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It was widely reported in the days following the Super Bowl that he personally ordered his Tweets be boosted after a Tweet by Biden got more engagement than his

by csb6 4y ago

It was widely reported in the days following the Super Bowl that he personally ordered his Tweets be boosted after a Tweet by Biden got more engagement than his similar Tweet [0]. As far as I can tell, he did not instruct Twitter employees to make his Tweets appear to all users, but he did want them to make his posts appear in timelines significantly more often. This lead to reports of users suddenly getting their timelines flooded with lots of his Tweets. It seems like there was a rush within Twitter to raise Musk’s engagement numbers by altering the recommendation algorithm to specifically boost posts from his accounts. The special boost factor was later reduced, but allegedly still exists. [0] https://www.theverge.com/2023/2/14/23600358/elon-musk-tweets-algorithm-changes-twitter https://www.theverge.com/2023/2/14/23600358/elon-musk-tweets...

hallqv 4y ago
Wrong. Elon noticed his tweets had low engagement relative to his follower count compared to other accounts. After some digging in the code base it turned out that there was a de-boosting factor based on the absolute numbers of blocks your account had, which affected popular and controversial accounts (like Elon’s) unfairly. This investigation was initiated by Musk but it resulted in a great improvement in the algorithm with no special treatment for his account.
- csb6 4y ago
  That directly contradicts the article: > By Monday afternoon, “the problem” had been “fixed.” Twitter deployed code to automatically “greenlight” all of Musk’s tweets, meaning his posts will bypass Twitter’s filters designed to show people the best content possible. The algorithm now artificially boosted Musk’s tweets by a factor of 1,000 – a constant score that ensured his tweets rank higher than anyone else’s in the feed. > Internally, this is called a “power user multiplier,” although it only applies to Elon Musk, we’re told. It seems indisputable that Musk’s account gets special treatment, even if some of the changes may also boost other controversial users. You did not reference any sources, while the article claims sources inside Twitter gave them this information.
  - hallqv 4y ago
    Elon spoke about this in the Twitter earnings call https://www.youtube.com/live/6bgCqskBmtk?feature=share https://www.youtube.com/live/6bgCqskBmtk?feature=share Anonymous Twitter sources have zero credibility since a good portion of the employees still want to oust Elon.
    - TheDong 4y ago
      Anonymous Twitter sources may have _low_ credibility, but Elon musk has _exactly zero_ credibility at this point. He has a significant and proven track record of making false and misleading statements, even ignoring the many many more difficult to prove allegations. In my personal experience, software engineers, when you ask them about technical matters like "does the code do X" or "is there a condition for Y" are generally pretty honest. Programming is a task that requires being able to have structured and literal reasoning, and asking engineers about purely technical details usually triggers that response, even if you can imagine a social motive for lying.
      - HopenHeyHi 4y ago
        [flagged]
      - concordDance 4y ago
        Note that some of the "false" statements later turn out to be true. E.g. holding child a last heartbeat happens (ex-wife held him for death rattle, elon for last heartbeat)
      - hallqv 4y ago
        Disagree, Elon has high credibility IMO, certainly higher than an anonymous source with incentives to slander. Not saying he is perfect but given the scrutiny he is under and how much he is “in the arena” pushing the envelope. Elon is furthermore a software engineer (he wrote ALOT of code at zip2 & paypal) so your argument falls flat in that regard.
        4y ago
- smcl 4y ago
  Well that's what the claim was. I never bought it, to me it sounded very much like the "Dear Leader Kim observed during the factory tour that one of the machines was miscalibrated and that productivity could be increased tenfold". Remember that he'd just fired an engineer on the spot for suggesting there wasn't a technical reason behind his lower engagement, and that the unspoken reason was he's frankly just a bit annoying and his epic meming CEO shtick was wearing thin. So I think when he raises the issue again, they just implement `author_is_elon` and they get to tell him that actually he is good at posting after all and there was just a weird technical issue they have now fixed. Elon's happy, the engineers he turned to kept jobs and any time I find myself in the "For You" tab I see Elon's memes and his @catturd2 RTs.

by csb6 4y ago

hallqv 4y ago

Wrong. Elon noticed his tweets had low engagement relative to his follower count compared to other accounts. After some digging in the code base it turned out that there was a de-boosting factor based on the absolute numbers of blocks your account had, which affected popular and controversial accounts (like Elon’s) unfairly. This investigation was initiated by Musk but it resulted in a great improvement in the algorithm with no special treatment for his account.

csb6 4y ago
That directly contradicts the article: > By Monday afternoon, “the problem” had been “fixed.” Twitter deployed code to automatically “greenlight” all of Musk’s tweets, meaning his posts will bypass Twitter’s filters designed to show people the best content possible. The algorithm now artificially boosted Musk’s tweets by a factor of 1,000 – a constant score that ensured his tweets rank higher than anyone else’s in the feed. > Internally, this is called a “power user multiplier,” although it only applies to Elon Musk, we’re told. It seems indisputable that Musk’s account gets special treatment, even if some of the changes may also boost other controversial users. You did not reference any sources, while the article claims sources inside Twitter gave them this information.
- hallqv 4y ago
  Elon spoke about this in the Twitter earnings call https://www.youtube.com/live/6bgCqskBmtk?feature=share https://www.youtube.com/live/6bgCqskBmtk?feature=share Anonymous Twitter sources have zero credibility since a good portion of the employees still want to oust Elon.
  - TheDong 4y ago
    Anonymous Twitter sources may have _low_ credibility, but Elon musk has _exactly zero_ credibility at this point. He has a significant and proven track record of making false and misleading statements, even ignoring the many many more difficult to prove allegations. In my personal experience, software engineers, when you ask them about technical matters like "does the code do X" or "is there a condition for Y" are generally pretty honest. Programming is a task that requires being able to have structured and literal reasoning, and asking engineers about purely technical details usually triggers that response, even if you can imagine a social motive for lying.
    - HopenHeyHi 4y ago
      [flagged]
    - concordDance 4y ago
      Note that some of the "false" statements later turn out to be true. E.g. holding child a last heartbeat happens (ex-wife held him for death rattle, elon for last heartbeat)
    - hallqv 4y ago
      Disagree, Elon has high credibility IMO, certainly higher than an anonymous source with incentives to slander. Not saying he is perfect but given the scrutiny he is under and how much he is “in the arena” pushing the envelope. Elon is furthermore a software engineer (he wrote ALOT of code at zip2 & paypal) so your argument falls flat in that regard.
      - 4y ago
smcl 4y ago
Well that's what the claim was. I never bought it, to me it sounded very much like the "Dear Leader Kim observed during the factory tour that one of the machines was miscalibrated and that productivity could be increased tenfold". Remember that he'd just fired an engineer on the spot for suggesting there wasn't a technical reason behind his lower engagement, and that the unspoken reason was he's frankly just a bit annoying and his epic meming CEO shtick was wearing thin. So I think when he raises the issue again, they just implement `author_is_elon` and they get to tell him that actually he is good at posting after all and there was just a weird technical issue they have now fixed. Elon's happy, the engineers he turned to kept jobs and any time I find myself in the "For You" tab I see Elon's memes and his @catturd2 RTs.