Twitter Users Report Weird Glitches, Outages

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Elon Musk has taken legal aim at the Center for Countering Digital Hate, an independent research nonprofit group, over the organization’s findings that since the multibillionaire acquired Twitter (now called X) hate, racism and disinformation on the social platform has substantially increased. “Musk and his legal team, led by attorney Alex Spiro at Quinn Emanuel, have engaged in an aggressive campaign to intimidate, bully, and silence CCDH,” the organization said in a statement released Monday.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Kanye West’s account on X, the social platform formerly known as Twitter, has been restored — after the controversial rapper/entrepreneur apparently promised the Elon Musk-owned company he would refrain from posting antisemitic and other hateful content. West, who now goes by Ye, was kicked off Twitter in December 2022 after he share an image of a Nazi swastika embedded inside the Star of David.

Twitter is officially being rebranded as X and the logo has now changed on the website.

Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X, the digital platform formerly known as Twitter, told employees they are “writing history” with the stunning overhaul of the well-established brand.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor TikTok has added the ability to create text-based posts — alongside its central short-form video format — although the move is more about giving users a new option for sharing content, rather than representing a new challenge to Elon Musk’s Twitter (which is rebranding as X) or Instagram’s Threads. TikTok’s new text posts have a 1,000-character limit. Users can customize their text posts by adding a sound (such as song snippets), tagging a location, enabling comments and allowing Duets, among other features. Unlike Twitter or Threads, on TikTok, text-based posts aren’t designed to facilitate a conversation — TikTok posts still function more like Instagram posts, which followers may be able to comment on but that’s not the main point.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Over the weekend, Elon Musk issued the unexpected fiat via late-night/early-morning tweetstorm (x-storm?) that Twitter would now be known as X — complete with a new X logo that has replaced the bonny blue birdie on the service’s website. Per Musk, you won’t be posting tweets on his social platform, you will be throwing up… “x’s.” Musk’s hand-picked new CEO Linda Yaccarino, late of NBCUniversal, tried to explain the situation. “X is the future state of unlimited interactivity — centered in audio, video, messaging, payments/banking — creating a global marketplace for ideas, goods, services and opportunities,” she, uh, x’d on Sunday. “Powered by AI, X will connect us all in ways we’re just beginning to imagine.”

Elon Musk is making yet another change to his social media platform.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Spotify is finally set to hike the price of its music streaming subscription in the U.S. to $10.99 per month for an individual plan — up one dollar — according to a Wall Street Journal report. It’s a move that would be a long time in coming and follow similar increases by competitors. When Spotify’s U.S. price increase would go into effect is unclear. The Journal story, citing anonymous sources, said the price hike for United States customers is expected to be announced next week, followed by similar increases in “dozens of markets globally in the coming months.” Spotify has not changed the $9.99-per-month price of the ad-free Premium plan in the U.S. since it launched in 2011.

Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino has forcefully disputed a Bloomberg article maintaining that a “surge” of harmful content on the Elon Musk platform has spooked advertisers.

Threads is making a big change as it continues to grow exponentially as an alternative to Twitter. Instagram boss Adam Mosseri took to the micro-blogging platform to announce that they would be implementing rate limits to combat bots.

Jeremy Vine has agreed a financial settlement with a Twitter user who falsely identified him as the BBC presenter at the centre of the Huw Edwards furore.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Elon Musk’s Twitter has been accused of failing to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in severance to laid-off workers. Now, under a new ad-revenue sharing program, the company just doled out millions to high-profile Twitter users, including controversial right-wing figure Andrew Tate and left-leaning twin brothers Ed and Brian Krassenstein. Twitter announced the ad-revenue sharing program for creators, initially on an invitation-only basis, on Thursday. The company said eligible creators will be paid a share of ad revenue starting in the replies to their posts. “This is part of our effort to help people earn a living directly on Twitter,” the company said in a blog post about the program.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Netflix is making it even easier for users to add a paid “extra member” to their primary accounts or migrate their streaming preferences to another household. Starting Tuesday (July 11), all Netflix members worldwide are able to port their profile from one account to an existing account. Previously, members were only able to transfer a profile to a brand-new account. “This was a much-requested feature from our members and we’re excited to roll it out to everyone,” a Netflix rep told Variety. The new capability expands on Netflix’s Profile Transfer feature, introduced last fall. The feature preserves all of an individual user’s personalized recommendations, viewing history, My List, saved games and other settings.

Joe Kernen, co-host of CNBC’s Squawk Box, took aim at what he called “mainstream media” hype about the potential for Meta Platforms’ Threads to kill Twitter, insisting he is “not mainstream media.” He also said he “wouldn’t sell Elon Musk short” in the social media competition.

Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino is throwing a little shade at Threads after Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced his platform had crossed 100 million signups in less than a week.

On Thursday, a lawyer for Elon Musk’s Twitter accused Meta of leveraging “trade secrets” to launch its Twitter competitor, Threads, which garnered more than 30 million sign ups in its first 24 hours of operation. Musk’s threats, however, did nothing to slow adoption of the new platform. In fact, user takeup increased.

Things are getting feisty on social media!

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor The battle between Elon Musk’s Twitter and Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta over the launch of Instagram’s Twitter rival Threads has taken a legal turn. On Wednesday, Meta’s Instagram debuted Threads, a text-focused social app designed to piggyback off Instagram’s infrastructure and user base. The app had more than 30 million sign-ups as of Thursday morning, according to Zuckerberg. In a July 5 cease-and-desist letter addressed to Meta CEO Zuckerberg, a lawyer representing Twitter said that Musk’s company had “serious concerns” that Meta “has engaged in systematic, willful and unlawful misappropriation of Twitter’s trade secrets and other intellectual property.” The letter said that “Twitter intends to strictly enforce its intellectual property rights, and demands that Meta take immediate steps to stop using any Twitter trade secrets or other highly confidential information.”

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Should you ditch Twitter in favor of Instagram’s Threads — which looks quite a lot like a clone of Twitter? Meta launched Threads, a “conversational” text-centric app tied to Instagram, on Wednesday, a day earlier than expected. The internet giant sees an opportunity to take on Twitter, controlled by tech mogul Elon Musk, which has been beset by various technical and business issues since he acquired the company. “I think there should be a public conversations app with 1 billion+ people on it,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a Threads post. “Twitter has had the opportunity to do this but hasn’t nailed it. Hopefully we will.”

Instagram‘s new app Threads, which was created as a rival to Twitter, has officially launched!