Has Musk reached his level of incompetence?

There is not much in the mainstream media (MSM) about Elon Musk’s wild ride at X. That is a pity because Musk challenges the establishment in media and politics. However, by looking closer, one can wonder whether we are witnessing a genius in action or the biggest blunder in media history in the making.

Just after buying Twitter, in an interview with Ron Baron, Elon Musk envisioned the platform (46th minute on the video) as a place where 80% (100% less 10% extremists on the left and 10% on the right) of the public could join the digital town square, voice their opinions, exchange ideas, and maybe change their minds once in a while.

How many X users changed their minds after participating in the forum? And, among those who did, do we know how many fell for the muddling of demagogues, and can we count those who became wiser?

When presenting X as an alternative to the MSM, Musk must prove that X is at least equally reliable but more credible. Musk and a devoted cloud of flatterers pat themselves on the back on X that it is happening. Others would be talking about it everywhere if that were the truth.

Community nonsense

Musk brags that his Community Notes (CN) concept makes X reliable and credible. Even his fawners on duty at X stay mum on that.

As soon as CN was introduced, I signed up to participate. I was accepted a few months later. From other posts on X, it appears that this is typical. After participating in the CN for about two months, I can confirm my original suspicion that the concept is flawed; it does not work and never will. Musk reached his level of incompetence when trying to establish the truth in the media.

How do we determine the truth?

I remember reading about the information bomb in the 1960s. We know from history that easy-to-print pamphlets caused a lot of misinformation during the early years of the United States’ existence. The internet has multiplied that. However, it does not make much difference for a person if the available information exceeds 100 times or 100 trillion times their ability to absorb it.

It means that about two centuries ago, the concept of learning switched from memorizing the dogma to acquiring the ability to sort out the truth from the overflow of mostly doubtful information. Before Musk was born, I learned in schools that in a world of overwhelming information, one needs to know something about everything and everything about something. This way, one can at least smell the lies on almost any subject and then apply the methodology of the known topic to find out the truth.

Musk has a good education. His successes at Tesla, Space X, and Starlink testify that he mastered finding the truth in engineering. However, he acts like a feeble politician when he enters the media world. We can only speculate why.

How does the Community Notes kitchen malfunction?

The concept is simple. The selected community members can add notes to questionable posts. This way, readers can be aware that there are valid reasons to question the integrity of the post.

A new CN member receives a nickname to preserve anonymity. Then, this individual can rate the proposed notes as helpful or not, or somewhat helpful. Replies open new questions, asking if a proposed note brings reliable sources and meets the basic formal standards. After that, the note appears below the post, but only if people identified by an algorithm as representing opposing views have rated that note as helpful.

A new member of CN can only rate notes. After rating a certain number of notes that the community decided were helpful, that person earns the ability to propose notes as well. If those notes are voted as not helpful by other community members, one loses the ability to post notes. To regain the right to post notes, one must rate more notes along with the community. If it sounds convoluted, it is because the concept of CN is messy.

Still, on many occasions, Musk proudly boasts of this truth-finding protocol.

Why CN should stand for Community Nonsense

The best explanation of the weakness of the CN concept is on X’s website page titled “Diversity of perspectives.” The assumption is that people form their opinions depending on their biases, euphemistically called “perspectives” on CN.

Unfortunately, that is often true and is the reason for the impasse in politics in the U.S. To exit this stalemate, we must apply cold facts and iron logic, like engineers do. Musk did it when working on Tesla. If he sought consensus on community perspectives when designing and manufacturing Teslas, no car would ever leave the factory.

The proposed notes are supposed to refer to credible sources. However, most links are to MSM articles, which is ironic. CN should help us identify the lies in the MSM, not repeat their message as the truth.

A community does not define the truth; informed individuals do

Reading notes, visible only to the members of CN, one can see the frustrations of the community members. Contrary to Musk’s claims, conformist members dominate. It has always been like that.

Socrates was the wise guy; the community killed him. The community was against Copernicus and burned Giordano Bruno at the stake. The community was against Einstein, too. At least on a few occasions, Musk has written that many people hate him.

However, when trying to modernize X, he forgets that civilization progresses when exceptional individuals lead society, not when communities subdue them.

In the media, time matters

In old times, yesterday’s newspapers were used to start a fire or in outhouses. Today, very few look back at yesterday’s posts on X. With the elaborate CN protocol, reaching a consensus on a community note takes days. So, whatever CN decides is often like a solution to the previous year’s snowstorm. Musk noticed this problem, but the current system has no viable solution.

A question Musk does not ask at CN

When rating the proposed notes, I looked for subjects I knew well. I might have studied it for one of my articles or know it because of my profession or upbringing. In one instance, the community note was about what exactly a Polish politician said when speaking in Polish. As Polish is my native language, I supported a proposed community note that offered the correct translation.

But, when answering questions about why I supported a given note, I had no option of saying that I knew the subject well enough to support a given note authoritatively. The vast X community has an expert on almost every subject. There is always someone who witnessed the current event. And there are always skeptics ready to point out flaws in reasoning.

If explored in an organized fashion, that combined knowledge provides immense capital. Musk dismisses it. He erroneously believes that the truth can come out through secretive actions.

The truth shines in the light

People lie, and the media lie, but not always. To find the truth, one needs to be skeptical but inquiring. Each media outlet has its political leanings, but it rarely lies outright. Media can twist the truth by omitting uncomfortable facts or by offering biased interpretations.

It is no different from our daily dealings with people. There are very few people we can always trust, some never, and most only on certain matters and to some degree.

Successful people would not thrive without figuring out how to find the truth in that overflow of information. There is no better way to get closer to the truth. Musk used that skillfully in his technical businesses. But he forgot all of that at X, where he depends on anonymous people doing hocus pocus behind the closed doors of CN.

X might use some AI to bring up critical comments and encourage the authors of the criticized posts to respond. This way, some members can earn a reputation for their expertise and objectivity. Others would be known for ignoring critique. And there will be plenty of people posting nonsense, trying to be witty.

Who are the pillars of X?

There is a group of high-profile influencers.

I had not spent any meaningful time on Twitter before Musk bought it. I saw it as chatting about nothing, a waste of time. Intrigued by Musk’s ambitious plans, I invested some time on the platform. In the process, I was introduced to a gallery of members with hundreds of thousands of followers. I had never heard of most of them before. I was surprised by many of these individuals’ mortifyingly low intellectual levels.

They are the pillars of X. They gather the mob. They make the numbers that Musk brags about.

The money is in the truth

Probably almost everyone saw Musk’s famous and vulgar rebuke to advertisers who left X as a recourse for political posts they disapproved of. He was correct in principle.

Advertisers must be there if the broad audience finds a media outlet worth attending. In the previously mentioned interview with Ron Baron, Musk envisions X as a place where 80% of Americans could meet and discuss public matters.

But Musk is not there yet. He seems to lean toward X’s pillars, mostly from the unintellectual right, despite some of them having academic credentials. So, bloated numbers of clicks and visits are likely from people who have a lot of time on hand and a little money to spend but bet on getting benefits by supporting politics promoted by influencers of their choice. Advertisers are not impressed.

Musk still has a long way to go before he can tell advertisers what he said in that interview.

Lawrence Peter was right

In his book, published in 1969, Lawrence Peter explains that the outperforming employees in a business are usually promoted to positions that require different skills. The promotions continue until the employee reaches a position where they perform poorly. Then, they stay at that job, often until retirement. Ergo, the higher in the corporate hierarchy, the more incompetent executives we have.

We can see a version of it in the entrepreneurial world. Self-confidence derived from success in certain kinds of businesses can easily become a reckless conceit when a person enters a business requiring different skills. Musk shows some symptoms of that, but he is an exceptional individual with a winding learning curve. The most interesting part of him running X is just about starting.

Chernomyrdinka tells it the best

Musk claims that he is a free speech absolutist. His biggest achievement so far is eliminating some formal restrictions that extreme right members experienced on Twitter under the previous ownership. Then, Musk came out as a sympathizer of the extreme right agenda.

The oversized Musk presence on X overshadows the petty work of CN.

At the time of this writing, journalists at The New York Times revolted against editorial policy related to reporting about Gaza. At MSNBC, reporters forced the dismissal of newly hired Ronna McDaniel, clearly for political reasons. Lastly, Uri Berlinger, a veteran senior editor at National Public Radio, published a lengthy essay describing how NPR gradually transformed from a news outlet to a Democratic Party political agency.

The above instances prove Musk’s message that the mainstream media is about playing politics, not objectively informing. Berlinger’s essay showed details of subjective reporting dominating the news coverage and got much attention at X. No one noticed the similarities of the modus operandi at NPR to that existing at X.

X does not have an editorial body, but it has Musk with a cluster of uncritical supporters. They set the tone. Their posts, replies, and reposts decide which opinions go on the top and which are buried on the platform. They de facto make editorial decisions analogous to those of the editors at NPR. They have different political preferences but shape what the masses at X see as the truth on critical political issues. Despite all of Musk’s high-pitch self-praise, X still operates like all other media outlets in the United States.

Viktor Chernomyrdin was Russian prime minister in the 1990s. He is remembered for his brilliant comments, called Chernomyrdinki in Russia. The most famous is: “We wanted the best, but it turned out like always.”

It is hard to find a better description of Musk’s accomplishments at X so far.