Members of the website were taken aback when they came across the sudden issue of not being able to access their photos and URLs shared prior to December 2014, which were now all defunct.
The succession of events following Elon Musk’s acquisition and subsequent revamping of Twitter has been a whirlwind of chaos. The breakdown of changes under his leadership is extensive.
As we piece together the fallout, the list includes a reduction by half of the organization’s workforce, the imposition of limitations on the daily tweet visibility, and transforming the verification process into a subscription model costing $8 monthly. In his efforts, Musk has frequently tweaked the platform’s branding, constantly revising X’s emblem, with the latest iteration adopting a new austere look featuring stark white details. Moreover, he’s also taken the drastic step of disabling the block function, essentially handcuffing users from shielding themselves against unwanted or harassing content. Could there be more that I’ve overlooked?
Observing his maneuvers, one might compare Elon Musk to a rookie sea captain naively navigating through hazardous ice fields. Surprisingly, the one element keeping the platform above water seems to be the very users Musk seems intent on disenfranchising—the loyal base which has stood by Twitter over the years.
Diving into the latest debacle, an alarming technical error has resulted in the erasure of almost every single image and reposted hyperlink predating December 2014. The issue was brought to light in a succinct update by Tom Coates via an insightful Twitter post, highlighting the startling erasure that effectively wiped clean nearly ten years’ worth of visual content.
Whether this is a deliberate purge or merely an unexpected technical fault remains ambiguous. Musk has yet to provide any commentary or explanation regarding the meltdown. On a slightly positive note, video content has been spared from this digital purge, possibly due to Twitter’s introduction of integrated video features only coming about in the year 2016.
However, there’s a glimmer of hope. Certain images seem to have been selectively reconstituted, pointing to the possibility that the occurrence could be accidental. For instance, the once-missing, buzzworthy Oscar group photo tweeted by a celebrity has made a comeback, now functioning as originally intended.
It remains to be seen whether the reversal of this incident is on Musk’s agenda. But if we take his recent string of controversies and mishaps as any indication, optimism might be premature.
