. When you tweet, someone has to be on Twitter, or very interested in what you have to say, to be back on your feed in time. Also, most Twitter addicts follow a lot of people and most posts get lost in the shuffle.

That’s why I rarely tweet. Let’s see, now I have 66.3k followers on Twitter. Sounds like a lot. But if I tweet, it’s like peeing in the wind. I can say the same to my mailing list and my inbox will go crazy. Because it is a direct contact. Twitter isn’t a direct connection, and most people don’t use it that way.

As for the quantity…it’s a fad. People sign up and sign. This is a bigger problem than robots. For most people on the platform, bots are juggling, and in fact most people are not on the platform!

And, even if you use Twitter a lot, it can be confusing.

Twitter tries to simplify it by using an algorithm, like Facebook, that chooses the posts that appeal to you the most. In theory. In practice, the algorithm is pretty bad, it overemphasizes some people and downplays others you’re interested in. Who cares if you miss a Facebook post about someone’s afternoon activity. But if you get news on Twitter and miss a big one, it’s a huge loss.

You’ll see on Twitter that people’s lives are based on being told. Because Twitter is instant, the story happens here. And, all the other reporters are in service. How many people in the US are journalists or general news junkies? rare! If Twitter was a sport, it would be monster trucks. No, that would give TV exposure…well, Twitter is bigger than backcountry skiing, but it doesn’t generate as much enthusiasm as Pickleball, which is on the rise and Twitter is on the decline. You only get one chance to be brand new. The hardest thing is to get the person who dropped you back, which is nearly impossible if for no other reason than having so many other options for entertainment/information.

So, what you see on Twitter are writers who don’t have a direct connection to their audience. They don’t have a mailing list, they don’t know who their readers are, so they post to feel good about themselves, by gaining followers and getting reactions. Then, when there is an evil counterattack, they will be stunned. Hello, this has been on the web for over 20 years! It’s just a matter of whether you have a direct connection with your audience. Complaining about this hatred today is ridiculous. You’re an asshole, people don’t like your status, they don’t like your attitude, they want to bring you down. period.

Funny how these establishment fanatics are too stupid to see the follower count of most haters. It’s anemic, and they’re almost untouched. Anyone with experience knows you never respond, which is exactly what haters want. They never hold back, and if you think you can get them straight, you are wrong.

So, instead of hoi polloi, what you see on Twitter is an elite group chanting that they are now subject to all the vagaries of the internet. Haters keep growing because they have access to these people.

And it’s a storm in a teapot that most people don’t see and don’t care about.

So Musk was forced to buy Twitter. To honor his deal.

He lost all credibility in the process. He made a deal with no strings attached and then wanted to add conditions after the fact, when you have a legal contract, this doesn’t play, homey won’t allow it.

Now that Tesla is in trouble in China, everyone knows the quality of the cars is poor, and…

With every move, Elon ruined not only his image, but Tesla’s as well. As for recovery…when Kanye gives a mistake, I expect a fault, it never will!

Elon thought he was untouchable and the rules didn’t apply to him. Since the story has been in the news for months, the public knows it. They’re not on Twitter, but they know the business story. It’s better than almost any TV, and definitely better than any record. Only streaming TV can compete.

So, since he’s not on Twitter 24/7, and because he has other obligations, Musk doesn’t really have a feeling for the service. His lack of knowledge means that he lives in a vacuum, unaware of the problems. You can’t let everyone say whatever they want because there are advertisers! Advertisers are conservative. They don’t want to make a client angry. Trust me, these companies often make decisions based on very little feedback, they won’t get a million emails, maybe ten or fifteen. But they are afraid.

So, Elon wants to make money, and he wants to charge for verification. who cares! Who are the people who need their authentication specifically for Twitter? Almost no one. In any case, no one steals the identities of big players because they play too much! The supposed advantage of the blue checkmark is trivial.

And then right, Trumpers. They started supporting Musk under the heading of “freedom of speech,” but once Musk gained control of the company, he found that content moderation was necessary. So now those free speech people on the right are mad at him. Musk succeeded in pissing everyone off!

Then there’s the bastards talking about competition, a new tweet. Let me take a break and see the latest truth social?

First, Twitter is not good business. But the history of the internet tells us that new platforms are based on new ideas! Namely TikTok and Instagram. The funniest thing is that Instagram tries to imitate TikTok with the same functionality, but it doesn’t work! People have TikTok, why do they need to post videos on Instagram? Aside from Instagram’s declining business, there are other issues users don’t care too much about.

Building an audience is nearly impossible these days. Everything scales much slower because there is so much content in the channel. So, are you going to start a new business from scratch when we already have Twitter?

As for those who left… not taking Amazon. It never works. It’s just that not enough people care enough to leave.

Do you know how many people have to leave Twitter to affect my usage? I can’t imagine it ever happened.

Still others use the service as a personal megaphone. I don’t want your damn opinion, give me info! That’s what the whiners don’t realize, we don’t want to hear what you have to say, just tell us the news, right away. As a result, the service was inundated with endless crumbs. Too many bs in my feed. And the more bs, the less I watch.

The list is only for professionals, hardly anyone.

As for what’s trending and general news and entertainment…what you’re clicking on isn’t based on following any particular person? Idiots create these trends and no one cares. There are better places to get news and entertainment that is not of the moment.

So what will happen now?

who knows?

Can Musk keep the train running on time and make Twitter a thriving business?

possible. But this will not affect the service!

Once again, users don’t care about the profitability of your business. They just want to know what works for them. And nothing Elon has said or done in the past year has directly impacted the utility of the service, the business story is separate from the utilization of the service!

So no, there won’t be a Twitter competitor and there won’t be any traction.

No, most people who tweeted don’t quit, or if they did, they would come back.

Nothing Musk has done to Twitter can turn it into a powerful engine attracting new users. Of course, he could turn the app into something else, like WeChat…but really, that’s about building a whole new service, and there’s not that much of a foundation on Twitter to build a new endeavor.

So, Elon tries to clean up the company, brag about how great it is, then take the company public again, and exit!

So far, Musk hasn’t done anything to improve Twitter, not a single thing. So one has a social media that most people never think about? He bought it on impulse, he didn’t think it through, that’s why he wanted to get out of the deal. This is Elon. He proves this over and over again, shooting from the hip in defiance of laws and social conventions. Only this time tens of billions of dollars were involved.

make him pay. Not only the cash spent on acquisitions, but also the burden of owning this moribund social media service, but no one has made it to fame. It’s his problem. Good luck!