But I’ve also observed enough managerial cultures close up to have some confidence in my sense of where particular playbooks fit or don’t. Half my shtick as a management consultant is stealing practices from one company to recommend to another. Tesla playbook doesn’t fit Twitter.
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As an aside, having also consulted for Amazon, Elon’s nemesis biz, I have to say… I tend to recommend Amazon ideas a bit more than Tesla ideas, but the 2 together are like 75% of my material… both are what I call 4th Gen mgmt, most of the economy is 3rd.
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I wouldn’t recommend the Tesla playbook for twitter even under the *most auspicious* initial conditions, let alone this politicized, toxic, litigious shitshow.
So what *would* I recommend? To say a non-hostile Elon regime or a different new leader?
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I have held, since won’t, that Twitter is in fact “too big to nail.” It’s a far faster opportunity space than most businesses which is why all previous leaders have struggled. It looks deceptively simple.
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* far vaster, not faster… I’m not paying $20 for edit button. That better be some of the free bread in this circus
I think you need a big product bet that comes from deep thinking about future of social software. More bluesky than a vague WeChat clone X.
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But this is wishful thinking. You need starter goodwill. Tailwinds. A core user base that trusts your intentions rather than scanning for exits. An ability to attract the strongest social product thinkers rather than Scaramucci incompetents or Miller type ideological hacks.
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If you try to place a big product bet without those conditions, it’s an uphill battle. Like take Tesla autopilot. Ambitious product that attracted some of the best talent (Karpathy etc) when Tesla was riding high. Still struggling to the point some (not me) call it a fraud.
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Fixing twitter the company = leveling up Twitter the product = at least as hard as full-self-driving technologically.
Like many, I think Elon underestimates the challenge. He hasn’t yet learned to respect the product challenge here, which may be why he’s focused on vendettas.
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So tldr… this has a snowflake’s chance in hell of ending well. The best outcome I can think of is Elon treads water long enough to claim a couple of face-saving small wins and then divests the thing to people who actually care enough about twitter to want to run it.
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The median case: extended tribal war of attrition between current employees who stay and “Elon’s people.” Same as Trump’s people vs “deep state.” Nothing will get done except earth-scorching.
Worst case: rapid implosion, Yahoo style.
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PS: take the current exodus threat more seriously than previous pseudoflouncathons. Users are responding to loss of trust in platform management, not vibe shifts or culture war ptsd. Stop loss is hard if half your users suddenly feel unwelcome. This is exit, not waldenponding.
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What's your expected relevancy-halflife of 'waldenponding' within the claves of twitter / mindspace you're known in?
Second order question is rather an admission of my love for compound words: will we see a new grammer emerge where they're a clear class of words rather than...
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