patrick.net

The degree to which Twitter was simply an arm of the government was not well understood by the public… Republicans were suppressed at ten times the rate of Democrats," - Elon Musk


“If you've walked around downtown San Francisco, right near that X - fka (formerly known as) Twitter - headquarters, it's a zombie apocalypse. I mean, it's rough… You can't believe it until you go there,”
“So you have to say well, what philosophy led to that outcome? And that philosophy was being piped to Earth.
“A philosophy that would be ordinarily quite niche and geographically constrained, so that the sort of the fallout area would be limited, was effectively given… an Information Technology weapon to propagate what is essentially a mind virus to the rest of earth.
“And the outcome of that mind virus is very clear if you walk around the streets of downtown San Francisco. It is the end of civilization.”
- Elon Musk

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-debuts-rebellious-grok-015320778.html

Elon Musk Debuts ‘Rebellious’ Grok AI Bot to Challenge ChatGPT

I'm guessing that this new chat isn't a flaming liberal either.

zzyzzx says

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/elon-musk-debuts-rebellious-grok-015320778.html

Elon Musk Debuts ‘Rebellious’ Grok AI Bot to Challenge ChatGPT

I'm guessing that this new chat isn't a flaming liberal either.

Yeah. If you pay for Premium+ on X.

Looks like Elon can continue to hire Americans at Space-X.

FJB

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-11-08/spacex-wins-order-blocking-doj-suit-claiming-anti-refugee-bias?srnd=premium

Patrick says

For the uninitiated, since Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter, "Community Notes" is the feature that permits users to tag intentionally omitted context onto another user's post. In other words, when a so-called "professional" journalist attempts to advance a narrative by intentionally spreading misinformation, they can now be rightfully humiliated by informed citizens who know better. It's got to be the single greatest development in the ability of the informed to use social media to police the information gatekeepers. ...

Community Notes is fucking glorious.

Also, to the Fakestine supporters, the "It's just a burned dog" response to Ben Shapiro's tweet itself got community noted; that dozens of reporters, politicians, ambassadors from multiple outlets, countries, and press services were shown the morgue and the bodies of the Hamas Massacre Victims, including the infant burned alive.

Elon Musk announces "Decolonization" will be regarded as a call to Genocide.

https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1725645884409401435?s=20

Whenever Israel faces a public relations debacle such as the Intifada or international pressure to resolve the Israel-Palestine conflict, American Jewish organizations orchestrate this extravaganza called the 'new anti-Semitism.' The purpose is several-fold. First, it is to discredit any charges by claiming the person is an anti-Semite. It's to turn Jews into the victims, so that the victims are not the Palestinians any longer. As people like Abraham Foxman of the ADL put it, the Jews are being threatened by a new holocaust. It's a role reversal – the Jews are now the victims, not the Palestinians. So it serves the function of discrediting the people leveling the charge. It's no longer Israel that needs to leave the Occupied Territories; it's the Arabs who need to free themselves of the anti-Semitism. – Professor Norman Finkelstein

https://twitter.com/breakingbaht/status/1724892505647296620



https://twitter.com/breakingbaht/status/1724959688922407181

Elon to Ad blackmailers: "Go F Yourself".

https://x.com/alx/status/1729993842412126443?s=20

I’m sorry for that tweet or post. I tried my best to clarify, six ways to Sunday, but you know at least I think over time it will be obvious that in fact, far from being antisemitic, I am in fact philosemitic. - Elon Musk

https://www.coffeeandcovid.com/p/mall-miracle-thursday-november-30

After a fiery back-and-forth, in which Musk, perhaps recklessly, vowed he’d rather Twitter go bankrupt than kowtow to advertisers’ political preferences, Musk said something very profound. At one point, the conversation wandered to Tesla, because Elon was noting how Tesla captured the electric car market without advertising. Then Elon boasted — fairly — that as Tesla’s CEO, he has arguably done more “for the climate” than any other individual on Earth.

Sorkin, smelling fresh meat, immediately prompted Elon: how did he feel about being that one individual. But Elon took it in a different direction, replying by saying he doesn’t care; since he’s using an internal yardstick, he doesn’t care about how other people perceive what he’s doing. And then Elon drove a militarized bulldozer directly through woke virtue signaling:

“What I care about is the reality of goodness, not the perception of it. And what I see all over the place is people who care about looking good, while doing evil. F— them."

Sorkin immediately recognized he’d overplayed his hand, that something significant had just happened, and he wasn’t sure exactly what to do about it. For a second the skilled interviewer was uncharacteristically speechless. He then adroitly changed the subject and none of the press about the interview has mentioned that quote.

But what Musk said pierced the heart of everything that is wrong with the world right now. The elites have inverted traditional ethics; they call good “evil,” and they call evil “good.” The perception of goodness is more highly valued by elites than is actually doing good. People used to be mocked for empty virtue signaling, but somehow now even obviously fake virtue signaling — not product quality — is required to keep a corporation financially viable. That’s how Bud Light wound up putting a mentally-ill, unattractive cross-dresser on its brand label.

The answer is simple: We need to get back to valuing doing good more than seeming good. Musk was right.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/boycotting-elons-boycotters

Time To Boycott Elon's Boycotters

It was about four years ago that ZeroHedge went through ad monetization hell, having lost most of our advertisers because they did not approve of the content on this website and as a result they - together with such members of the Censorship Industrial Complex such as Newsguard, Sleeping Giants and CheckMyAds and various three letter US government agencies - did everything in their power to kill the site by starving it of ad revenue...

Fast forward to today, when Elon Musk is going through the same hell, as a growing group of companies are trying to do to X/Twitter what they tried to do to us by targeting the social media network and trying to starve it of ad revenue (their stated trigger of responding to the Media Matters fake news "report" was just a red herring: if it hadn't been for Media Matters, they would have found some other point of "virtue" to rally around, and pull their ads).

Of course, there is one key difference: Elon is the world's richest man, and if Twitter does not generate even one additional dollar of revenue, Elon will still be a multi-billionaire, and X can continue to operate for a long, long time if not in perpetuity (if costs are trimmed enough). It's also why Elon yesterday had some choice words for those advertisers who had halted advertising, telling them "go fuck yourself" (with a shout out to Disney chief Bob Iger) if they think they can blackmail Musk... which is precisely what ad demonetization is: a not so subtle way of pushing content and editorial direction in exchange for a monthly stipend.

Here, a brief tangent: for the most part, advertising spending is rarely about actual "advertising" and instead it is about endorsing, encouraging and funding certain ideologies and party lines which corporations agree with, encourage and seek to make default. It is about influencing the content decisions and editorial slant by implicitly threatening that the ad money can disappear at a moment's notice if something is published the company disagrees with. It's why when Pfizer or Moderna spend tens of millions for advertising in the NYT it is not so people are aware that Pfizer makes a covid booster shot - they know that from non-stop news coverage; it is to make sure that the NYT never questions the corporate party line. In other words, it is public relations in an advertising wrapper. Add to this lobby spending and political donations by those same corporations, and you have a fusion of the corporate, political and media branches, all superglued together with lots of money (and in the case of Pfizer and Moderna, it's taxpayer money) something which in simpler times has been called fascism. Glenn Greenwald recaps this dynamic in the clip below...

As a result, ad companies have unlimited leverage when it comes to dealing with most media companies... except one: X, which as noted above, is controlled by the world's richest man, and thus advertiser leverage in this particular case is virtually non-existent. It's also why instead of pretending they can influence the narrative (and force X to pursue the same censorship as were implemented by the former management team of its predecessor, Twitter) they are simply pulling away and hoping to crush this bastion of free speech, the same way they did to us. ...

Which is why it is time to boycott the boycotters: below we have summarized the names of those companies which have publicly signaled their "virtue" by pulling their ads from X/Musk.

Disney
CNBC/NBC parent Comcast
Warner Brothers
Discovery
Apple
Sony
Lions Gate
Paramount
IBM
Paris Hilton

We are confident there are many more companies that have also pulled their influence "ad" dollars, and we will update the list as more become public. These are the companies that Musk told to "go fuck yourselves" because, well, he can afford to. And while ordinary Americans have far less recourse and don't have nearly enough "fuck you money" as Elon, they have the ability to chose who gets their money instead, and the only way to retaliate to the Musk boycott is by boycotting the boycotters themselves, and stop spending money on products like Disney streaming services, or getting every new iPhone or buying whatever it is that Paris Hilton is selling.

"MUSK: I'm saying what I care about is the reality of goodness, not the perception of it. And what I see all over the place is people who care about looking good while doing evil. Fuck them."

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2023/11/30/elon_musk_lets_see_how_earth_responds_to_advertisers_trying_to_blackmail_twitter.html

Patrick says

And the whole musk antisemitic bullshit is just the excuse.

I think is because of the replies to their posts that aren't being 'moderated' by X anymore is the real reason.

PumpingRedheads says

And the whole musk antisemitic bullshit is just the excuse.

Yep. CCP TikTok is the leading driver.

Evidence:
https://twitter.com/antgoldbloom/status/1730255552738201854

Anyone else watch that awesome video where Elon tells the woke advertisers to fuck off?

https://rumble.com/v3youep-booom.html

Even better!

https://rumble.com/v3ypc7y-fjb.html

Et tu Walmart? WM won't advertize on X. FWM.

The powers that be will try anything to silence a dissenting voice. It will get worse. Censorship will become more active.

https://www.westernjournal.com/man-arrested-plot-kill-elon-musk-cause-mass-casualty-event-tesla-cybertruck-launch-officials-say/

Man Arrested in Plot to Kill Elon Musk, Cause 'Mass Casualty Event' at Tesla Cybertruck Launch, Officials Say

A Florida man was arrested near a Tesla Gigafactory in Austin, Texas, after allegedly threatening a mass casualty shooting there.

The man told police that “I was going to shoot up Elon Musk and the plant” during Thursday’s Cybertruck delivery event, Austin CBS outlet KEYE-TV reported.

The man, identified as Paul Overeem, 28, was booked at the Travis County Jail on a charge of making a terroristic threat — a third-degree felony.

Reminds me of the guy the FBI/CIA/NSA sent to murder RFK Jr.

Misc says

The powers that be will try anything to silence a dissenting voice. It will get worse. Censorship will become more active.

Elon Musk taking over Twitter is the best thing that happened in many years. I am thinking about becoming a subscriber. 16 bucks a month is affordable.

gabbar says

Misc says

The powers that be will try anything to silence a dissenting voice. It will get worse. Censorship will become more active.

Elon Musk taking over Twitter is the best thing that happened in many years. I am thinking about becoming a subscriber. 16 bucks a month is affordable.

You don’t have to pay anything to join Twitter. It’s free. You only pay a monthly fee of $8, or $16, or whatever if you want the blue check mark.

What does a blue checkmark get you?

Yep, it sure does go to Bob's wiki page. F'n hilarious.

https://www.reddit.com/r/wallstreetbets/comments/1884rxo/elon_phones_a_friend/?share_id=hDPo4VhN3TvMBKj1ENcpv&utm_name=ioscss&utm_term=1

Patrick says

This is financial jihad on Elon, the kafir!

GNL says

What does a blue checkmark get you?

identify verification

FortwayeAsFuckJoeBiden says

GNL says

What does a blue checkmark get you?

identify verification

Not anymore. All it means is that someone is paying $8/month now.

PumpingRedheads says

FortwayeAsFuckJoeBiden says

GNL says

What does a blue checkmark get you?

identify verification

Not anymore. All it means is that someone is paying $8/month now.

Generally you're using a CC to pay for the checkmark. So it kind of is identity verification. Of course you could use a spouses CC and name or business card, but it's the closest thing you'll get to identity verification in the social media world.

Also unlikely that bot/spammers will open multiple accounts to do their bull shit AND pay for the checkmark. So when you see the blue checkmark I'd imagine people will take the comment more seriously? I don't use X/Twitter, but that would be my take if I used the site.