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☆ Elon Musk is handing a truckload of mess to Twitter's new CEO
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-12 | by ( Hasan Chowdhury | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Elon Musk is finally ready to share his Twitter mess with someone else. The billionaire has found a new CEO to succeed him, but the mess they'll need to address is huge. It's been a long time coming but Elon Musk is finally ready to do it: he's about to hand over his Twitter mess to someone else. Twitter's finances are a messThe first challenge Musk's decidedly bumpy reign has left for his successor is Twitter's financial mess. If news organizations are continuously maligned, Twitter's new CEO will need to solve an identity crisis.

The number of Twitter mobile app downloads actually declined 18% in February to 14.05 million from 17.2 million in January. Meanwhile, Twitter had 14.9 million app downloads in April, which is a 2% increase from the 14.6 million downloads it accumulated in March. Musk's Twitter makeover has sparked new interest in decentralized social networks. Elon Musk's Twitter is facing new competition from a rival called Bluesky, a so-called decentralized communications app that is backed by Twitter co-founder and twice-former CEO, Jack Dorsey. The front-end apps built atop these decentralized platforms are often clunky, not professional-looking or easy to use.

☆ Jack Dorsey encouraged the student who tracks Elon Musk's jet to keep posting on Bluesky after his Twitter ban
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-07 | by ( Sam Tabahriti | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Jack Dorsey encouraged the college student who tracks Elon Musk's private jet to keep on posting. Twitter cofounder Jack Dorsey has doubled down on his explicit and implicit criticism of Elon Musk, encouraging the college student who tracks Elon Musk's private jet to keep posting on rival apps Bluesky and Nostr. Dorsey, who has given money to both platforms and sits on Bluesky's board, got into a brief exchange on Bluesky with college student Jack Sweeney Saturday about the jet-tracking account. the college student asked Dorsey. Sweeney created the original @ElonJet account in 2020, using public flight data to monitor the whereabouts the of billionaire's private jet.

☆ Democratic lawmakers are having a blast on 'Bluesky,' the latest alternative to Twitter
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-06 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

Some Democratic lawmakers have begun posting on "Bluesky," the latest alternative to Twitter. And for the Democratic lawmakers who use the platform, it's a place that feels safer and more gentle than Twitter. "The invite tree accountability makes people more judicious about bringing in solid people," wrote Ocasio-Cortez in a "skeet" this week. But I've [posted] triple digits in less than a week [on Bluesky]," she wrote in an earlier post. In a "skeet" on Bluesky, Rep. Ocasio-Cortez declares the platform to be "safer and more fun" than Twitter.

☆ Elon Musk has chopped Twitter down to about 1,000 employees
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Kali Hays | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

In six months of ownership, Elon Musk has whittled Twitter's employee count down by close to 90%. Current headcount for full-time employees at Twitter is around 1,000 people, according to two people familiar with the company who asked not to be identified discussing private matters. Getting closer to 1,000 workers means Twitter's headcount is down by almost 90% from just before Musk took over, when the company had roughly 7,500 employees. More frequently, employees at Musk's Twitter are fired or let go piecemeal with little to no explanation after sending in weekly reports of their work for review, the people familiar said. The former CEO has also admitted that he hired too many employees at Twitter when he ran it.

☆ Meta is building an 'Instagram for your thoughts' that could take on Twitter competitor — and it could be a 'great opportunity'
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Sydney Bradley | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Meta is building a decentralized text-based social network that will integrate with Instagram. It's no longer a secret that Meta is building out its own decentralized text-based social network. "We're exploring a standalone decentralized social network for sharing text updates," a spokesperson for Meta told Insider in a statement when asked about the prototype. "It's a great opportunity for them to fill that void with Twitter going through such a transition." Meta's decentralized social network could very well face the same fate.

☆ Explainer: With Bluesky, Jack Dorsey has another go at Twitter-like service
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-01 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

May 1 (Reuters) - Jack Dorsey is taking another whack at a Twitter-like service with a new social media platform called Bluesky. The service is gaining traction among Twitter power users, attracting prominent personalities including U.S. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. It's a text-focused social media service launched for select users in February. Bluesky offers a similar experience to Twitter - people create profiles and post short messages with text and images. On the timeline, Bluesky has "What's hot" and "Following" feed, similar to the curated "For You" and the chronological "Following" feeds on Twitter.

☆ What is Bluesky? A new Jack Dorsey-backed Twitter rival has people fighting for invites
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-29 | by ( Beatrice Nolan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Bluesky has been compared to Mastodon and is backed by Twitter cofounder Jack Dorsey. The Jack Dorsey-backed platform, Bluesky, is a Twitter clone with a very similar format to its established rival. Bluesky users set up a profile by choosing a picture, bio, display name, and domain name. However, unlike Mastodon, users don't have to choose a server when they sign up – something that appeared to be an issue for Mastodon users who found the process too complicated. In April last year, Bluesky clarified the company's relationship to Twitter, saying: "The bluesky project originated with Twitter in 2019, but the Bluesky PBLLC established this year is an independent company focused on decentralized social network R&D."

☆ Bluesky Social: Twitter's former CEO has a new app that looks a lot like Twitter
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Samantha Murphy Kelly | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —The buzzy new social media app of the moment looks so much like Twitter it’s almost hard to distinguish the two. But under the hood, Bluesky, developed by Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey, is vastly different. The Bluesky social media app logo is seen on a mobile device in April 2023. Like Mastodon, Bluesky appeals to a number of Twitter users who are frustrated with the direction of the platform under owner Elon Musk. As Eve 6 wrote on Twitter: “Bluesky invite codes are the new blue check.”

☆ 10 Things in Tech: Amazon Slack, industry extinction, and top EVs
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Diamond Naga Siu | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Community: Inside Amazon's little-known Slack channel. And that's playing out inside an internal slack channel called #focus-and-pivot-info for employees put on performance improvement plans — also known as PIPs. Go behind-the-scenes of Amazon's little-known Slack channel here. Right as tech companies shrink their headcounts, AI is gaining popularity in the workplace, writes Insider's editor in chief for business, Matt Turner. Thousands of anonymous tech employees fretted over the future of tech compensation.

☆ Meta is working on its own Twitter-like social network. Here's why an 'Instagram for your thoughts' could win as competitors multiply.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Sydney Bradley | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Meta is building a decentralized text-based social network that will integrate with Instagram. It's no longer a secret that Meta is building out its own decentralized text-based social network. "We're exploring a standalone decentralized social network for sharing text updates," a spokesperson for Meta told Insider in a statement when asked about the prototype. "It's a better idea than a lot of other things that have come out of Meta recently," Morgan added. Meta's decentralized social network could very well face the same fate.

☆ Opinion: Banning TikTok isn’t just a bad idea. It’s a dangerous one
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-16 | by ( Evan Greer | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

CNN —The US government is racing ahead with proposals aimed at banning TikTok, the viral video platform used by more than 150 million Americans. Banning TikTok won’t make us safer from China’s surveillance operations. But banning TikTok isn’t just foolish and dangerous, it’s also unconstitutional. You do that by passing a strong national data privacy law that bans companies from collecting more data about us than they need to provide us with the service we’ve requested. Join us on Twitter and FacebookIt’s a national embarrassment that we have no basic data privacy law in the United States.

☆ Elon Musk and Substack are beefing. Here's a rundown of the back and forth between the Twitter CEO and the blogging site.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-09 | by ( Hannah Getahun | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Twitter users began noticing Substack links were being suppressed beginning Thursday evening. One of these claims is that Substack was trying to "download a massive portion of the Twitter database," Musk wrote on Twitter Saturday, to help support its recently announced Twitter competitor, Substack Notes. Thursday evening: Users begin reporting that Substack links are being suppressedSubstack bloggers who use Twitter to promote their work began noticing Thursday evening the Substack links seemed to be suppressed on Twitter, and Twitter users who tried to interact with posts that contained Substack links would receive an error message. Saturday: Musk clarifies that Twitter never blocked Twitter notesMusk clarified in a tweet early Saturday that Substack links were never blocked on Twitter. In the same post, Musk called Substack Notes a "Twitter clone" and claimed that Substack was "trying to download a massive portion of the Twitter database to bootstrap" their new feature.

☆ Silicon Valley Bank depositors are saved at the last minute
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-13 | by ( Matt Weinberger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

By now, you've probably heard a lot about the sudden, bank run-driven collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, one of the tech industry's most stalwart and trusted institutions. Tech startups say they can't access their cash deposited in Silicon Valley Bank. Before the FDIC stepped in to save the day (for depositors, anyway), the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank sparked fear, uncertainty, and panic as startups suddenly lost access to whatever cash they had stashed there. Here's the latest from Insider on the Silicon Valley Bank meltdown:Read more about the financial panic that swept Silicon Valley over the weekend here. Can Silicon Valley succeed where the CDC failed?

☆ Meta considering a standalone social network that sounds a lot like Twitter
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( Clare Duffy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

The concept is similar to Reddit or Discord, but a departure from how Meta’s other platforms function. If Meta’s new platform were decentralized, it could allow third parties to build apps and features into the platform, potentially giving users experiences beyond what Meta itself might build. Meta declined to comment beyond its statement, including in response to questions about the new platform’s potential features or a timeline for launch. Many of them had an early jump in users following Musk’s takeover at Twitter, but have since struggled to gain widespread adoption. But its growth has slowed in recent months, in part as users struggle with the somewhat less straightforward and user-friendly nature of a decentralized platform.

☆ Meta exploring plans for Twitter rival
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

March 10 (Reuters) - Meta Platforms Inc (META.O) is exploring plans to launch a new social media app in its bid to displace Twitter as the world's "digital town square". "We're exploring a standalone decentralized social network for sharing text updates. A Twitter-like app would allow Meta to take advantage of the current chaos at the Elon Musk-led company, where cost-cutting has been rampant. Twitter has been struggling to hold on to its advertising base since Musk's takeover of the platform late last year. "They're just trying everything... at least with a mini blogging site like Twitter, there's some expectation that it could start to make money out of much quicker timeline than the metaverse investment."

☆ Meta says it's working on a Twitter-like social network
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( Pete Syme | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Meta confirmed that it's exploring plans for its own Twitter-like social network, per Platformer. It follows a score of problems at Elon Musk's Twitter, and Meta's launch of paid verification. People familiar with the plans told the outlet that Meta's app will be decentralized and use the same protocol that powers Mastodon, known as ActivityPub. Users will be able to sign into "P92" with their Instagram logins, and Meta hopes to harness all Instagram users' data to improve the product even if they don't use the new social network, Moneycontrol reported. Meta did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider made outside normal working hours.

☆ Meta explores decentralized social network app for text updates
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

March 10 (Reuters) - Meta Platforms Inc (META.O) is exploring a standalone decentralized social network for sharing text updates, a company spokesperson said on Friday, in what could be a direct competitor to billionaire Elon Musk's Twitter Inc."We're exploring a standalone decentralized social network for sharing text updates. We believe there's an opportunity for a separate space where creators and public figures can share timely updates about their interests," a Meta spokesperson told Reuters in an emailed statement. The report said Meta's new content app would support ActivityPub, the decentralized social networking protocol that powers Twitter-rival Mastodon and other federated apps. Meta's new app would be Instagram-branded and will allow users to register or login through their Instagram credentials, according to the Moneycontrol report. Reporting by Shubham Kalia and Shubhendu Deshmukh in Bengaluru; Editing by Rashmi Aich and Sherry Jacob-PhillipsOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ Meta exploring a new social network that could compete with Twitter
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-10 | by ( Rohan Goswami | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +1 min

Meta is exploring a new decentralized, text-based social network that could compete with Elon Musk's Twitter. The move could help Meta attract some of the Twitter users who are looking for alternatives after Musk took over and changed some of the site's rules. "We're exploring a standalone decentralized social network for sharing text updates," a Meta spokesperson told CNBC on Friday. The effort by Meta would expand its offerings beyond Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram, and into a space that has been dominated by Elon Musk's Twitter. Meta is also exploring integrations with existing social networks like Twitter or Mastodon, in part relying on a protocol called ActivityPub, Moneycontrol reported.

☆ Salesforce: A New Dawn. CEO Marc Benioff is pivoting the cloud company from family to profitability.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-02 | by ( Diamond Naga Siu | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

I'm Diamond Naga Siu, and I'm not just talking about the Selena/Hailey 'mean girls' saga — I'm fascinated by the Salesforce spectacle. CEO Marc Benioff recently oversaw the departure of two leading candidates to inherit the Salesforce throne. Now, under their careful watch, Benioff needs to guide the company through a cost-cutting period — something he's never done before. This is quite the turn, considering he was still emphasizing Ohana after laying off 10% of the company in January. CEO Marc Benioff announced on Wednesday that the company is starting a "new day."

☆ With Twitter upended by Musk, these services see an opportunity
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-13 | by ( Jennifer Korn | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

Like Twitter, it offers a social feed of posts with 280-character limits. The list of newer entrants in the markets includes apps created by former Twitter employees, a startup backed by one of Musk’s Twitter investors, and a service from former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey. The service launched publicly in June of last year, after Musk offered to buy Twitter. (As part of the acquisition, Musk took Twitter private and the company no longer reports user numbers in quarterly securities filings.) Though controversy remains, many Twitter users may feel less urgency to jump ship today than in late October.

☆ Google, Microsoft ChatGPT Clones Will Destroy Internet Search
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-09 | by ( Adam Rogers | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +13 min

The other kind of search — "exploratory search" — is the hard one. That's where you don't know what you don't know. When you're scrolling through the links in a Google search, looking for "esoteric shit," as one search expert calls it, you see some pages that just look dodgy, maybe in ways you can't even totally articulate. But search chatbots can fake all that. Google's search pages already aren't fully trustworthy — they overindex YouTube video results, for example, because YouTube is a subsidiary of Google.

☆ Elon Musk says bots making 'good content' will be exempt from Twitter's plan to charge for API access
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-05 | by ( Stephanie Stacey | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Twitter plans to charge developers to access the API used to make third-party services and bots. Elon Musk has tweeted it would offer a free, write-only API for bots "providing good content." Saying he was "responding to feedback," Musk tweeted late Saturday: "Twitter will enable a light, write-only API for bots providing good content that is free." Musk said then that the free access had previously been "abused badly" by "bot scammers & opinion manipulators." "Just ~$100/month for API access with ID verification will clean things up greatly," he tweeted.

☆ A leaked internal message appears to show Elon Musk ordered Twitter staff to suspend a left-wing activist's account
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-27 | by ( Pete Syme | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Anti-fascist activist Chad Loder's Twitter account was suspended in November 2022. A leaked internal Twitter message suggests Elon Musk directly ordered the suspension. Bloomberg reported the internal message as saying: "Suspension: direct request from Elon Musk." Bloomberg said it viewed a screenshot of the message in question, involving the account of Chad Loder, which read: "Suspension: direct request from Elon Musk." Loder's account was one of several prominent left-wing accounts suspended by Twitter in November 2022.

☆ Frustrated Tweetbot and Twitterrific users say they're prepared to quit Twitter after access was revoked
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-17 | by ( Kate Duffy | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Tweetbot and Twitterrific users say they're angry that Twitter cut access to third-party apps. All users Insider spoke to said they were considering leaving Twitter. Insider spoke to various users of the third-party apps, who were unimpressed about the suspension. Twitter is 'clunky'Meanwhile, users on Twitterrific were also impacted by Twitter's suspension of third-party apps. Paul Wilke, who said he's used Twitterrific for around ten years, said he was disappointed about the news.

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