1/🧵🚨New analysis!
How much did Musk's "civil war is inevitable' reply to a tweet spreading #disinformation boost the original tweet?
TLDR: A reply from Musk will boost racist disinformation.
#UkRiots
👉
2/ On Aug 4 at 00.45 UTC the account @stclairashley retweeted a @libsoftiktok video with a false and xenophobic remark about immigration - attributing violence in UK to open borders (there aren't open borders). Musk replies at 03.07 UTC saying "Civil war is inevitable"
3/ The below graph shows the number of retweets over time. In green, are the retweets of @stclairashley's tweet BEFORE Musk replied. The orange tweets are the retweets AFTER Musk replies. Note the DRAMATIC increase in retweets of @stclairashley's tweet after Musk's intervention
4/ You'll notice that before Musk's reply @stclairashley's tweet was declining in terms of retweets. In the hour before Musk's retweet, she received 55 retweets (less than one tweet per minute). This jumped to 6 retweets per minute (352) in the hour after Musk's intervention.
5/ This represents an increase of about 540%. The total number of retweets after Musk's reply is 1,988, the total number before is 350. While the original tweet would have certainly got more retweets even if Musk had not replied, they were clearly in decline.
6/ So basically Musk's replies function as algorithmic boosts to disinfo and hate speech. As the most followed person on X, he is essentially the disinfluencer-in-chief, giving leg ups to bad tweets that are trying to die.
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