how I tricked Twitter to unlock edit tweets

…Ssh! Don’t tell anyone.

Author

Matt Navarra
October 07, 2022

Hello geeks,

(In my most British accent): How the devil are you? Had a good week?

Have you heard…?

  • …Elon Musk is back to being a total dick. Again.

  • …Meta’s own staff think its flagship metaverse world ‘Horizon’ sucks. Ouch!

  • …And TikTok is copying Instagram for a change! Interesting.

We’ll get into all of that in a moment.

Random thing first. I’m curious… Where are you and what are you (typically) doing when you open Geekout to read it each week?

Tweet me a BeReal-like pic of your setup (tag @mattnavarra in your tweet). I will retweet the best ones! Before we get started:

Right… Let’s crack on. Here are the hottest news headlines in social this week:

🔥 GEEKOUT HOT 5

  1. Elon Musk Wants To Complete $44BN Twitter Deal After U-Turn [FFS ELON]

  2. TikTok Takes Aim At Instagram With New Photo Mode [AIM…FIRE!] 

  3. Instagram Plans to Fill Your Feed With Even More Ads [THANKS, ADAM]

  4. Facebook is Killing Its ‘Bulletin’ Newsletter Platform [OPEN RATE ZERO] 

  5. Meta’s Own Staff Think Its Flagship Metaverse World Looks S**t [CODE BROWN]

If you only read one section of Geekout, this bit might be the most useful.

Here’s everything else new and noteworthy spotted by me in the past seven days:

Facebook is going to let you customise your feed even further (translated: Help FB fix its sucky algorithm to be more like TikTok’s)... Instagram is testing a ‘Group Profiles’ feature in Canada… Instagram’s new ‘Broadcast chat’ feature is now being tested in the wild.

Instagram wants you to share your crappy draft unpublished posts… WhatApp Premium subscription is rolling out to beta users… And Meta has finally realised no-one has a clue WTF the metaverse is.

Twitter’s much-hyped Edit tweets feature is rolling out to all Twitter Blue users…I managed to get it working in the UK (sorry Twitter bosses) and found it very useful here… Twitter doesn’t want you to screenshot tweets anymore.

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Twitter will now let you attach a combination of videos, GIFs and photos to a single tweet (why did it take them this long!)... Also, Twitter’s funky ‘Status’ feature is now available to more users… And Twitter is testing a new ’View’ counter on tweets.

TikTok added a bunch of new video, sound, and text editing tools for creators… Linkedin has got a growing problem with fake profiles… Meanwhile, Linkedin has renamed its ‘Share’ button as ‘Repost’ for some users.

Researchers say Elon Musk would lose 14+ million followers if the platform removed fake accounts… This new website helps debunk viral misinformation… And finally… Jack Dorsey’s private text to Elon Musk about my tweet made headlines. 🤣

WORTH A LOOK 👀

  • 💥 INVITE-ONLY: Join30k SMMs in the Official Geekout Group on FB [JOIN US]

  • ✨ INSIDER INFO: How The Washington Post Grew Its IG From 600k to 6m [SHOW ME]

  • 🛠 TOP TOOLS: 10 Top Free Video Editing Tools for 2022 [TAKE A LOOK]

  • 😱 TERRIBLE TWEETS: The Worst Ever Tweets According to Twitter Users [VIEW TWEETS]

  • 🤑 MONEY MAKERS: A Rough Guide to How Much Money Influencers Make in 2022 [REVEAL]

Alrighty then… Let’s dive a little deeper into the headlines everybody’s talking about.

Keep scrolling for analysis of this week's top stories, coming up next.👇

– Matt

P.S. Join us for the Geekout weekly debrief on Twitter Spaces, with special guest Chris Stokel-Walker at 5pm UK / 12pm ET / 9am PT: LISTEN LIVE / PLAY BACK

🚨 Everyone's talking about...

If there's one thing to expect with the never-ending Musk-Twitter saga, it's the unexpected. Elon Musk shocked the world this week by announcing that he wanted to buy Twitter after all... or did he?

By yesterday, everything we were expecting was thrown into disarray, as the trial we thought was going to start in 10 days' time was pushed back to the end of the month by the court to give Musk and Twitter time to sort out their differences and close the deal.

The differences here are all imposed by Musk: after reportedly trying to negotiate a discount of as much as 30% to close the deal (Twitter said no), he said he'd buy Twitter at his original price if Twitter drops all litigation and if he can get the money together.

Unsurprisingly, Twitter is in no mood to trust Musk. He's been trying to get out of the deal for weeks, and if Twitter does as he asks, there's a chance he'll walk away entirely - especially as he was supposed to have the money together already.

What happens next? Well, Twitter seems in no mood to give Musk any wiggle room, calling his proposal to drop the trial "invitation to further mischief and delay". So I wouldn't be surprised if both parties are in court after all on the 28th.

If Musk does buy Twitter, he has lots of things to fix. And if he can find space in his busy schedule, he has big plans to incorporate Twitter in a WeChat-style 'everything app' he's calling X.

But whatever big plans he might have for Twitter, they won't come easy. Some employees who haven't already left over the drama are questioning their future (choice quote: "Living the plot of Succession is f**king exhausting").

And whatever plans he has for free speech on the platform, he could have his hand forced somewhat by the US Supreme Court, which picked up a couple of pivotal cases relating to moderation this week.

Then there's his apparent intention to undo many bans on users. If he brings Trump back now that he's gone full QAnon over on Truth Social, will that signal Musk's Twitter is the kind of platform many really users want to stick around on?

So running Twitter might not be as much fun as he hoped. And if the deal does go ahead, the banks backing Musk could be left with big losses, and Musk himself could have legal bills as high as $100m.

Whatever the outcome of this mess, Musk could well end up the biggest loser.

🗳 POLL: Will Elon Musk actually buy Twitter?

Tap your response:

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The pressure on Instagram just ratcheted up a level. As it tries to figure out what it should be after users roundly rejected its hyperactive push into video, a new challenger has entered the arena to take on its original strength.

Yes, TikTok announced a bunch of new editing features yesterday alongside a new carousel format called Photo Mode.

For when you'd prefer to express yourself in formats other than video, we released Photo Mode, a new carousel format available on mobile for photo content that's ideal for sharing high quality images on TikTok. Photo Mode allows you to share carousel posts of still images that automatically display one after another. You can add music to soundtrack the images, which viewers can swipe through at their own pace.

– TikTok

While photo sharing isn't necessarily going to draw a lot of hardcore Instagrammers over to TikTok, it gives TikTok users one less reason to open Instagram, and Meta could definitely do without that.

The news came after Instagram announced it was going to be pushing a lot more ads your way. Look out for new Reels ad formats, skippable video ads and carousel image ads, a new Instagram ad unit in the Explore tab and ads in profile feed, and AR ads to be tested in Feeds and Stories.

Meta is under serious pressure to boost revenue, but pumping your marquee product full of even more ads when users were already complaining about them feels like a misguided way to go about it.

On the plus side, Instagram says creators will be able to earn extra income from ads displayed in their profile feeds. And the app is still adding feature users want - the Repost feature is now being tested in the wild (well, Argentina) and the ability to add multiple 'links in bio' is being tested more widely.

And with Facebook now giving more control over the News Feed, via 'show more' and 'show less' options for different kinds of content (look out for a test starting test with Reels), Meta isn't abandoning user experience. But its push for revenue against competition that is a little less urgently concerned with it could have serious impact on how much time people want to spend in Meta's apps.

The big social media companies like to dip their toes in every trend going. But often, anything that launches outside of their core social apps seems more like a 'we have to try this' thing rather than a 'we must make a success of this' thing.

And so it is with newsletters. They became a hot, trendy new thing, so Meta felt the need to jump on board. But now its newsletter platform Bulletin is shutting down, going the same way as the company's social audio products, launched back when Clubhouse looked like a hot new rival.

There are currently more than 120 writers on Bulletin. The first group of writers on Bulletin included celebrities such as Malcolm Gladwell, Mitch Albom, Tan France, political journalist Jessica Yellin and cookbook author Dorie Greenspan.... Meta is paying out all contracts. Writers will keep their subscription revenue and can take the subscriber lists and content with them after Bulletin has folded.

– Caitlin Huston, The Hollywood Reporter

Twitter made a lot of noise when it acquired newsletter platform Revue, but after introducing some great features for creators like a one-click subscribe button from a newsletter author's profile, it seemingly left Revue to drift while shifting its attention to Notes, which is more tightly integrated with the rest of Twitter.

Similarly, Meta says it wants to give Bulletin creators more opportunities on the Facebook platform. That makes a lot of sense, but we've just pegged up another case study for why you should always be wary when a big social media company tries to push its way into a rising trend.

👉 On-point meme

Tap below for your 2023 social strategy cheat sheet 😉

🗣 Industry chatter

If Elon Musk does buy Twitter, his plans to develop it into an 'everything app' could be doomed from the start, as this smart thread explains 👇

❓ Question of the week

There are some genuinely great responses here. If you're a manager, or want to be in the future, this should be inspiring.

A couple of common themes: actually understanding social media and being realistic about what it can achieve, and trusting staff to do their best work. Tap through for more:

📈 Trending meme

Twitter rolled out the ability to combine images, videos, and GIFs in the same tweet this week, and it quickly became a meme as people tried it out with a little help from the Pope.

Want to try it yourself? Here's the original image, and a useful template.

🤦 Fail of the week

If the drama around his Twitter deal wasn't enough, Elon Musk had one of the biggest dunkings anyone has had in recent memory on the platform. His 'peace plan' for Ukraine was so bad that even Zelenskyy himself (or his social media manager) felt the need to tell him.

📺 Did you see...?

Saturday Night Live absolutely nailed BeReal in this sketch. IT'S TIME TO BEREAL!

Also worth a watch:

🛑 Make it stop!

Just when you thought you'd seen the last of me-too Stories features...

💡 New feature spotlight

This smart security feature could cause problems for some political journalists (if they don't have another phone around to take a photo of the screen).

💬 You can quote me on that

When I'm quoted in the news, you'll find it here...

The Information got a lot of... information out of me in this interview:

Also:

👌 Pro tip

The thumbnail can be one of the trickiest parts of making a successful social video. Tap through for this thread to help you make the most of yours:

📈 Charts of the week

And don't miss:

📊 Stat of the week

Remember this one next time anyone assumes a big audience equals a big income.

Also:

😆 LOL tweets

Meta News

Facebook is reportedly urging managers to select 15% of their teams to be labelled as underperforming, in what has been described as 'quiet layoffs'.

  • ...and Meta has rescinded some intern offers for 2023. [Gizmodo]

  • Violent erotica ads for ByteDance- and Tencent-backed apps have been running on Facebook and Instagram. [Forbes $$$]

  • Meta's Oversight Board is reviewing the removal of a post calling for the death of Iran’s Supreme Leader amid anti-government protests in the country. [The Verge]

  • Meta shouldn't reinstate Donald Trump because his Truth Social activity shows he's gone full QAnon, a new report argues. [Mashable]

  • Facebook Marketplace no longer lets car dealerships post used car listings from their business page. [The Verge]

  • Facebook is notifying users of political advertising restrictions in the U.S starting 1 November. [@MattNavarra]

  • Meta could face a huge fine for leaking 533m users' data, as an EU investigation nears completion. [Bloomberg $$$]

  • Meta's Horizon Worlds social VR app is buggy and barely used internally, a leaked company memo says. [The Verge]

  • Meta has settled a lawsuit for a ‘significant’ sum against businesses scraping Facebook and Instagram data. [TechCrunch]

  • Meta is ramping up efforts to woo creators and influencers in India. [Bloomberg $$$]

  • Meta has found 400 apps this year that try to lure users into compromising their Facebook and Instagram logins. [Social Media Today]

  • Meta's A.I. chief Yann LeCun has published paper on creating ‘autonomous’ artificial intelligence. [Motherboard]

  • Meta paid just £29m in UK corporation tax despite a record £3.3bn sales in 2021. [The Guardian]

  • Meta is still paying for Sheryl Sandberg's bodyguards, even though she's lest the company. [Insider $$$]

  • Meta says Telegram's boss is talking "complete rubbish" when he claims WhatsApp has deliberately planted security holes. [The Independent]

  • WhatsApp has been described as 'poisonous' for UK school children. [The Guardian]

Insights to give you an edge at work:

  • Meta is launching a new training course called 'What is the Metaverse'? [Coursera]

  • How the Washington Post grew its Instagram following from 600,000 to 6 million. [Link in Bio]

  • Meta will hold an event for Facebook Group admins on 20 October. [Social Media Today]

New features and tests:

Facebook:

  • Facebook will shift to custom technology for its in-app browser on Android. Meta says this is for security and UX reasons. [9to5Google]

  • Facebook on iOS is testing a new ➕create post button in the tabs navigation bar. [@MattNavarra]

  • Facebook has expanded its Music Revenue Share programme for creators worldwide. [@MetaforCreators]

  • Facebook has been spotted offering an Instagram-style Story collections feature. [@oncescuradu]

Instagram:

  • Instagram is testing a feature called 'Group Profiles' that lets multiple users collaborate and share content. [Insider $$$]

  • Instagram is prompting users to share content from their draft posts "to free up space" on your device. [@hammodoh1]

  • Instagram has added a per-chat privacy setting. [@jonah_manzano]

  • More details have emerged of Instagram's in-development Portfolio feature for creators. [@alex193a]

  • Instagram has started testing the 'broadcast chat' feature for creators we saw in development recently. [@hammodoh1]

  • Instagram is more widely testing the ability to add more than one link in your bio. [Social Media Today]

  • Instagram has been spotted offering a 'manage captions' option. [@jonah_manzano]

  • Instagram is publicly testing the ability to add three topics to Reels. [@3zestesdecitron]

  • Instagram has tweaked the layout of comments. [@mrchrisfloyd]

  • Instagram is testing letting you respond to a question sticker with text, a photo or a video. [@hammodoh1]

  • Instagram is working on a redesigned settings section. [@alex193a]

  • Instagram is testing a 'delete and move to drafts' option for Reels. [@hammodoh1]

  • Instagram is working on smart new features for sharing a post via DMs. [@alex193a]

WhatsApp:

  • WhatsApp Premium for businesses is rolling out to beta testers. [WABetaInfo]

The rest: Creator Studio/adtech/Quest and more:

  • Meta plans to let Horizon Worlds and Crayta users jump between the two apps, in the first nod to a true 'metaverse'. [Road to VR]

  • The Quest Pro's peripheral blinders and colour passthrough have been shown in a brief video clip shared by a developer. [UploadVR]

  • The Quest 3's GPU could be twice as powerful as Quest 2 and Pico 4, according to apparently leaked details. [UploadVR]

Twitter News

Elon Musk's team wanted to see internal Twitter communications including the word 'Trump' as they claimed it was relevant to bots. They were unsuccessful.

New features and tests:

  • Twitter's edit button is now available to all Blue subscribers, after it hit the US yesterday. [The Verge]

  • Twitter's API now supports edited tweets. [@TwitterDev]

  • Twitter is making its Birdwatch tweet annotations available to all users in the US. [TechCrunch]

  • Twitter has expanded access to its experimental 'Status' feature in the US, but Blue subscribers don't get priority. [TechCrunch]

  • ...and the Status emojis have a new 3D-style look. [@wongmjane]

  • Twitter now auto-detects faces in images attached to tweets and suggests tagging people. [@MattNavarra]

  • Twitter encourages users to share a tweet the official way when you take a screenshot of it. [@MattNavarra]

  • Twitter has rolled out its refreshed Spaces emoji reactions to all users on iOS and Android. [@TwitterSpaces]

  • Twitter is working on a 'Views' counter for tweets. [Social Media Today]

  • Twitter now lets Super Follow creators on Android run Spaces just for their paying subscribers. [@SuperFollows]

  • Twitter's Birdwatch programme now separates out fact-checks from other types of annotation on tweets. [@birdwatch]

  • Twitter is testing a new set of in-app icons. [@wongmjane]

  • Twitter is still working on support for 'delegated accounts'. [@nima_owji]

  • Twitter has given its Status feature some visual tweaks. [@JoselinMane]

  • Twitter could soon let you switch on notifications for Communities. [@alex193a]

  • Twitter is still working on a 'verified phone number' profile label. [@nima_owji]

TikTok News

TikTok plans to launch live shopping in North America, outsourcing its operation to an LA-based company called TalkShopLive. TikTok's in-house shopping offering struggled to get going in the UK.

  • TikTok is using an army of agencies to rapidly expand the number of livestreamers on the platform. [Rest of World]

  • TikTok's European business has reported $990m revenue in 2021, up from $172m in 2020. [Financial Times $$$]

  • ..but parent company ByteDance's losses are increasing. [Wall Street Journal $$$]

  • An influencer has sued TikTok over ads she says misused her image. [Washington Post $$$]

  • Russia has fined TikTok 3 million roubles ($51,000) for supposed 'LGBT propaganda'. [Reuters]

Insights to give you an edge at work:

  • How brands like Pepsi and American Eagle are investing in original sound marketing on TikTok. [Digiday $$$]

New features and tests:

💥 More social media news and updates

Kim Kardashian must pay $1.26m after she promoted a crypto asset on social media without disclosing it was an ad.

  • YouTube wants to sign up streaming services in Australia to offer their products via a new 'A La Carte' service. [Financial Review]

  • YouTube is putting together a supercut of the best YouTube Shorts bloopers. [TubeFilter]

  • YouTube’s is testing new crowdsourced feedback about the accuracy of automated captions. [Social Media Today]

  • Fake LinkedIn profiles are proving a headache for HR staff at big companies. [Krebs on Security]

  • BeReal is keeping brands guessing about its product roadmap. [DigiDay $$$]

  • Only 4.3% of creators make more than $100,000 per year, according to a new survey. [Marketing Brew]

  • Creators aren't so hot with tech investors anymore. Funding for US creator economy startups dropped 53% in Q3 2022. [The Information $$$]

  • Russia has fined Twitch 4 million roubles ($68,000) for Ukraine-related content. [Reuters $$$]

  • Roblox and Discord have been sued over a girl’s alleged sexual and financial exploitation. [Bloomberg $$$]

  • Reddit has acqui-hired the team from machine learning content moderation startup Oterlu. [TechCrunch]

  • Pinterest is giving away 6-month free Headspace subscriptions to thousands of creators in 20 countries to mark World Mental Health Day. [AdWeek $$$]

  • Telegram has cut its subscription fee by more than half in India. [TechCrunch]

Insights to give you an edge at work:

  • How much do influencers make in 2022? Check this guide. [Hootsuite blog]

  • How to recruit better on LinkedIn. [Protocol]

  • How good is AR at driving engagement? Snap has some insights. [Social Media Today]

  • Snap is accepting applications for the second cohort of Its 523 content accelerator. [AdWeek $$$]

  • Want to be an influencer's assistant? There's a course for that! [Insider $$$]

New features and tests:

  • YouTube is testing making the ability to watch 4K videos a Premium benefit. [MacRumors]

  • LinkedIn has renamed its Share button to Repost. [@MattNavarra]

  • Twitch is letting some viewers pay up to $100 to highlight a message in chat. [Game Developer]

  • Snapchat now offers new Halloween outfits for your Bitmoji. [@techjalal]

  • Twitch now displays creators' estimated tax withholding and third-party payment processing fees in the Creator Dashboard. [@TwitchSupport]

  • Reddit is testing a live chat feature. [AdWeek $$$]

  • Reddit has launched updated onboarding for its Ads Manager. [AdWeek $$$]

  • Signal is working on its own Stories feature. [@MattNavarra]

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📖 Weekend reading

"Photographers and illustrators who once eagerly shared images of their work on Instagram are moving away from the site as it emphasizes video."

😳 And finally...

An oldie but goodie from my old boss. Beat the spammers and have some fun with it...

📅 Back next week...

…And that’s about it, folks.

You are now fully Geeked out! ✅

Before you go…

(this is why I prefer dogs!) 😆

Goodbye geeks!

– Matt

This newsletter is edited by Martin SFP Bryant

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