This is an excellent article about Elon Musk by economist Paul Krugman in the New York Times. This is a “gift link,” so you don’t need a subscription to read the full version.
Why Petulant Oligarchs Rule Our World
http://wfryer.me/42z
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Krugman may not have been surprised by Elon‘s actions in the past couple weeks, as he took over Twitter, but I naively have been. What a disappointment. I had some sense of Elon’s penchant for rash and “ugly behavior,” but that has become dramatically apparent to everyone this last week. Understanding who Elon Musk is and the values he both demonstrates through his actions and supports have me rethinking my latent desire to buy a Tesla electric car at some point.
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@wfryer he didn’t surprise me. I figured he was a poopy-head after he started treating people who worked at Twitter so badly. It just got worse. What I have trouble with is how folks got mad when I told them what was going to happen and that organizations should establish themselves on Mastodon. But orgs decided to take a wait and see attitude…would a fascist billionaire get worse? A silly question since you either are a poophead or you are not at his level. 🙃 They were afraid to lose their time investment in Twitter.
I have been on Twitter since May, 2007. What dumpster fire 🔥 for educators, and other special pops and communities who found a voice.
Now, our focus needs to be building our own space, and hope the masses decide to come. And if they don’t, at least, we have the benefit of hindsight.
@davecormier @wfryer Yes, a fresh start is nice! While we carry the seeds of doom with us, hope for the better travels with them, too. 🤣
@mguhlin @davecormier b/c more early adopters have been on Mastodon, it has reminded me of the mid-late 2000s as Web 2.0 was starting. Dynamics naturally change when more early & late majority adopters participate. For me, Twitter has almost entirely been a positive experience, I have heard about the problems & issues, but I have been fortunately sheltered. Of course, some of the consequences in terms of societal impacts (subversion of democratic processes, etc.) have an impact on us all.
@mguhlin @davecormier What were your “individual tipping points” in terms of knowing you want to abandon Twitter & entirely move to Mastodon, or primarily share on Mastodon?
@wfryer @davecormier The echo chamber feel, disengagement from people and the edtech branding and sales/ambassadors by teachers, always focused on selling and making money. Whatever happened to collegial connections that resulted in no profit but solution sharing, and improved human condition? While Twitter offered global reach, education professionals became commodities, each Twitter account an opportunity to achieve financial independence, escape from school-based tyranny. Typing this on a small screen, so apologies for lack of big picture connections. 🙂
@mguhlin @davecormier Thankfully, I have remained largely insulated from that “boat show” aspect of edtech vendors, not as much during my 4 years as a school tech director, but still pretty insulated. I think our experiences & perspectives with Twitter have been quite varied, & are not uniform. I wonder how many others have used Twitter mainly in very positive ways as educators, avoiding the ugly side / the dark side?