Techmeme
November 1, 2022, 3:55 PM

Top News

Elon Musk / @elonmusk:
Musk says the current blue check system is “bullshit”; Twitter Blue to cost $8/month with half as many ads, priority in replies, mentions, and search, and more  —  Twitter's current lords & peasants system for who has or doesn't have a blue checkmark is bullshit. Power to the people! Blue for $8/month.
Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Twitter is planning to end the ability of Twitter Blue subscribers to access ad-free articles from hundreds of publishers  —  Move comes as company's new owner, Elon Musk, continues to make changes to social-media platform  —  Twitter Inc. is ending the ability of subscribers …
James Ball / New Statesman:
Elon Musk's plan to monetize Twitter verification would generate little revenue, even at $20/month, and could create myriad issues, including enabling spammers  —  Elon Musk's latest brainwave risks alienating the users Twitter depends on and would expose it to lawsuits.
Bloomberg:
Sources: Twitter froze some staff access to content moderation and policy enforcement tools, raising worries about a misinformation spike before the US midterms  —  Twitter Inc., the social network being overhauled by new owner Elon Musk, has frozen some employee access to internal tools used …
New York Times:
Twitter's chief customer officer has resigned; sources: IPG, a top advertising company, recommended clients pause spending on Twitter over moderation concerns  —  At least three Twitter executives have left in recent days, as one of the world's largest ad companies said clients should pause spending on the social media platform.
Lora Kolodny / CNBC:
David Pierce / The Verge:
YouTube rolls out Primetime Channels in the US, with shows and movies from 35 partners, including Paramount+ and Epix, and plans to add NBA League Pass soon  —  Streaming services are coming to YouTube.  The company is rolling out a new feature called Primetime Channels that will bring shows …
Nilay Patel / The Verge:
Q&A with Amazon VP of Music Steve Boom on making its ~100M song library available to Prime users without ads, running the unit, music industry, labels, and more  —  Apple Music raised its rates.  Will Amazon Music follow suit? … Steve Boom is the VP of Amazon Music, and he has a great name for the music business.
Andy Robinson / Video Games Chronicle:
Sony reports PlayStation Plus subscribers fell from 47.3M in Q1 to 45.4M in Q2 despite its revamp as PlayStation Network MAUs fell from 103M in Q1 to 102M in Q2  —  PlayStation Plus subscribers have dropped by nearly 2 million users since the revamped service launched in June.
Steve Dent / Engadget:
Matt Levine / Bloomberg:
Elon Musk likely violated contracts when he fired top Twitter executives including Parag Agrawal for “cause”, based on a look at their employment agreements  —  Oh Elon  —  I don't know if you noticed, but I have spent much of the last six months writing …
Kali Hays / Insider:
Washington Post:
Twitter disrupts three China-based influence campaigns ahead of the US midterms, spanning nearly 2,000 user accounts; two networks skewed right and another left  —  A fake China-based account called MAGA ‘Hot Babe’ was among nearly 2,000 that sought to influence America's midterms and were removed by Twitter

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Earlier Picks

Selina Cheng / Wall Street Journal: