As a regular MSNBC pundit is calling for Elon Musk to be stripped of his citizenship for trying to reintroduce free speech protections to Twitter, the new owner is outraging blue checkers by suggesting a monthly charge for verified users. Figures like CNBC’s Jim Cramer declared: “I’m not paying them anything. They should pay me.” Some of us would be willing to pay an added monthly fee to support a true free speech alternative on social media if Musk keeps his word.
Of course, for full disclosure, I would first have to get a blue check to get charged for a blue check. I have been barred from being verified for years by Twitter despite being a columnist for newspapers like USA Today and the Hill as well as a legal analyst for CBS, NBC, BBC, and now Fox over the last two decades. I have been ranked in the top five law professors on Twitter, but I was still turned down over a dozen times under multiple categories.
I have previously joked about the bar on verification and I am not sure how much the blue check honestly does for individuals. Indeed, there are some advantages. I can presumably deny prior statements since they were made by an entirely unverified person using my name for over a decade. Yet, as a long-time critic of Twitter’s censorship system, there has been a long curiosity over the denial.
Musk has indicated that he is now looking into such concerns and there may be greater transparency in the weeks to come.
However, Musk is looking for ways to reduce the dependency on advertisers and many of us would support that effort. Recently, General Motors suspended advertising on Twitter until it can evaluate the implications of Musk’s new policies. Some of us immediately criticized the action by GM over the move.
The company had no problem with supporting Twitter when it was running one of the largest censorship systems in history — or supporting TikTok (which is Chinese owned and has been denounced for state control and access to data). Twitter has been denounced for years for its bias against conservative and dissenting voices, including presumably many GM customers on the right. None of that was a concern for GM but the pledge to restore free speech to Twitter warrants a suspension.
Musk’s pledge to restore free speech protections will not be realized if these pundits and politicians can use corporations to drain the company, a repeated and successful means used in the past. Making the company more dependent on actual customers rather than these companies can reduce such pressure to resume censorship policies.
Many customers never wanted the censorship being sold by companies like Facebook and Twitter, but they lacked any alternative. Twitter can now be that alternative. We can show that there is a market for free speech but supporting Twitter in trying to reduce the dependence on corporate sponsors.
Ole Government Motors.. how many handouts they get in the last few decades?
Wow, You remember Daniels.
As I said before it is rare for people to change paraphelia’s.
Whether you like it or not the Daniels story disproves the Russian Hotel story.
Epstein is tied to all kinds of powerful people – Like Bill Clinton. \
So far the Only link between Trump and Epstein is having rarely met at parties in NYC.
You have an odd way to get to 50/50
You have a story which has no direct of indirect source – it is merely DNC gossip.
Every effort to find a direct or indirect source has failed – with those sources claiming they never even heard of it.
You Try to connect Trump to Epstein which reporters have been trying to do for almost a decade with no success.
And you pretend the pretty vanilla encounter with Daniel – light spanking which is just about the most common fetish there is
someone supports claims of urolgia one of the rarer fetishes.
You do understand there is a difference between wishful thinking and math.
Why did GM stop advertising on Twitter? Naked self interest.
1. Elon Musk is now on the receiving end of the full force of government and progressive media wrath. GM can ride the wave with a massive virtue signal.
2. GM views Tesla as a major competitor. Anything they can do to hurt Musk benefits GM. Kind of like a proxy war.
3. Government ev subsidies are a critical source of funding for GM. GM is pandering to the political paymasters. Friends with benefits, as it were.
Speak for yousekf! I am not opening my wallet! Twitter is obe! Spook…and there have never been that many ppl in it. No one cares! This is the biggest waste of billions ever! If likes keg parties in 1992 that cost 100 bucks a keg. .. Whilst in then I waited on Warren Buffett at the Omaha country club! in 92. No tips! Pure rational evaluation. Twitter is not God fathers pizza! Twitter is obe. The only th i g that keeps Twitter alive is a few publishers….who no one believes…to anchor some ads. Twitter is over? Did Warren Buffett ever own any of it?
Well they act like they are gods, because of their little blue check, they want to be coddled and pampered.
The way I see it is, if you want to eat.
A: goto McDogmeats, get some crap thrown at you, you get food, you get to eat
B you want to be coddled, pampered, you PAY to goto a 5 star restaurant to be coddled. you PAY for that extra privelage.
Most the ones crying are losers from the media… you know… the same people who’s sites want to charge YOU 3 or 4 bucks a month to see their content. You can’t make this crap up
If Twitter seeks to become a communication media like the phone company, then it can charge for the service.
Someone has to pay for the company to exist. End users, or advertisers.
Currently it’s advertisers. The users are the ones bringing eyes to the advertisements.
Then who needs it? I just fired dish…wanting 60 plus a month..I can gator all that they were selling me to free! No body cares about twitter..a novel fad…but it’s over! It’s not like Facebook that had every school and board saying “join is on facebook”….. No body does that for twitter. It’s so o e I feel sorry for elo n…wasting billions. It’s very because it never was. That’s what makes this so embarrassing for elon! And it won’t help free speech….they are going to throw him in with Facebook when they regulate. He musk remember The govt had a campaign for Facebook’s monopoly….never as much for twitter. Remember that when twAt sues!! All these g0,vts said ” join is on facebook”. They have the market to them…Twitter could have done better??? Leon never decided to say…elo n is a lost cause!
Elon may be on to something. Charge $1 to any American citizen who puts another nation’s flag next to their name; double if it’s the Ukranian flag; $5 for the rainbow homosexual flag; and charge $10 bucks if you put your pronouns in your profile and $20 bucks if the pronouns don’t agree with your biological gender.