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My predictions: 1. Musk is going to discover (and maybe admit?) that fixing Twitter is harder than he thought. It will be just like self-driving, which seems s

My predictions: 1. Musk is going to discover (and maybe admit?) that fixing Twitter is harder than he thought. It will be just like self-driving, which seems straightforward, but which actually has thousands of edge cases which are hard to solve with a single general system. Nevertheless, he will persist, because that's what he does. 2. Current Twitter makes a profit on advertising, which means Twitter needs to encourage high levels of engagement, which means they need controversial (emotional) content, but not so emotional (toxic) as to drive people away. They need to be as close to the line as possible, which is why they spend so much effort on moderation. Musk's solution is, I predict, to try different revenue sources so that engagement with the feed is not the primary metric. 3. Musk has already stated that his goal is the Everything App (which he calls X). The Everything App has news, social media, games, videos, and a payment infrastructure (both to pay for content and to get paid). He wants Twitter to replace Facebook, Instagram, Google News, YouTube, Twitch and PayPal, etc. Will he be able to pull it off? I expect he will deliver the 20% of those services that are high-value, but pitch it as a complete solution. That might actually be good enough for most people. 4. If he accomplishes #3, then the revenue source is obviously: they will take a cut out of every transaction going on in the network. Maybe ads are a component, but they don't have to be a major component. If engagement is no longer the most important metric, then it's possible to allow every person to have a radically personalized feed. Even something as simple as only showing you tweets from people you follow (what a concept!) would revolutionize the experience and drastically reduce the need for moderation. 5. Since Twitter is private, Musk can front-load #4 even before the Everything App is ready. If he hasn't already burned the current team, he can make the experience better relatively quickly and worry about profit later. 6. Now for my safest prediction: No matter what he does, some people will hate him for it.

TehCorwiz 4y ago
> his goal is the Everything App (which he calls X). The Everything App has news, social media, games, videos, and a payment infrastructure so, AOL?
- LeonM 4y ago
  More like WeChat, where you have micro apps within the app, and payments.
jpadkins 4y ago
4) don't overestimate cut of transaction and underestimate ad revenue (promoting the transaction seekers). Let's use Amazon as an example: They run a 3P marketplace with a transaction cut business model, and it's not very profitable. Vs. their ads based sponsored product which is extremely profitable (soon to larger than AWS for profit at Amazon). This is a very different ad business than twitter's current performance marketing ad product. I think first party ads promoting commerce on your platform can be very lucrative. And % of transactions tend not to be, with the exception of Android / iOS app store markets.
- GMoromisato 4y ago
  Fair point. I haven't done the math because nobody is paying me to. But your example of Amazon might reinforce my point in that all three components (retail, ads, AWS) reinforce each other. Amazon is trying to be the "Everything App" also because they see synergies (even if only in shared infra). And Amazon can afford to be less agressive with ads because it's a smaller part of their business, compared to (e.g.) Meta or Twitter. Apple is in a similar place: they can afford to care more about privacy because they don't make money from ads. The more revenue Twitter can get from non-ad sources, the better the user experience (in my opinion). But you're right that there's no guarantee that they will be able to get much non-ad revenue.
JasserInicide 4y ago
Musk is going to discover (and maybe admit?) that fixing Twitter is harder than he thought. Yeah I think he's going to intensely focus on Twitter for ~6 months, not change much, get bored, and then move onto something else.
- kjksf 4y ago
  The way he got bored running Tesla and SpaceX for ~20 years? I really don't get where this meme of "impulsive, erratic, hotheaded Musk" comes from given he demonstrated ability to stick with a business in the toughest of times. Tesla was literally days away from bankruptcy at one time and Musk made it work. After first 3 failed launches he was about to run out of money and yet he financed another launch, which worked. He hasn't had a business failure yet. Is that a guy who gets bored and moves on to something else?
  - edmundsauto 4y ago
    Those companies are solving problems with logistics and engineering. Twitter is fundamentally trying to solve a people problem, which is much fuzzier. Every impression I've had from "public Elon" is that he is absolutely wretched at people-problems-at-scale. I'm also not sure there is any human ever who has been able to solve people problems at Twitter's scale.
    - permo-w 4y ago
      John Maynard Keynes
      - edmundsauto 4y ago
        Could you elaborate? He wrote a book that many considered important, but how specifically did he solve people problems? To me it sounds like he understood emergent behaviors in economics, but didn’t those economicists also believe in the rational actor? That is not an accurate assumption about humanity.
themagician 4y ago
He doesn't have to completely fix Twitter. All he has to do is make Twitter Ads actually produce a decent ROI for the average customer.
philsnow 4y ago
> his goal is the Everything App (which he calls X). The Everything App has news, social media, games, videos, and a payment infrastructure so, WeChat?
- inawarminister 4y ago
  WeChat for Anglosphere/the West could be a great innovation, to be fair. WeChat in China, LINE in Japan, Gojek in Indonesia... A lot of those platforms are crazy profitable
  - algoatecorn 4y ago
    The platform may be innovative, but monopolizing attention is horrible for future innovation.
  - bamboozled 4y ago
    The reason we don’t need an everything app is because we have a lot of good apps, that’s not the case in Japan, for example.
- throwaway290 4y ago
  Having used WeChat, LINE and the like I shudder. Not just because they naturally become bloated slow ugly behemoths to use but also because they more generally become de-facto monopolies. Not having to compete with anyone is the ultimate killer of innovation.
  - bamboozled 4y ago
    Same, I’m happy I have a bunch of different apps which are good at different things.
hesk 4y ago
> Even something as simple as only showing you tweets from people you follow (what a concept!) would revolutionize the experience and drastically reduce the need for moderation. You can do that right now by turning off retweets for the people you follow. You have to do that individually for every user you follow but it allows for a highly curated timeline. I turn of retweets for about 80% of the people I follow because I am interested in their original content but not in their random retweets. The other 20% introduce me to new content through their retweets.
augustuspolius 4y ago
Seriously considering #3 a solid idea to even discuss is a delusion. Twitter already has videos (YouTube, Twitch), a feed (Facebook, Google News), images (IG), etc. did it replace any of the above mentioned services or do you think the only missing element in this massive intercontinental cross-technological enterprise is Elon Musk? They just need his guidance and leads, PMs, design, engineers, … and, most importantly, users of these existing platforms will all align and populate this brave new super app.
jjguy 4y ago
With respect to the name “X” - I’ll bet he revives the OG x.com brand - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X.com https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X.com
- grogenaut 4y ago
  I had a chance to buy 76.com before the oil company realized they should buy it. Had I any access to capital as a kid I would have bought it for $2k. well at least I get it as a trump in dns stories missed out on.
ohmyzee 4y ago
Some kind of e-commerce system will definitely be on his mind. People seem to forgot that he was involved in PayPal.

TehCorwiz 4y ago

> his goal is the Everything App (which he calls X). The Everything App has news, social media, games, videos, and a payment infrastructure so, AOL?

LeonM 4y ago
More like WeChat, where you have micro apps within the app, and payments.

jpadkins 4y ago

4) don't overestimate cut of transaction and underestimate ad revenue (promoting the transaction seekers). Let's use Amazon as an example: They run a 3P marketplace with a transaction cut business model, and it's not very profitable. Vs. their ads based sponsored product which is extremely profitable (soon to larger than AWS for profit at Amazon). This is a very different ad business than twitter's current performance marketing ad product. I think first party ads promoting commerce on your platform can be very lucrative. And % of transactions tend not to be, with the exception of Android / iOS app store markets.

GMoromisato 4y ago
Fair point. I haven't done the math because nobody is paying me to. But your example of Amazon might reinforce my point in that all three components (retail, ads, AWS) reinforce each other. Amazon is trying to be the "Everything App" also because they see synergies (even if only in shared infra). And Amazon can afford to be less agressive with ads because it's a smaller part of their business, compared to (e.g.) Meta or Twitter. Apple is in a similar place: they can afford to care more about privacy because they don't make money from ads. The more revenue Twitter can get from non-ad sources, the better the user experience (in my opinion). But you're right that there's no guarantee that they will be able to get much non-ad revenue.

JasserInicide 4y ago

Musk is going to discover (and maybe admit?) that fixing Twitter is harder than he thought. Yeah I think he's going to intensely focus on Twitter for ~6 months, not change much, get bored, and then move onto something else.

kjksf 4y ago
The way he got bored running Tesla and SpaceX for ~20 years? I really don't get where this meme of "impulsive, erratic, hotheaded Musk" comes from given he demonstrated ability to stick with a business in the toughest of times. Tesla was literally days away from bankruptcy at one time and Musk made it work. After first 3 failed launches he was about to run out of money and yet he financed another launch, which worked. He hasn't had a business failure yet. Is that a guy who gets bored and moves on to something else?
- edmundsauto 4y ago
  Those companies are solving problems with logistics and engineering. Twitter is fundamentally trying to solve a people problem, which is much fuzzier. Every impression I've had from "public Elon" is that he is absolutely wretched at people-problems-at-scale. I'm also not sure there is any human ever who has been able to solve people problems at Twitter's scale.
  - permo-w 4y ago
    John Maynard Keynes
    - edmundsauto 4y ago
      Could you elaborate? He wrote a book that many considered important, but how specifically did he solve people problems? To me it sounds like he understood emergent behaviors in economics, but didn’t those economicists also believe in the rational actor? That is not an accurate assumption about humanity.

themagician 4y ago

He doesn't have to completely fix Twitter. All he has to do is make Twitter Ads actually produce a decent ROI for the average customer.

philsnow 4y ago

> his goal is the Everything App (which he calls X). The Everything App has news, social media, games, videos, and a payment infrastructure so, WeChat?

inawarminister 4y ago
WeChat for Anglosphere/the West could be a great innovation, to be fair. WeChat in China, LINE in Japan, Gojek in Indonesia... A lot of those platforms are crazy profitable
- algoatecorn 4y ago
  The platform may be innovative, but monopolizing attention is horrible for future innovation.
- bamboozled 4y ago
  The reason we don’t need an everything app is because we have a lot of good apps, that’s not the case in Japan, for example.
throwaway290 4y ago
Having used WeChat, LINE and the like I shudder. Not just because they naturally become bloated slow ugly behemoths to use but also because they more generally become de-facto monopolies. Not having to compete with anyone is the ultimate killer of innovation.
- bamboozled 4y ago
  Same, I’m happy I have a bunch of different apps which are good at different things.

hesk 4y ago

> Even something as simple as only showing you tweets from people you follow (what a concept!) would revolutionize the experience and drastically reduce the need for moderation. You can do that right now by turning off retweets for the people you follow. You have to do that individually for every user you follow but it allows for a highly curated timeline. I turn of retweets for about 80% of the people I follow because I am interested in their original content but not in their random retweets. The other 20% introduce me to new content through their retweets.

augustuspolius 4y ago

Seriously considering #3 a solid idea to even discuss is a delusion. Twitter already has videos (YouTube, Twitch), a feed (Facebook, Google News), images (IG), etc. did it replace any of the above mentioned services or do you think the only missing element in this massive intercontinental cross-technological enterprise is Elon Musk? They just need his guidance and leads, PMs, design, engineers, … and, most importantly, users of these existing platforms will all align and populate this brave new super app.

jjguy 4y ago

With respect to the name “X” - I’ll bet he revives the OG x.com brand - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X.com https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X.com

grogenaut 4y ago
I had a chance to buy 76.com before the oil company realized they should buy it. Had I any access to capital as a kid I would have bought it for $2k. well at least I get it as a trump in dns stories missed out on.

ohmyzee 4y ago

Some kind of e-commerce system will definitely be on his mind. People seem to forgot that he was involved in PayPal.