Mastodawn

Litzz11 Jul 3, 2023

@chargrille Not a surprise at all. Dorsey is one of Elon’s investors in Twitter. He has interests in both platforms. He probably told Elon to keep his hands off Bluesky.

Norobiik @[email protected]Jul 3, 2023

@chargrille I've been waiting for the other shoe to drop for a while now. #Elon always goes ballistic in public re: Twitter competitors, but not a single peep about #Bluesky. My guess is the two plan to have some sort of payments/crypto collaboration eventually.

Feel truly sorry for all the people who fled to bluesky thinking it's a haven. It isn't.

https://www.ft.com/content/f65414c4-f3e4-4bff-9af0-4960f922ce1d

@Norobiik

June 11, 2022:
Jack: "Twitter Inc could also use [Bluesky] as foundation."

"According to the filing, Dorsey and Musk “may be deemed to have formed a group” for the purposes of part of the filing, a designation that indicates the pair were working together on the buyout."

Oct. 18, 2022:
Q: You've talked about a protocol for Twitter...is this along those lines?

jack @jack:
yes

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Christos Argyropoulos MD, PhD Jul 4, 2023

@chargrille @Norobiik Bankrupt Twitter and obtain the tech infrastructure during a firesale and move the base over to bluesky. Solves the insolvency of twitter and jumpstarts it under a different name for a fraction of the price.
I have a Bluesky account and the experience is much much worse (slow app, limited features eg lists, QT/like algos up and running). I think it makes more sense for ppl to fork 6 to 7 dollars a month and run their personal mastodon instance

wyvernsrose Jul 3, 2023

@chargrille I believe keeping friendly with the original designer of Twitter is strategic... possibly even contractual

MissyintheDot↔️Jul 3, 2023

@chargrille Dorsey is a fash right wing libertarian and like musk a shitty CEO who spend more time chasing clout and young skirts than running a company. Capitalism is useless violence and repression

Radio Justice Jul 3, 2023

I don't trust BlueSky, or Tribel.

pacific_murmurs Jul 3, 2023

@chargrille can you explain what you mean by saying that it was "never banned" and "still allowed to advertise itself"? Like, are we talking about official, paid adverts, or is it other stuff, like hiding tweets containing links to other platforms or mentions of other platforms?

@808murmurs

All of that. Musk ordered a number of bans to try to stop people going to competitors: disabled links, blocked tweets, labeled links to Mastodon as "potentially harmful" etc.

@TwitterSupport on Dec 18, 2022 "...we will remove accounts created solely for the purpose of promoting other social platforms and content that contains links or usernames for the following platforms: Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon, Truth Social, Tribel, Nostr and Post."

Paid ads too:
https://twitter.com/Chronotope/status/1604538254795198465

pacific_murmurs Jul 3, 2023

@chargrille ah, thanks. I wondered if something like that had happened. I mostly don't use Twitter anymore, but in the past I'd cross-posted a few things from here over there, or tried to promote Mastodon to my followers and it always seemed like those posts had very little engagement.

@808murmurs

Notice the glaring absence of the competitor that's most directly a Twitter clone: Bluesky.

This suggests there are legal agreements/informal collusion behind the scenes. Which would not be at all surprising, since they're friends, & Bluesky was created by Jack as Twitter CEO, to serve Twitter, & funded directly by Twitter. There's zero info re how exactly BS ownership was transferred from shareholders to Twitter's CEO, as Jack was pushed out & just before he plotted w/Musk to buy

TransitBiker Jul 3, 2023

@chargrille Hmmmmmm!

Georgia Jul 3, 2023

@chargrille i still use the hellsite (i know, but it's only to keep chatting to some friends on there that haven't migrated elsewhere yet) and the amount of people i've seen that have got to bluesky that have been subject to transphobic or racist abuse is very disturbing. also saw a mutual had their account suspended for "hate speech" because they used the term cracker in jest... bluesky is not the safe haven people thought it would be

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-twitter-content/twitter-plans-to-build-decentralized-standard-for-social-networks-idUSKBN1YF2EN

They are intrinsically linked. Bluesky received $13M from Twitter.

This is an article from 2019, when Jack Dorsey announced he would be funding a team to explore a decentralized standard for social media. If the bet to move towards Mastodon-like social media works, Elon would be a fool to get rid of it.

Twitter plans to build 'decentralized standard' for social networks

Twitter Inc plans to set up an independent research group to create an "open and decentralized" system for social networks, CEO Jack Dorsey said on Wednesday, which could relieve pressure on the company to appease critics of its content policies but also give rise to a new...

Reuters

Thanks for the replies. So, I'm aware of these sources, texts & the lawsuit, of course. Big gaps remain in the story of how & why - & importantly, when - Dorsey & Musk came to an agreement about Twitter, & with what goals. This all happened during the time that Dorsey was stepping down/being pushed out as Twitter CEO, for the second time. We may merely interpret the available facts differently.

But what is your source for the claim Musk paid Bluesky $13m?

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/07/03/users-flock-to-twitter-competitor-bluesky-after-elon-musk-imposes-rate-limits.html

Here is what I found:

Oops, just realized that I misinterpreted the wiki article—it seems they got the 13M just before Elon came into ownership of the platform. Thanks for pointing that out.

Right, I had seen those tweets from bluesky. It doesn't say that Musk paid $13 million to Bluesky, so I can't assume that. And, the thread came before litigation forced specific performance of Musk's purchase offer.

I've seen elsewhere that the $13 million came from Twitter. My Qs remain: why is there no consideration given in exchange for $13m of Twitter's shareholders' money, and how was ownership transferred from Twitter shareholders to Jack, Graber, & the other Twitter guy?

If he did actually pay Bluesky $13m after their late 2021 splitting off from Twitter & incorporation as a separate PBLLC , why? What did he get in return?

(Query: how exactly did that happen, legally? How could they just take the money and run? What consideration did the new PBLLC owners give in exchange for ownership & whatever resources Twitter had provided to the project? It makes no legal sense.)

These are great questions and things to consider. Unfortunately, I am not a lawyer so I’m not sure of how corporate law works. But, it would be interesting to do a deep dive on how they actually managed to pull this off.

@aa1217 You probably know this but your handle (esq.) indicates that you are a lawyer.

fyi I assumed you were, based on that.

@chargrille @aa1217 Dorsey paid the $13m in March, according to Crunchbase, which details that funding round.

@OutOnTheMoors @aa1217

Can you see edit history of Crunchbase? When I looked at it several weeks ago iirc Twitter was the source, not Dorsey. Also, contemporaneous tweets talk about that $13 million having come from Twitter, *not* Dorsey.

@chargrille @aa1217
Hasn't been edited as far as I know. This is what I saw a month or two ago, and what I still see today

@OutOnTheMoors

Thanks. Based on announcements from Twitter, I don't think that information is correct.

What is Crunchbase's source? Who put that information up? It looks like a lot of people can edit these profiles.

@chargrille @aa1217 I don't know its sources, but it's a fairly reliable (in terms of basic company info like this) site used mainly by VC types looking for new places to invest. I don't think it can be edited except by staff.
It's owned by TechCrunch, which is itself part of Yahoo, and has been around for about 15 years

@chargrille @aa1217 The BlueSky project was funded by Twitter until last year. The amounts aren't directly reflected in the annual reports because it was an "operating cost" as opposed to a separate investment, but it was mentioned on Twitter (by Dorsey, I think) as being in the $3m region. I don't know if that was annually or in total.
Believe whatever you want. I regard Crunchbase as reliable enough for this purpose

@OutOnTheMoors
I don't believe anything in particular at this point, I'm just looking for reliable sources. Without knowing how that # got there, I can't rely on it. What I saw in contemporaneous tweets indicate that Twitter provided $13m in funding to Bluesky. I've been through this type of thing enough in work for large business clients to know that the devil is in these details & it's amazing how sloppy rich men & enormous companies (& white shoe legal firms!) actually can be.

@chargrille @aa1217 I'm an old print journalist and did some time in the Companies/Business section saltmines.

@OutOnTheMoors

Also, devious and contemptuous of both laws & contracts.

@chargrille Always.

afufa, vc., esq.Jul 4, 2023

@OutOnTheMoors @chargrille

Thank you for posting this. I didn’t even know this website was a thing.

@aa1217 @chargrille The VC bros subscribe to it and get alerts when some start-up is looking for finance. I find it useful for finding out who's behind non-listed companies