Elon Musk has already implemented some bizarre ideas on Twitter in recent months. Now comes the next step. In future, the network will show Musk’s tweets to all users – whether they follow him or not.
The world of social networks can sometimes be really ungrateful. You put a lot of effort into a post and then it is not sufficiently appreciated.
An unpleasant experience that normal users simply have to put up with. But of course this does not apply if you own the social network in question.
As the US magazine Platformer reports, Elon Musk has also made use of this privilege. The reason: he was not satisfied with the reach of his Super Bowl tweet.
What was wrong with Elon Musk’s Super Bowl tweet?
Musk’s tweet in question is no longer available on the platform. It had previously received just over 9.1 million views.
The problem with the whole thing, however, was that US President Joe Biden sent out a similar tweet. And it was precisely this tweet that achieved around 29 million impressions.
As a result, James Musk, a cousin of Elon’s, had sent a Slack message to Twitter engineers at 2:36am on Monday morning. “We are fixing an engagement issue across the platform,” Platformer quotes from this message.
Any people who can create dashboards and write software can please help fix this. This is of high urgency. If you are willing to help, please give this post a thumbs up.
What does this mean for Twitter users?
The engineers at Twitter must have done a great job on that night shift. Shortly afterwards, Elon Musk’s tweets appeared prominently on the platform for all users.
This also applies to those who have not subscribed to the Twitter CEO’s account at all. Musk had threatened to fire his engineers if they did not fix the problem with the reach of his tweets.
Only last week, Musk had fired one of the senior engineers. This was because he had attributed the problem with the declining reach of Musk’s tweets to the dwindling interest in the CEO.
Reach of Musk’s tweets has top priority
For the employees, the problem with the Super Bowl tweet quickly became a top priority. Because on Sunday evening, Musk had around 80 employees working on this very issue.
They changed the algorithm so that all tweets from their CEO bypassed the very filters that show users:inside the best possible content for them.
“He bought the company and went out of his way to show what he thought was broken and manipulated under the previous management,” a current employee tells Platformer. “And then he turns around and manipulates the platform to force engagement on all users so they only hear his voice.”
I think we’re past the point where we believe he actually wants the best for everyone here.
