jeremyp
Philosopher
I think he'd love for people to have to buy the app, but even he probably realises that is a non starter.
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Merged Musk buys Twitter!/ Elon Musk puts Twitter deal on hold....
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I think he'd love for people to have to buy the app, but even he probably realises that is a non starter.
jeremyp
Philosopher
Is the vapour composed of atomised brain matter?
johnny karate
... and your little dog too.
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Yes, pretty much what I thought.
At least we can put to bed the lies told here:
As I've repeatedly said, conservatives don't care about free speech. They only care about their speech and silencing the speech of everyone else.
Thanks for proving my point, Warp12.
lobosrul5
Philosopher
Google did already try their own social media thingy... and its already shutdown.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google+
plague311
Great minds think...
It wasn't really twitterish though, more facebook. I think they could put something together pretty easily.
They have seen that even with the huge number of users Twitter has managed to attract it is a marginal business, can't see them wanting to throw billions of dollars away trying to compete in an unprofitable sector. I think they will concentrate on wooing those companies that have reduced their marketing spend on Twitter.
Segnosaur
Penultimate Amazing
Yes, I know they tried social media with Google+. (That's why I mentioned they "didn't have much luck with their facebook competitor".)
But like I said, the dynamics are a bit different here....
- Twitter is a much simpler/straight forward application. (Facebook and Google+ seemed to be a lot more.... huge? Facebook has things like games, Google+ tied into things like google drive, etc.) A twitter replacement doesn't need to be that comprehensive
- When Google+ was released, Facebook was relatively stable. Yes, there were occasional grumbles about things like security, but not enough to scare people and advertisers off the system. And its hard to take on a competitor who is currently dominating a niche. However, Twitter is currently suffering from changes made by Musk... fascists being given free reign, advertisers abandoning the platform, etc. This might make a competitor to Twitter more viable since people will be looking for "an alternative".
Segnosaur
Penultimate Amazing
Its true that Twitter is not the financial success that Facebook, etc. are.
However:
- They still occasionally turned a profit in the past. (Not huge profits, but it does show its doable). And google seems to be successful at finding ways to make money from the internet
- I don't think they'd have to invest "billions" into a Twitter clone. They already have significant infrastructure, experts, etc. so I suspect development to take a lot less time/money.
- Even if a google Twitter clone doesn't make significant profits, it still might be valuable as a tool to drive users to OTHER google products. "Oh you've posted a google tweet about cars... let me give you a link so you can use google search to look up cars"
Why would anyone join a Google Twitter clone?
It would start off with zero users.
Twitter had the advantage of prominence and being heavily used by journalists. That is eroding but there is no single unified replacement as far as I can see.
It would start off with zero users.
Twitter had the advantage of prominence and being heavily used by journalists. That is eroding but there is no single unified replacement as far as I can see.
lobosrul5
Philosopher
End game of Elon buying Twitter might be a tech giant scooping them up at a sizable discount.
plague311
Great minds think...
It would start off with zero users but I don't see it being complicated for them to gather users really quickly.
A) They have a massive database of users to pitch the alternative. They can send an email to literally every single email address gmail has and, given their youtube platform, could bring in big names pretty quick. They could also tie the two together more than twitter could.
B) They have significant ties to advertisers and companies that would want to start at ground zero with googles version. I think it would start making money pretty quickly.
C) As has been mentioned, they have dabbled in the social media arena, they have massive infrastructure and they can boost the advertisements for their twitter clone on every single google search, if they so desire.
Of all the options available I think Google would be the one that could easily step in to make an alternative, and make it profitable. I'm not just saying that as a google fanboi, but I am. (I have 5 chromecasts, use the Google Pixel phone on the Google Fi network, etc.) I really think they could easily do it.
Suddenly
No Punting
What I was thinking.
It depends on how much Elon Musk manages to tarnish the brand before a sale is forced. They wouldn't have trouble now, but once it's overrun by right wing nutjobs and his gutting the moderation staff causes a disaster (child porn, snuff films, etc.) and becomes notorious for that nobody will want to touch it at all.
Segnosaur
Penultimate Amazing
Depends on the person.
Some might join a google twitter alternative because they like the concept/functionality of twitter but hate Musk and think using google-twitter is a good way to 'stick it' to Musk.
Or maybe Google can make its version easier to use than Twitter... maybe make a default application that comes on Android phones, tie its user base into Gmail (no separate account needed), integrating its functionality into Chrome, etc.
Yes it would. But its not an unfamiliar position for google... it wasn't the first internet search engine and gmail wasn't the first "free" mail system. In those cases it started from zero users, but built up its user base from there. It built up its user base by a combination of offering something 'better' than the competition, and by smart integration.
It also had the advantage of being "first" to fill the niche.
You're right... there is currently no 'unified replacement'. That's why I'm suggesting Google could create such a replacement.
The highlighted.
The thing is that search don't have any penalty for the user of a small userbase as long as the functionality is good.
Likewise for an email system.
But a social media site needs users to make it attractive because it is the interaction.
Blue Mountain
Resident Skeptical Hobbit
Which is why I wouldn't touch it with an 11½ foot pole. When Google suspends an account, it suspends access to everything that account has on Google. Send out an offensive Gweet? Goodbye, email. Goodbye, calendar. Goodbye, blog. And photos. And Drive documents. And Groups. And Youtube.
And you'll never get it back unless you can manage to raise a big enough stink about it that a human at Google notices and intervenes. Today the favoured method to raise a stink is using Twitter, so that would no longer be an option. Google's appeal process appears to be entirely automated and can only reply "No."
Google was way too much power already on the web. We shouldn't be cheering on giving them even more!
plague311
Great minds think...
Of all the Google products, and all of the stuff I use them for I've never, ever run into a problem as you've described. Ever. Then again, I don't post offensive **** but what you describe is fairly easy to work around. Just create a separate Gmail account for whatever they call their version of twitter, or don't post really offensive **** I guess. Shouldn't be that hard. I swear, I talk ****, I do a lot of that online and I've never been suspended by Google, Facebook, Twitter, or even here.
Google does have a lot of power and making them even bigger wouldn't be ideal, but it's better than me having no ******* choice but to read right wing bull **** all over my, now vacated, twitter feed because Elon has a new pet project. Kick in the face or punch in the nuts? Your call I guess.
Google does have a lot of power and making them even bigger wouldn't be ideal, but it's better than me having no ******* choice but to read right wing bull **** all over my, now vacated, twitter feed because Elon has a new pet project. Kick in the face or punch in the nuts? Your call I guess.
lobosrul5
Philosopher
Yeah you might want to read up on the account closure of Terraria's Andrew Spinks, before you assume that as long as you don't post hate speech or the n-word etc all your stuff will be safe.
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/202...utube-account-ban/?comments=1&comments-page=1
He hit an algorithm somewhere, somehow, that made them decide he violated their TOS. With no explanation. And for that he lost everything, development work on his hugely popular game, emails, digital media etc.
Its why I've decided I aint never even going to own much in the way of digital media, and when I do its on Apple... and thats ALL I use Apple for.
Edit: and it was probably an automated DMCA takedown notice from their YT channel, that Google automatically just disabled everything over. And this was someone making a game for their own Stadia platform... which is now canceled... jesus Google likes canceling ****.
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Segnosaur
Penultimate Amazing
Yes, a social media site needs a certain critical mass of users. But google would have the technical resources (e.g. the ability to push its version of Twitter on Android/Chrome, shared user IDs, etc.) to grow its user base faster than it would if it were trying to do so in a vacuum, and the financial resources to wait until it grew enough to be successful.
arthwollipot
Limerick Purist Pronouns: He/Him
I'm not seeing any sniveling and/or squealing. I'm seeing people point out massive hypocrisy, but no sniveling and/or squealing.
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