Originally published at: Musk takes @X from user who's had it since 2007 | Boing Boing
…
4 Likes
22 Likes
I speculate that the X is temporary in any case. I think they’re going to bend the four ends of the X at little right angles soon.
30 Likes
Maybe so.
14 Likes
Basic respect is not for the little people. I mean, how many billions does Hwang have? /s
16 Likes
Now he has a billion numbers after the x.
12 Likes
now you went and got me curious if there is such in the expanded Unicode set. and lo’ there is, but it’s reputed to be because of Eastern religious practices; which of course is ‘prior Art’, but i’m not sure this fine distinction will occur to our current crop of neo-nazis
from wikipedia (and i’m pleased to note that none of my manifesting platforms has that character defined)
The swastika is included in the Unicode character sets of two
languages. In the Chinese block it is U+534D 卍 (left-facing) and U+5350
for the swastika 卐 (right-facing); The latter has a mapping in the
original Big5 character set, but the former does not (although it is
in Big5+). In Unicode 5.2, two swastika symbols and two swastikas
were added to the Tibetan block: swastika U+0FD5 ࿕ RIGHT-FACING SVASTI
SIGN, U+0FD7 ࿗ RIGHT-FACING SVASTI SIGN WITH DOTS, and swastikas U+0FD6
࿖ LEFT-FACING SVASTI SIGN, U+0FD8 ࿘ LEFT-FACING SVASTI SIGN WITH
DOTS.
8 Likes
“Oh well – guess that’s how it goes,” Hwang said.
This pretty much sums up the attitude of everyone still on Twitter/X who isn’t a Nazi. “Oh well, not like I could leave or anything, I’ll just take what Lord Musk gives me and like it, I suppose.”
11 Likes
… we are all presumed to be “happy” by default
The Market is my shepherd; I shall not want
13 Likes
12 Likes
8 Likes
Musk did the exact same thing the week he took possession of Twitter, stealing @e from its rightful User. The authentic account holder was never compensated in any way despite going through Twitter’s published dispute procedures.
13 Likes
44 billions dollars to prove you nothing about business and live forever as a case study in multiple text books on how to do it wrong or…
- Solve world hunger - Estimated $7 billion dollars
- Fund Parton’s Imagination Library for every child in the US - (~3.8 million children * 6 books * ~$10 book) - Estimated $228 million, plus about $69 million for shipping and handling
- Fund the Carter Center for 10 years, ensuring the extinction of one of the most horrific diseases ever (guinea worm - note, don’t google it) - $3 billion
- Fund the WHO for 10 years, allowing it to ignore any political tides or government interference - $10 billion
- Fund St Jude’s Research Hospital for a year - Around $2 billion dollars. Add another billion to cover the currently often underfunded ancillary costs of patients family like parking, food, etc.
- Buy my own island - $60 million (currently most expensive island for sale in the Bahamas)
- Mail a crisp, new $2 to every single person in the US, individually - (($2 +$0.66 postage + $0.04 envelope) * 332 million people) - $900 million
And I’m only at just over $24 billion dollars. Including the absolutely crazy thing with the $2 bill and I’ve done stuff that would absolutely lock me in as a pure legend. Without putting my worst impulses on display.
29 Likes
Hang has a good attitude but that doesn’t change the fact the Musk is a thief as well as a vandal.
9 Likes
I mean, I’m not a Nazi, I’m just waiting for a suitable alternative. No Bluesky invite, not touching Threads, no interest in Mastodon’s weirdness. The Following tab is still, for the most part, unmolested by Elmo.
I have wondered this about billionaires for decades now. With so much money that they could solve multiple humanity-scale problems and still have enough left over for themselves and multiple generations of their kids to spend thousands of dollars every single day for their entire lives, why do they invariably go for the high score rather than trying to make the world (which, despite being insulated from, they still have to live on) better for everyone? If they want fame, it seems like actually doing something with their money would be far more memorable than gathering the most (which will, eventually, be eclipsed by someone in the future). Even Bill Gates, who is something of a philanthropist compared to other megarich folks (or at the least, not a fascist edgelord toddler in an adult’s body like Musk) hasn’t done the stuff you listed. Why the hell not? What is stopping any of them?
14 Likes
A couple:
Tax reasons; at a certain point, giving away that much money wouldn’t get you any additional tax benefits.
And they wouldn’t be a billionare anymore and have to surrender their diamond encrusted platinum blue membership in the club. /s
6 Likes
Both of which are just part of the “high score” mentality. It’s as though to become a billionaire it’s absolutely mandatory that you have to be an astoundingly boring, passionless, unimaginative person with no dreams or hopes. I almost said no ambition, but of course they’re plenty ambitious as long as it results in accruing more wealth. After that the drive to do anything more with their lives seems to magically evaporate into thin air. I still don’t get it, at all.
13 Likes
I agree, that even just a few truly altruistic billionaires could put right many or most of the world’s problems. None of them have so much as taken a swing at being Iron Man. Or Batman. What has to be said though, is that most of them are not that liquid. Musk, for example, does not have 100 billion just sitting in bank accounts. Most of his vast wealth is in the value of the stocks he owns for Tesla, SpaceX, Boring, etc. If he tried to liquidate that stock, he’d 1) plummet its value as available shares flood the market, and 2) no longer control those companies. That’s why a lot of the obscenely wealthy put off much of their philanthropic work until the end of their lives when the settlement of their estate usually means a liquidation of such assets that can then be used to set up charitable foundations. Few of these foundations have achieved much either, because they feel a responsibility to maintaining the endowment. Pennies, comparatively, are spent on doing the real work for which they’re established.
In any case, it was a monumentally dick move to commandeer those twitter handles without compensating the original owners of those handles. Obviously, they had VALUE or Musk wouldn’t have felt it necessary to take them. Every new report I read makes me glad I deleted my account months ago, and a little angry I can’t delete it again.
16 Likes
Sounds like nonsense. The trademarked logo is nothing like it.
1 Like
