Twitter - X

The Tech Transparency Project identified several Iranian government agencies and officials enjoying the perks of X Premium accounts. Normally, Premium requires a paid subscription, which could violate US sanctions. Suspiciously, when Wired flagged some of those accounts to X, they were stripped of their blue checkmarks:

Presumably this tweet was timed before Elon Musk’s Grok posted an estimated 3 million sexualized images onto the platform, including 23,000 of children, averaging an estimated 190 images per minute over an 11-day sample period:

The removals — which follow the Trump administration’s previous data purging efforts — target all posts prior to the president returning to office in January 2025, with a goal to “limit confusion on US government policy,” A spokesperson told NPR that the department’s X accounts “are one of our most powerful tools for advancing the America First goals.”

Maybe combining Musk’s companies is really about space AI data centers. But reports from Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal indicate that SpaceX’s IPO pursuit includes a push to have major index providers find a way around the usual waiting periods before they’ll add newly listed companies.

I used to compare Elon Musk to an old boss of mine who would spin up a company division every time he found a new hobby, but this might be just as apt:

The Paris Prosecutor’s office announced that it’s abandoning X after French police raided the offices of Elon Musk’s social media network on Tuesday, part of a year-long investigation into whether X’s algorithm was used to interfere in French politics. Here’s a machine translation of its departing post:

While X has long allowed NSFW images, The Washington Post reports that the platform’s content moderation filters couldn’t handle the estimated millions of sexualized deepfakes of real women and children being generated by Grok.

After suffering multiple issues last month, X is down again to kick off February. Downdetector and NetBlocks both confirmed the outage. Users are reporting that the most recent posts they’re able to see are from an hour ago.

After an extended outage on Friday, the site formerly known as Twitter is tossing around error messages and/or entirely failing to load posts once again. Downdetector and NetBlocks are tracking the outage, and if there are any updates, we’ll follow up with them.

Similar to starter packs on Bluesky, Threads, and Mastodon, X’s take on the feature will provide you with lists of accounts to follow based on what they post about, such as sports, video games, food, and more. Starter packs will roll out to all users in “the coming weeks.”

The solution is using Bluesky, of course. Naturally, a user with a blue check next to their name told Grok to put a bikini on the butterfly and the AI did — which seems like an even stronger advertisement for Bluesky than the one Bluesky itself posted.

Ofcom says the probe will establish whether X has failed to comply with Online Safety Act obligations, over concerns its Grok AI chatbot is generating sexualized deepfakes of adults and minors. The investigation is “a matter of the highest priority,” and may result in hefty fines or even X being banned in the UK.

That incredible Financial Times quip above, is supported by newly released data from deepfake researcher Genevieve Oh, published by Bloomberg. Over a 24-hour period from January 5th to the 6th, Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot generated “about 6,700” images every hour “identified as sexually suggestive or nudifying.”

“Prediction markets” continue to appear everywhere, including CNN and CNBC, and Polymarket is shitposting about citizen journalism.

Elon Musk’s company has filed a lawsuit against Operation Bluebird, a new startup hoping to claim the “abandoned” Twitter trademark, but its legal argument is a little unorthodox.