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Not really, revenue seems to have fallen but not so much and it's growing again according to this: https://www.businessofapps.com/data/twitter-statistics/ https

by brabel 2y ago

Not really, revenue seems to have fallen but not so much and it's growing again according to this: https://www.businessofapps.com/data/twitter-statistics/ https://www.businessofapps.com/data/twitter-statistics/ 2014 1.4 2015 2.2 2016 2.5 2017 2.4 2018 3 2019 3.4 2020 3.7 2021 5 2022 4.4 2023 3.4 Number of users is actually larger than ever now: 2015 304 2016 313 2017 310 2018 298 2019 312 2020 347 2021 362 2022 401 2023 421 I think everyone can agree this looks nothing like "collapse".

lotsofpulp 2y ago
Is there a reason to assume this website has access to audited figures from a private business like Twitter?
edmundsauto 2y ago
The linked article doesn’t seem to say anything about growth in revenue numbers - but it does say overall revenue has dropped 50% since Musks takeover. The quarterly chart doesn’t look great either. Further, the brand has been tainted and Threads was allowed to pop up. Now threads is around 1/4 to 1/3 the size of Twitter MAU. It may not have replaced Twitter, but the door has been opened and that seems like an unforced error. This election season looks poised to further drive long term disengagement as the platform is going to be very toxic and very unmoderated. Otoh, profit might actually be up - if revenues are down 50% but costs down 80%, it may make more money. I suspect, like other private equity investments, this will not work for too long. With how much Musk has put his personal brand onto the site, it may also be difficult to unload the pieces at a profit as per the normal PE playbook.
- brabel 2y ago
  > if revenues are down 50% Check the actual graphs! It went down by 50% briefly, but then increased again. It's still lower than before, but not by that much.
- zdragnar 2y ago
  Don't forget the peak happened during COVID- where it is at now isn't really much different than where it was before, if the numbers are accurate anyway.
- bigstrat2003 2y ago
  > Further, the brand has been tainted The brand was never not tainted. Twitter has long been known as one of the cesspools of the Internet, actively contributing to the degradation of the social fabric. It would be a great blessing if Elon did actually kill it the way his detractors predicted. Twitter delenda est.
- skissane 2y ago
  > Threads was allowed to pop up. Now threads is around 1/4 to 1/3 the size of Twitter MAU Main thing I consume on X nowadays is space journalism. Plenty of big name space journalists seriously posting on X (e.g. Jeff Foust, Eric Berger). I had a look at Threads, I can't find any of that content, mostly just people posting silly memes and mind-numbingly misinformed takes on the topic, at best people just reposting stuff that you'll already find better coverage of on X. > This election season looks poised to further drive long term disengagement as the platform is going to be very toxic and very unmoderated. I don't find much "toxic" on X. If you only read stuff posted by people you follow, and are selective in who you follow, you can have a pretty curated experience.
AlexandrB 2y ago
Where is this site getting revenue numbers for 2023 & 2024? The company is no longer public and doesn't issue public earnings reports AFAIK.
vecter 2y ago
Isn't revenue declining according to that data?
- brabel 2y ago
  Look at the revenues per quarter. It was growing in 2023, but declined in the first quarter of 2024, but I wouldn't say you can make conclusions for 2024 from one quarter.
  - vecter 2y ago
    That's the wrong way to read revenue graphs. You need to compare quarterly year over year. From that perspective, it's down across the board.
    - brabel 2y ago
      No one is comparing year over year, there's been barely a year since the acquisition. I said the "arrow" over the latest few quarters was generally UP, in response to a mistaken argument that Twitter/X has collapsed. I am not trying to say Elon is great or something like that, I am making an observation of what the charts say, that's all. I don't know if the charts are 100% accurate, but I have no reason to doubt either... Why anything that may be positive about X is so controversial, even something as uncontroversial as the direction of an arrow on a damn graph? People seem to lose all rationality over this guy, what the hell is going on?! Do you actually have figures showing completely different results?? IF no, why all of a sudden people are so completely skeptical of it?! Sounds like discussions about climate change: someone shows a chart with temperatures way up, all of a sudden everyone is an expert and points out it was higher 60 million years ago or whatever, or the data cannot be fully trusted because they learned in high school that these are just estimates or other crap on the same vein. It's embarrassing for the human race.
      - vecter 2y ago
        The point has nothing to do with Elon. It's just the correct way to analyze revenue graphs due to seasonality. Whether or not X is "collapsing" isn't obvious from the graphs either, and I made no such claim. We'd need to know other things that aren't public, and it's probably too early to tell anyway. But it's incorrect to say that revenue is growing. It's down quarterly YoY, which is the only real meaningful way to look at it.
lolokwhatever 2y ago
[dead]
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
slashdave 2y ago
> Number of users is actually larger than ever now So... you mean the bot detection is now more broken?
runako 2y ago
Let's assume we can trust these numbers. The user count is not material for a site that has already scaled and monetized, so focus on the actual money changing hands. That is obviously in decline but does alone not capture how much worse off the company is today than before the acquisition. In 2022, the company did $4.4B in revenue and had negligible debt. In 2023, the company possibly had debt service payments in the range of $1.2B for the year. If you back out the mandatory debt service, 2023 looks more like $2B in topline. Put another way: Twitter 2022 was significantly more capital-efficient than Twitter 2024. Similarly, one can run a simple model of the value of the company now. Once you include the $13B in outstanding debt, you will end up with a negative number. Yes, this business is currently in "collapse."

by brabel 2y ago

lotsofpulp 2y ago

Is there a reason to assume this website has access to audited figures from a private business like Twitter?

edmundsauto 2y ago

The linked article doesn’t seem to say anything about growth in revenue numbers - but it does say overall revenue has dropped 50% since Musks takeover. The quarterly chart doesn’t look great either. Further, the brand has been tainted and Threads was allowed to pop up. Now threads is around 1/4 to 1/3 the size of Twitter MAU. It may not have replaced Twitter, but the door has been opened and that seems like an unforced error. This election season looks poised to further drive long term disengagement as the platform is going to be very toxic and very unmoderated. Otoh, profit might actually be up - if revenues are down 50% but costs down 80%, it may make more money. I suspect, like other private equity investments, this will not work for too long. With how much Musk has put his personal brand onto the site, it may also be difficult to unload the pieces at a profit as per the normal PE playbook.

brabel 2y ago
> if revenues are down 50% Check the actual graphs! It went down by 50% briefly, but then increased again. It's still lower than before, but not by that much.
zdragnar 2y ago
Don't forget the peak happened during COVID- where it is at now isn't really much different than where it was before, if the numbers are accurate anyway.
bigstrat2003 2y ago
> Further, the brand has been tainted The brand was never not tainted. Twitter has long been known as one of the cesspools of the Internet, actively contributing to the degradation of the social fabric. It would be a great blessing if Elon did actually kill it the way his detractors predicted. Twitter delenda est.
skissane 2y ago
> Threads was allowed to pop up. Now threads is around 1/4 to 1/3 the size of Twitter MAU Main thing I consume on X nowadays is space journalism. Plenty of big name space journalists seriously posting on X (e.g. Jeff Foust, Eric Berger). I had a look at Threads, I can't find any of that content, mostly just people posting silly memes and mind-numbingly misinformed takes on the topic, at best people just reposting stuff that you'll already find better coverage of on X. > This election season looks poised to further drive long term disengagement as the platform is going to be very toxic and very unmoderated. I don't find much "toxic" on X. If you only read stuff posted by people you follow, and are selective in who you follow, you can have a pretty curated experience.

AlexandrB 2y ago

Where is this site getting revenue numbers for 2023 & 2024? The company is no longer public and doesn't issue public earnings reports AFAIK.

vecter 2y ago

Isn't revenue declining according to that data?

brabel 2y ago
Look at the revenues per quarter. It was growing in 2023, but declined in the first quarter of 2024, but I wouldn't say you can make conclusions for 2024 from one quarter.
- vecter 2y ago
  That's the wrong way to read revenue graphs. You need to compare quarterly year over year. From that perspective, it's down across the board.
  - brabel 2y ago
    No one is comparing year over year, there's been barely a year since the acquisition. I said the "arrow" over the latest few quarters was generally UP, in response to a mistaken argument that Twitter/X has collapsed. I am not trying to say Elon is great or something like that, I am making an observation of what the charts say, that's all. I don't know if the charts are 100% accurate, but I have no reason to doubt either... Why anything that may be positive about X is so controversial, even something as uncontroversial as the direction of an arrow on a damn graph? People seem to lose all rationality over this guy, what the hell is going on?! Do you actually have figures showing completely different results?? IF no, why all of a sudden people are so completely skeptical of it?! Sounds like discussions about climate change: someone shows a chart with temperatures way up, all of a sudden everyone is an expert and points out it was higher 60 million years ago or whatever, or the data cannot be fully trusted because they learned in high school that these are just estimates or other crap on the same vein. It's embarrassing for the human race.
    - vecter 2y ago
      The point has nothing to do with Elon. It's just the correct way to analyze revenue graphs due to seasonality. Whether or not X is "collapsing" isn't obvious from the graphs either, and I made no such claim. We'd need to know other things that aren't public, and it's probably too early to tell anyway. But it's incorrect to say that revenue is growing. It's down quarterly YoY, which is the only real meaningful way to look at it.

lolokwhatever 2y ago

[dead]

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

slashdave 2y ago

> Number of users is actually larger than ever now So... you mean the bot detection is now more broken?

runako 2y ago

Let's assume we can trust these numbers. The user count is not material for a site that has already scaled and monetized, so focus on the actual money changing hands. That is obviously in decline but does alone not capture how much worse off the company is today than before the acquisition. In 2022, the company did $4.4B in revenue and had negligible debt. In 2023, the company possibly had debt service payments in the range of $1.2B for the year. If you back out the mandatory debt service, 2023 looks more like $2B in topline. Put another way: Twitter 2022 was significantly more capital-efficient than Twitter 2024. Similarly, one can run a simple model of the value of the company now. Once you include the $13B in outstanding debt, you will end up with a negative number. Yes, this business is currently in "collapse."