I’m going to go out on a limb and says that efforts like Block The Blue have had a material effect on Twitter, X, or whatever it’s called. As in it’s likely costing him money. So given that there were rumours of this happening straight from Elon Musk, it now seems to actually be happening based on this:
Now there are no details about this, because Elon isn’t a details sort of guy. And he’s likely to get major pushback from users who rely on this feature to control the stupidity that sometimes appears on social media. But here’s why Elon’s latest brainwave may not go anywhere. Apple. Or more specifically the App Store guidelines which says this:
1.2 User-Generated Content
Apps with user-generated content present particular challenges, ranging from intellectual property infringement to anonymous bullying. To prevent abuse, apps with user-generated content or social networking services must include:
- A method for filtering objectionable material from being posted to the app
- A mechanism to report offensive content and timely responses to concerns
- The ability to block abusive users from the service
- Published contact information so users can easily reach you
Which means that Elon’s latest brainwave may get Twitter kicked off the App Store. That would be unfortunate for him. Thus this is likely Elon doing his “ready, fire, aim” thing again and he’ll either stop talking about it, or he’ll find some way to say that he’s being screwed over by Apple or something.
UPDATE: There’s similar verbiage on Google’s Play Store that keeps Elon from doing this: https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answer/9876937