quote:

NPR will no longer post fresh content to its 52 official Twitter feeds, becoming the first major news organization to go silent on the social media platform. In explaining its decision, NPR cited Twitter's decision to first label the network "state-affiliated media," the same term it uses for propaganda outlets in Russia, China and other autocratic countries.

The decision by Twitter last week took the public radio network off guard. When queried by NPR tech reporter Bobby Allyn, Twitter owner Elon Musk asked how NPR functioned. Musk allowed that he might have gotten it wrong.

Twitter then revised its label on NPR's account to "government-funded media." The news organization says that is inaccurate and misleading, given that NPR is a private, nonprofit company with editorial independence. It receives less than 1 percent of its $300 million annual budget from the federally funded Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

https://www.npr.org/2023/04/12...t-funded-media-label

Apparently Musk only has a problem when other entities get government funding...

https://www.businessinsider.co...larcity-2021-12?op=1

quote:

Musk allowed that he might have gotten it wrong.

Ya think...

Snark aside, I have a twitter account (I know, no one cares but) and I have been thinking about how long I'll keep it...

It's been a great resource for connecting with other people in my field, but it's such a dumpster fire now....

Don’t see the need to avoid Twitter just because of Elon. Not clear if Elon makes any money off your tweets, you’re certainly not paying Elon out of pocket, and you get to do whatever useful things you do with Twitter on Elon’s dime. What’s not to like?

quote:

you get to do whatever useful things you do with Twitter on Elon’s dime

I suppose that's one way to look at it... I was just thinking that participating, using the site, implies condoning him....

Article:

Twitter is broken. Thanks, Elon.

$43 billion, shot to hell

quote:

Originally posted by Steve Miller:
$43 billion, shot to hell

Pretty much!

EM has a ton of followers, which I just don’t get, given his over the top idiocy…

Why? I'm sure most people do it for the entertainment value. Some hang on every word about rockets but I suspect most of the followers are just mildly curious. He is a celebrity.

I just got an e-mail from my local NPR affiliate saying that they, too, were abstaining from twitter.

Musk is an right-wing extremist who was born into wealth (of sketchy origins--South African ruby mines or something like that), basically stole Tesla from its founders, and is using his outsize wealth to try to impose his extremist ideas, plus his hate and bigotry on the world. He has completely ruined twitter.

I've never used twitter. I never will. I've even stopped looking at huffpo and buzzfeed articles that are basically compilations of tweets.

Mrs pj used to read twitter a lot, but recently she said that many services that made daily or automated posts have either shut down, or have stopped showing up because the posters won't pay their eight bucks for a checkmark. This morning she said that one account just posted that they can no longer post automated avalanche warnings. Yeah, that's bettering humanity.


twitter can just die and we will all be better off.

What little I’ve seen of Twitter seems to be mostly pundits either praising each other or getting in to petty arguments.

There’s surely more to it but I got bored and stopped looking at it.

Twitter is whatever you want it to be, based on accounts you follow.

it can be all about economics, philosophy, linguistics, public health, drug development, or petty arguments and inane pop culture.

quote:

Originally posted by jon-nyc:
Twitter is whatever you want it to be, based on accounts you follow.

That is true, provided those accounts are worth following. It is the same with FB, where 10 years ago I could follow deep and intelligent discussions that don’t seem to occur much anymore. Either those posters stopped posting or stepped back from engaging in those discussions.

I think most of the deep discussions have moved to subcultures of Twitter. Facebook seems more about family updates, memes, etc.

quote:

Twitter is whatever you want it to be, based on accounts you follow.

But isn't this exactly the current complaint, that this is no longer that case, because the algorithms are all messed up now and the feed is no longer as good as it once was?

It certainly seems that way to me, i.e., there's a lot more junk in my feed than there used to be.

The opposite, at least ostensibly. He made it easier to default to “following” rather than “for you” which includes algorithmic suggestions. Now once you choose “following” it keeps you there, it used to be it would switch back every time you reopened the app. What they’ve done with algorithms that choose content within the set of accounts one follows I’m not sure. That could have gotten worse.