Musk wants to 'fix' community notes on X

From the «100 lbs of shit in a 50 lb sack» department:
Title: Elon Musk wants to 'fix' Community Notes on X
Author: Ian Carlos Campbell
Date: Thu, 20 Feb 2025 21:23:10 +0000
Link: https://www.engadget.com/social-media/elon-musk-wants-to-fix-community-notes-on-x-212310412.html?src=rss
Podcast Download URL: https://o.aolcdn.com/images/dims?image_uri=https%3A%2F%2Fmedia-mbst-pub-ue1.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fcreatr-uploaded-images%2F2025-02%2F11d99120-efcd-11ef-b7fe-c03ad8c98369&resize=1400%2C933&client=19f2b5e49a271b2bde77&signature=cefecf50dfe931280b1e66e213f678ee902d8bdd

Elon Musk has a problem with Community Notes, the crowdsourced fact-checking
feature that started as Birdwatch[1], and launched at scale after he purchased
Twitter[2].

"Unfortunately @CommunityNotes is increasingly being gamed by governments &
legacy media," Musk posted[3]. "Working to fix this..." Based on the rant his
tweet descends in to afterwards, his issue appears to be with how X's Community
Notes contributors have been treating misinformation about President Volodymyr
Zelenskyy and the war in Ukraine. Musk quotes a post from an X account[4] that
claims polls showing Zelenskyy has a 57 percent approval rating in Ukraine are
"not credible." Information like that being challenged on X doesn't jive with
President Trump's description of Zelenskyy as a "dictator"[5] or Musk's desire
to use the platform as an unofficial arm of the current administration.

Unfortunately, @CommunityNotes[6] is increasingly being gamed by governments
& legacy media.

Working to fix this …

It should be utterly obvious that a Zelensky-controlled poll about his OWN
approval is not credible!!

If Zelensky was actually loved by the people of Ukraine, he…
https://t.co/gy0NjtPwiq[7]
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 20, 2025[8]

What "fixing" Community Notes will look like remains to be seen, but Musk
uncritically quoting a post that cites no sources beyond an image with small
text that says "Accuracy Confidence: Normal" is hopefully evidence enough that
Community Notes are the bare minimum needed. Ragging on the feature of course
fits the larger pattern of Musk's tenure at X, which has been characterized by
him manipulating the platform's algorithm[9] and eliminating features that
helped determine credibility, like verification[10]. If he thinks you can't
even trust crowdsourced fact-checks, there's really no source of truth left on
the platform.

The concept of Community Notes is no longer unique to X — Meta recently opened
up the waitlist[11] to use the feature on its platforms — but how long
Community Notes exists its current form is apparently now an open question.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at
https://www.engadget.com/social-media/elon-musk-wants-to-fix-community-notes-on-x-212310412.html?src=rss

Links:
[1]: https://www.engadget.com/twitter-birdwatch-fact-checks-expansion-190037862.html (link)
[2]: https://www.engadget.com/twitter-community-notes-rolling-out-globally-195650660.html (link)
[3]: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1892613981426102465 (link)
[4]: https://x.com/amuse/status/1892597899130740926 (link)
[5]: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/trump-zelenskyy-dictator-russia-ukraine-war/ (link)
[6]: https://twitter.com/CommunityNotes?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw (link)
[7]: https://t.co/gy0NjtPwiq (link)
[8]: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1892613981426102465?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw (link)
[9]: https://www.engadget.com/twitter-artificially-boost-elon-musk-tweets-053602807.html (link)
[10]: https://www.engadget.com/elon-musk-verification-twitter-blue-161532924.html (link)
[11]: https://www.engadget.com/social-media/you-can-now-sign-up-to-be-a-contributor-to-metas-community-notes-feature-190814234.html (link)