The twitter buy isn't about money its about power. Money is only a proxy for power. Controlling the largest distribution source of worldwide news is a pure power play.
>>...the largest distribution source of worldwide news>>
That's not really true is it? My understanding is that it's actually the smallest of its immediate peers in social media. And perhaps the same in the field of the broader definition of media.
As a separate issue, my personal sentiment on social media, like a number of others I know, is that it has all become a steaming pile of toxic garbage, not unlike the pile of junk mail I dutifully retrieve from my physical mailbox once a month (and even then only so that the mail person has room to add more). My concern on a deal like this is that if that sentiment takes off in the mainstream a property like Twitter could experience a MySpace style collapse overnight.
This is what I was referring to. Sure there are infinite other sites but Twitter is where it is being broken and where majority of all the journalists live. It is currently the site with status and clout for important news. Will that change? Always possible but it is the site du jour.
It's also the site for the unimportant news that journalists decide to transform into "important" news. Too many "click bait" news stories end up being "xxx is outraged" and the story links to 3-4 random twitter comments
Yes, social media has become toxic but a lot of people use it to get their news and information.
Twitter is a great way for Musk to get into social media without having to get users and build the infrastructure. He can compete at a worldwide level with Facebook on day one.
How much global news comes out of either of those? That's the point of the parent comment.
Weido and Wechat may have more users, but they aren't newsmakers. Just like there's more people at a Def Leppard concert than in the White House, but the White House makes news.
They are largely irrelevant to the rest of the world as a source of news except to see what the government line is and as a pulse taker of Chinese population tolerance to policy. They are a propoganda news source controlled by the Chinese Government for the Chinese population. Large population for sure, and highly impactful to controlling that population but only viable for the CCP.
My rebuttal was to this comment, which implied that size was an overriding factor of importance. That comment was a rebuttal to you. So I'm not sure what you even want to argue about.
