Link copied Elon Musk's recent acquisition, the platform formerly known as Twitter, now named X, has been under the lens of Ethereum's co-founder, Vitalik Buterin. In a fresh analysis posted on August 16, Buterin delved deep into X's Community Notes tool, likening it to cryptographic principles found in today's digital age.
Introduced in the U.S. under the name Birdwatch in October 2022, before Musk's acquisition, the Community Notes feature enables contributors to label tweets as "helpful" and provide added context. Buterin appreciated the open-source nature of the tool, saying it mirrored certain cryptographic values evident in today's online platforms.
In his assessment, Buterin applauded the neutrality and utility of the algorithm powering the Community Notes, especially in challenging scenarios. He highlighted that the algorithm steers clear from merely averaging out users' votes to gauge the usefulness of a comment. It has an added capability to sense major political disparities in content and even provides clarity on potentially misleading image previews and misinformation related to COVID-19.
Buterin further emphasized the necessity of distinguishing genuinely decentralized protocols from those appearing trustworthy but hiding centralized operations.
He speculated that within the upcoming years, large-scale applications will increasingly resemble the Community Notes tool in terms of value and scale. However, he didn't shy away from suggesting potential conflicts of interest. Buterin hinted that Musk might have influenced the removal of certain Community Notes that could be detrimental to his business agenda, including comments critiquing the Chinese government.
In a twist of events, the X platform, under Musk's leadership, is rumored to have introduced a five-second delay for links directing to major news outlets, such as The New York Times and Facebook, as per a report from The Washington Post. This revelation coincided with Musk's online disagreement with Meta's CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, where the duo entertained the idea of a future mixed martial arts clash.
Despite Buterin's pointed observations and implicit critique of Musk's handling of X, the tech entrepreneur acknowledged Buterin's post, praising it as a "great analysis."
