An Inthreadible Unraveling - The Unmaking of Twitter

Part I: Welcome to the Little Biggest...

Before we even set off here, let me explain how I’m going to tell this story and how that impacts the completeness and accuracy:

The subject of this two-parter is: 1) how the big machine of Twitter worked its special magic of putting a tweet from someone you liked right above one from someone you had never heard of about the same breaking topic within one minute of it having happened; and 2) how that was changed for the worse after Elon Musk bought the company.

To tell that story, I’m going to use metaphor to explain what would otherwise be an unwieldy discussion of technology, data management, analytics, web services, etc. Doing that simplifies some things and that’s imperfect. I am also distilling my understanding of publicly available information as I understand it - which may be imperfect or flawed. Consider this fully disclaimed.

And now, let’s goooo, because this is a pretty magical ride on the Fuckery Express.

Let’s start by putting Twitter on the map.

A Different Kind of Storefront

The year is 2006. Somewhere near you, a new bookstore opens in what used to be a Barnes & Noble.

“Grand Opening! The World’s Coolest Bookstore!”

So, you pay the place a visit.

The windows all still have that brown manilla paper over them, but a sign says, “We’re Open!” so go in and then it gets a little weird.

When you step through the first of the two sets of doors you see a digital sign saying:

“Wait time 000 seconds.”

And to your left, you see a scanner affixed to the wall like you’d see at a convenience store to check if lottery tickets were winners.

Above the little scanner are the words:

“Please scan last receipt to enter.”

You don’t have one of those but then the second of double doors swings open and someone inside says “Welcome! Come inside.”

A Different Kind of Shopping Experience

Inside, instead of seeing all of the familiar features of a bookstore, there is only one table and the rest of the store is screened from view. Standing next to is it is someone who looks cheery and eager to help.

“WELCOME! Is this your first visit?” they ask.

“Uhhh, yes, it is.” You say.

“Great, let’s get you setup…” the cheery staffer says. “Let me explain how this place works…”

“The goal of The World’s Little Biggest Bookstore That is Really More of a Library is to help you find amazing things to read every time… and then, give them to you FOR FREE!”

You have to ask “Is that really the name of this place?”

And the cheery person laughs and says “No. This whole place is an allegorical construction by a guy writing a story about how Elon Musk fucked up one of the world’s largest social media platforms. Just call us Twittle.”

The helpful attendant then explains how Twittle works.

“Here at Twittle, we’re building the world’s smartest system for picking great books for people. Visit Twittle, find great books. It’s that simple. You come in and we’ll present you with some choices… and you can pick any of them or all of them… and every time you come back, we’ll have all new choices… and they’ll get better and better.”

“Oh, one thing...” The person adds. “The books come wrapped in a book jacket with ads on it. That’s how we pay for this place. We wrap the stuff you read with ads.”

“Today, we’re going to show you some books. Take what you like. When we’re done, we’re going to give you an index card which has a little information on it. Scan it next at that little machine in the lobby next time you come in.”

Then the assistant showed you some first choices. You liked a few and took them; and were piqued by a couple others but put them down. Afterwards, they gave you an index card with a barcode on it and a little detail on what you had been shown and liked.

Next time you visited, you scanned the code and went inside and there were already ten books laid out on the table. Again, considered some but put them down, and liked a few and took them home. Again, you left with an index card.

And this goes on and on and on… and the choices seem to always have some likable offerings.

Eventually, Twittle added a wrinkle where you could name authors you really liked so their books could find their way to the table more often.

And then, that manilla paper over the outside windows of the store was replaced by digital displays with “Authors you might like!” on them. You could just tap the display to add the authors to the list of ones you liked seeing stuff from on the selection table.

This process repeats for yeaaaars… Eventually, the digital display in the anteroom started to show a wait time before you went in. “Wait time 220 seconds.” But then it got shorter and shorter went away altogether again.

And that shopping experience… it is our working metaphor for being a Twitter user.

Twitter’s core functionality is a ‘content selection engine’.

Twitter presents a selection of things written by other people. What they present to us is based on some dark magic behind those curtains and that sorcery got better the longer you were on the platform - right up until November of 2022 when Twitter was purchased by Elon Musk.

If you had been a Twitter user for a while, you implicitly understood what made Twitter special and fun. You viscerally ‘got’ that every time you showed up, there would be an array of books on the table, and you’d like the experience of looking over them and would find some you like from authors you also liked.

You didn’t know how they did that, but you liked what it presented on your side of the curtain.

Twitter’s new owner appears to have understood little to none of that.

And in that ignorance, he thought he could tamper with the very last step in the sorcery: picking books for you.

He thought he could make it cheaper and faster and more profitable and better at picking books.

His “improvement” actually broke the entire system… and it also made it likely impossible to even undo that.

And that is the subject of Part II.

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