Musk's Week, Twitter's Decade

Written by: Meiyi

Edited by: Jingyu

Source: Geek Park

If given the chance, Twitter employees would likely wish time could stop on October 26, 2022—before Musk officially took over Twitter's headquarters. At least before that, they were only troubled by rumors of an "acquisition," rather than being tossed around by the new boss as they are now; at least those who haven't been laid off might think so.

In the past week, Musk's changes to Twitter have surpassed the total changes the company has undergone in the past decade. Moreover, this rapid pace of change shows no signs of a "finish line."

If we take a closer look at the timeline of the "Silicon Valley Iron Man" wielding the axe on Twitter over the past week, we might better understand the feelings of Twitter employees:

• On October 26, Musk entered the company holding a "sink," officially "sinking in," and renamed his Twitter account to "Chief Twit";
• On the morning of October 27, Musk released an "open letter to advertisers," reiterating his motives for the acquisition and reassuring advertisers;
• On the afternoon of October 27, a "task force" of Tesla engineers arrived to interface, and Twitter programmers' code access was "frozen";
• On the evening of October 27, three senior executives, including CEO Parag Agrawal, left with $200 million "golden parachutes";
• On October 30, the board was dissolved, and Musk took over as CEO;
• On October 31, he revealed on Twitter that the "blue V verification" would increase in price, which was criticized by legendary horror novelist Stephen King; he also tweeted to ask whether the previously closed short video app "Vine" should be restarted.

In just one week, Twitter was rapidly "Tesla-fied"—reportedly, since October 27, Twitter employees have been working late into the night and have had no weekends off, living a "007" lifestyle.

However, behind this series of "thunderous measures," it is evident that Musk has some ideas for "revitalizing Twitter," focusing on "content moderation," "monetization," and "short video content" to make this company, which has been around for 16 years, a major player in the social media landscape once again.

01 The Beginning of Changes in Content Moderation

Musk prides himself on being an "absolute free speech absolutist" and has publicly questioned Twitter's content moderation policies as being too strict, even calling for the establishment of a platform for free speech.

It is not hard to understand that he claims the acquisition of Twitter is to liberate one of the world's most influential social media platforms, making it the "ultimate home for free speech."

He hopes to "promote free speech by reducing content moderation," making Twitter's content more interesting and free, while publicly committing that he will not allow Twitter to evolve into a "hell where everyone can run rampant," where people can speak freely without consequences.

Additionally, on October 28, Musk stated that he plans to establish a "content moderation council" to make important moderation decisions for the company.

According to his tweet, this council will have "a wide range of different viewpoints," and no major content decisions or account restorations will occur before the council convenes.

This tweet did not include any details about what kind of viewpoints Musk is seeking in the council, how many people will be on the council, how they will be appointed, or how it differs from the company's existing content moderation and policy teams; it merely reiterated that he disagrees with the current moderation system's operation.

In fact, other social media companies have attempted similar approaches, such as Meta's Oversight Board, which aims to be an independent organization that adjudicates Facebook's platform and moderation decisions.

It is also worth mentioning that Musk indicated, "Until there is a clear process, Twitter will not allow any users removed for violating Twitter rules to return to the platform, which will take at least several weeks."

Undeniably, if moderation is completely relaxed, it will open the floodgates for more online toxicity, which will inevitably offend some users, politicians, and especially clients advertising on Twitter.

Advertisers naturally do not want to risk tarnishing their brands by promoting their products alongside disturbing, racist, and hateful posts.

To reassure advertisers, before the acquisition was completed, Musk released a long letter outlining his reasons for buying Twitter and his views on advertising.

In the letter, Musk clearly stated that he does not want advertisers to leave Twitter and assured them that he would not allow Twitter to evolve into a "hell where everyone can run rampant." He promised that Twitter would provide more "relevant ads" suitable for users, striving to make Twitter one of the most respected advertising platforms globally, to strengthen brands and help businesses grow.

Despite this, many advertisers still expressed concerns about advertising on Twitter after Musk's takeover.

On October 28, General Motors, a competitor of Tesla, announced that it would pause its advertising on Twitter but continue to use the platform to interact with users while figuring out the platform's direction under Musk's leadership.

However, Lou Paskalis, former media head at Bank of America, firmly believes that Twitter's most loyal advertisers, many of whom are Fortune 100 companies, trust the platform and are unlikely to leave unless "some very unpleasant things happen."

02 Accelerated Monetization

Faced with years of debt pressure on Twitter, in addition to layoffs, Musk and his advisors have also explored changing the Twitter app to innovate its profit model.

Musk believes one solution is to offer some premium experiences that users are willing to pay for—such as a new "verification system."

On October 29, he tweeted, "The entire verification process is currently undergoing reform."

Musk's advisors also assigned a team of Twitter engineers to oversee this "verification" program, which will issue "badges" to high-profile or famous users to confirm the authenticity of their profiles.

Previously, the "Twitter Blue" verification service was only available to celebrities, politicians, and journalists, but now he is considering making it available to everyone.

Users who receive blue verification are real accounts of celebrities, politicians, journalists, and other public figures.

Musk originally planned to charge users $20 per month to retain their blue verification under "Twitter Blue," adjusting the price according to purchasing power by country, to alleviate the issue of spam accounts and reward content creators.

In response, renowned author Stephen King stated that if this plan were implemented, he would leave Twitter.

Subsequently, Musk tweeted in response, "We need to pay the bills somehow! Twitter can't rely entirely on advertisers. How about $8?"

Then, on Monday, Musk officially tweeted that the subscription fee for "Twitter Blue" would increase from the current $4.99 per month to $8 per month, a 60% increase.

Musk then tweeted an outline of other features included in the $8 monthly Twitter Blue package, such as "the ability to post long videos and audio" and "half the ads."

However, the "ad-free article benefit" originally provided to "Twitter Blue" users was terminated.

The next day, Twitter ended the "ad-free article benefit" for its subscription service "Twitter Blue."

However, the last benefit Musk mentioned, which is "to allow publishers willing to collaborate with us to bypass paywalls," sounds like a replacement for the "ad-free article benefit."

As of now, Musk's tweets seem to provide no further details about this special benefit, but the tweet about "bypassing paywalls" suggests that as part of the "Twitter Blue" subscription, users may one day be able to bypass paywalls of participating publishers. If this ultimately becomes a reality, this benefit could be better than an ad-free reading experience.

According to current plans, verified users will have 90 days to subscribe, or they will lose their "blue verification."

Reports also indicate that employees working on this project have been notified that they need to complete the price adjustment by November 7, or they will be laid off.

Currently, Twitter is heavily reliant on advertising, with a single monetization model.

Data shows that in 2021, advertising accounted for 89% of Twitter's $5.08 billion revenue; in the second quarter of 2022, advertising sales accounted for over 90% of Twitter's revenue.

Musk has consistently criticized Twitter's ad-based revenue model and has publicly stated on Twitter, "I hate ads."

Earlier this year, in a series of tweets, he suggested that Twitter should shift to subscriptions, offering premium projects with additional features for users, and remove ads from "Twitter Blue."

Now, against the backdrop of declining global online advertising and a significant drop in tech stocks, Musk paid too high a price for the acquisition of Twitter, which has left Twitter burdened with $13 billion in debt, requiring about $1 billion in interest payments each year.

Reversing the financial pressure on its business is undoubtedly a strong driving force for innovation in Twitter's monetization model.

In a survey of 1.2 million voters regarding Twitter's charging, over 80% indicated they would not pay for blue verification, while 11% said they would be willing to pay $5 for it, and another 5.5% would be willing to pay $15.

This change will also open the door for fake accounts impersonating journalists, celebrities, government officials, and organizations, which could lead to a surge in misinformation on Twitter.

Musk changed his profile picture to a childhood photo and renamed his Twitter account to "Twitter Complaint Hotline Operator"｜Twitter

In the face of these complaints and controversies, Musk modified his Twitter verification to "Twitter Complaint Hotline Operator" and set his profile picture to a little boy answering a phone, stating, "All complainants, please continue to complain, but the $8 will still be charged."

03 Focusing on Short Videos to Compete with TikTok

In addition to financial pressure, internal research shows that Twitter's "heavy users" are rapidly declining, which may be the biggest challenge Musk faces as he completes the $44 billion acquisition proposal.

According to internal research seen by Reuters, the number of "heavy users" (those who log in six or seven days a week and tweet three to four times) has been "absolutely declining" since the COVID-19 pandemic.

Although they account for less than 10% of the overall monthly users, they generate 90% of tweets and half of global revenue.

If Musk wants to retain Twitter's most active users and seeks to increase user numbers, bringing back the short video app Vine to follow TikTok seems like a good choice.

Twitter acquired the video app Vine back in 2012.

Similar to Twitter's previous 140-character limit, one of Vine's selling points was its restriction on users sharing videos of up to 6 seconds that could loop indefinitely, aimed at capturing the most exciting moments.

Just one day after its launch, it soared to the top of the App Store's social category. However, Vine's popularity was short-lived.

In 2014, Vine's monthly user growth began to decline sharply. In October 2016, Twitter suddenly announced the closure of the app, as Vine faced numerous issues, including a mass exodus of influencers to platforms like YouTube and Instagram.

During its three years of operation, Vine launched many stars, but Twitter never figured out enough ways to monetize Vine's impressive viewership. Vine co-founder Rus Yusupov also stated on Twitter that Vine failed because it did not timely establish the right features, did not help creators monetize, and did not embrace the trend of lip-sync videos like TikTok.

It has been six years since Twitter shut down Vine, and during that time, Twitter has never successfully sold Vine.

Now, Musk may resurrect this defunct app to "compete" with the hot TikTok and even hopes to see economic returns from this business.

In fact, as early as June this year, during a Q&A session at a Twitter employee meeting, Musk hinted at praising TikTok's algorithm as "not boring" and stated that Twitter could be shaped in the same way to make it "interesting."

Sure enough, in the early hours of October 31, Musk tweeted, "Should we bring Vine back?" However, in a poll of over 2 million people, only 69% supported its return.

In the comments section, well-known YouTuber Mr. Beast commented, "If you really do this and start competing with TikTok, that would be hilarious."

Musk seriously replied, "How can we make Vine better than TikTok?" His words revealed that he has begun planning Twitter's short video business.

According to Axios, Musk has asked Twitter's engineers to start developing an updated version of Vine, which may be launched by the end of the year.

Twitter's engineers have been instructed to check Vine's codebase, which has not been changed since it was shut down, requiring a significant amount of work.

Restarting Vine could signal Twitter's renewed efforts, indicating that Musk is positioning "short videos" as one of the key sources for driving "user engagement," thereby expanding Twitter's reach to a broader user base.

Interestingly, even before Musk took over, Twitter had already begun laying the groundwork for a TikTok-like vertical video channel, but Twitter had provided almost no form of creator ecosystem for video.

Musk stated that he hopes to retain Twitter's video features and does not want to split them into a second app, while a version of Vine within Twitter could encourage more video sharing on the platform.

“Sign-holding influencers” support Musk in bringing back Vine｜Twitter

So, assuming Vine eventually returns, and Musk successfully integrates its vertical channel into Twitter with its own dedicated tag, a large number of nostalgic fans ready to see Vine's revival could inject some creator-centric video energy into Twitter as a social media platform.

Vine could likely attract users from mature players like TikTok, and even if they cross-post videos similar to those on TikTok and Reels, Twitter could ultimately develop its own small content ecosystem, drawing users in, and eventually, this traffic could grow enough to attract advertisers and sponsors' interest in Twitter.

Six years have passed, and Vine still holds some influence in internet culture, and with the booming creator economy, Vine's commercialization challenges may not be as difficult to overcome as before. Additionally, integrating Vine into Twitter is not too difficult.

Online, there are still many doubts about Musk's leadership of Twitter, with critics arguing that while Musk can build electric cars, recover rockets, and even one day take humanity to Mars, social media is not something that can be simply "engineered" and transformed.

On the other hand, the changes Musk has made in just one week have indeed breathed new life into Twitter, beginning to generate change.

After just one week, it is still hard to say whether Musk's current decisions are correct or whether Twitter can become the "American WeChat" that Musk envisions. However, taking action is always a good thing; otherwise, Twitter will gradually fade from the historical stage as a second-rate social media platform.