Social Media: Center Of The Hustle Universe

Michael Hedges April 18, 2022 Follow on Twitter

Social media has been in the news lately. Actually, social media is always in the news, mostly because it’s always there. In that respect, social media is like the Kardashians; basically useless, always in the news. Since inception, social media has traversed several vectors. Most persistent is the hustle.

“We need ads. Lots of ads,” wrote jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny on social media, reported The Moscow Times (April 15). “A huge national anti-war campaign will start with an advertising campaign. I know what you’ll say now: intrusive advertising is annoying, it would be much better if people spread the good links themselves. That's how we usually operate, but it's not going to work now.” He addressed the message to Meta (Facebook) chief executive Mark Zuckerberg and Alphabet (Google) chief executive Sundar Pichai as well as several political leaders. The Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) has not commented on Mr. Navalny’s endorsement.

Activists - and others - have learned that social media content is easily controlled. Regulators and censors, like Russia’s infamous Roskomnadzor, block or remove individual social media posts at will. Ads are more difficult to eliminate, mostly because they are served up through specialized technology. By design social media bots control ad content placement. When asked by a US Senate committee (2018) how Facebook remains free to access, Mr. Zuckerberg answered: “Senator, we run ads.”

Roskomnadzor has banned Facebook and Instagram in Russia and it’s threatening YouTube, Alphabet’s video sharing platform. Facebook, Instagram and YouTube removed accounts and pages of Russian state media over the last few weeks. Social media platforms have been blocked in several Southeast Asian countries for years, most recently in Sri Lanka.

Elections provide opportunity for dodgy social media campaigns. This has recently attracted the attention of the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC), which wants to know more about ads from candidates aligned with One Nation and other micro-parties opposing coronavirus vaccine mandates or pushing impending electoral fraud, reported The Age (April 17). Of course, fake news is not new for election observers nor is it new to social media platforms. The AEC has enlisted Facebook’s aid in identifying funders of campaign ads, required by Australian law.

Retail sales are another natural opportunity for social media platforms. Meta is raising its commission rates for those offering merchandise on Facebook, Instagram or WhatsApp. The official statement, reported gaming portal IGN (April 14), referred to “new tools for creators to monetize their products through the metaverse.” The bottomline is a 47.5% commission. Apple gets heat for taking 30%.

Big news on finance and technology pages this past week was the bonkers saga of Twitter and Elon Musk, the world’s richest guy according to Bloomberg and Forbes. A serial investor and space adventurer, Mr. Musk made an “unsolicited” (read: hostile) takeover bid for Twitter, valuing the social media platform at US$43.4 billion, to insure its position as “a free speech platform.” He is known for rash, sometimes belligerent pronouncements, including various conspiracy theories. But, he’s very rich and, notably, has more than 80 million Twitter followers.

On April 4, he acquired a 9.1% stake in Twitter, for a moment its biggest individual shareholder. He was quickly offered a seat on the board of directors, which, also quickly, he turned down only to make the buyout offer. In the ensuing hours he offered various operational and financial suggestions to the board. The Twitter board responded with “Oh, we don’t think so” and quickly drafted a shareholders rights plan, commonly referred to as the poison pill. “You can not understate what a rollercoaster ride this has been so far,” wrote The Verge (April 16) summarizing Elon’s week of fun.

Returning to earth, extraordinarily popular social messaging platform TikTok became Official Entertainment Partner for the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC), said the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) (April 14). All ESC events in Turin, Italy in mid May will be live streamed on TikTok in addition to zillions of little ESC moments. TikTok has around a billion global users.

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