Twitter: riddled with bots, porn and bad algorithms? Elon Musk has some issues with his deal

File photo of Elon Musk taken earlier this month. Picture by REUTERS/Brendan Mcdermid

File photo of Elon Musk taken earlier this month. Picture by REUTERS/Brendan Mcdermid

Published May 18, 2022

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It’s very important to fix your Twitter feed, a pinned post on Elon Musk’s twitter feed says.

He then goes on to show you how to do it:

1. Tap home button.

2. Tap stars on upper right of screen.

3. Select “Latest tweets”.

In another tweet he warns tweeps: “You are being manipulated by the algorithm in ways you don’t realize”.

“Easy to switch back & forth to see the difference.”.

In another tweet he says he is “not suggesting malice in the algorithm, but rather that it’s trying to guess what you might want to read and, in doing so, inadvertently manipulate/amplify your viewpoints without you realizing this is happening”.

Added to that he has also hit out at what he believes is at least “four times more fake accounts than what the company has said”.

Musk has put his $44 billion deal on hold, and some think he may pull out. On Twitter and at conferences he is highlighting what he sees as problems he believes were not revealed to him.

Reuters reported him saying at the All-In Summit 2022 conference this week that "the more questions I ask, the more my concerns grow".

Musk has said he may seek to pay less for Twitter. "You can't pay the same price for something that is much worse than they claimed," he said at the conference in Miami.

Musk has put his $44 billion deal to buy Twitter on hold, pending information on the spam accounts. He believes they make up about 20% of users - compared to Twitter's official estimates of 5%.

Previously IANS reported that a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) states if Musk's financing falls through, Twitter will get $1bn as compensation and vice versa if Twitter terminate the deal, they will have to pay Musk $1bn.

When asked at this week’s conference whether the Twitter deal is viable at a different price, Musk responded, "I mean, it's not out of the question."

Meanwhile @fintwit_news asked on Musk’s Twitter account: “You didn’t think about this before offering $44 billion to buy the company?”

Musk replied saying he had “relied upon the accuracy of Twitter’s public filings”.

More shocking was the revelation that Twitter is “also a porn site”. With the person tweeting the revelation sending followers to a porn tweep. The link was later removed and made “unavailable”. Pornhub itself has a section: Twitter porn videos.