There’s that famous meme from Arrested Development where Jason Bateman’s character opens up a paper bag labeled “DEAD DOVE: Do Not Eat.” He opens the bag, presumably finds a dead bird, and, full of regret, says to no one in particular, “I don’t know what I expected.”
That’s all to say: I picture Elon Musk, wandering the halls of Twitter HQ, whispering to no one in particular, “I don’t know what I expected.”
Because the latest shitstorm for Musk, amid a deluge of crashing shitstorms, is perhaps the most predictable thing in the history of the internet. Musk removed any barrier for verification on Twitter — putting a blue check up for sale for $8 — and people immediately used that ability to post fake news. See, while there was a difficult-to-find distinction between a blue check verifying the identity of a notable person and a blue check for having $8, it all pretty much looks the same on the timeline. So people could buy blue checks and post fake news, posing as someone or something notable. At first it was mostly people posting fake sports news. That didn’t last.
Things have gotten much worse for Twitter. Predictably, people began posing as businesses, political organizations, political figures, and others. By Thursday evening it was out of control. At seemingly every turn was a fake account. Here’s just a small sampling and, fair warning, these examples are pretty controversial in nature.
All this, obviously, is far more serious than a fake tweet about LeBron James. This is political and could be dangerous. Imagine the damage a bad actor could do on an election night. Less serious for the world — but quite serious for Musk and Twitter’s future — this is the exact sort of thing that would scare the hell out of advertisers, which is basically the only way the platform makes money.
Unsurprisingly, Twitter has now paused the ability to buy a checkmark through Twitter Blue. Back to the drawing board for Musk. I’m not sure what he expected.