It’s been 30 years since the “Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?” episode of The Simpsons, in which Homer designs a car for an auto company run by his long-lost half-brother.
Homer’s brought in because he’s “an average schmo” in touch with the true desires of the common folk, but the car is a monstrosity and fails so spectacularly that the company is driven out of business. Which brings us neatly to Elon Musk and his many plans to monetise Twitter.
After reaching out to a few former insiders, Crikey satirist Tom Red has secured the minutes of a recent ideas jam, proving that there is such a thing as a wrong answer in a brainstorming session.
Bankification
Idea: Get users to link their personal finances to the Twitter platform and create a sort of Facebook Marketplace for day-trading stockjobbers and meme-stock freaks.
Pros: An exciting opportunity to help users give their money to us.
Cons: Is data hacking still a thing?
Cameofication
Idea: Introduce a Cameo-style service where Twitter users can pay a fee to have their tweets liked or shared by celebrities. In true capitalist style, the fee is determined by the market at any point in time. For example, a retweet by Stephen Colbert might set you back $10,000, whereas a dozen likes and a poo emoji from Prue MacSween could be yours for the price of a goon bag.
Pros: More money for people who already have lots of money.
Cons: Top-line users such as the pope may have issues liking a tweet from the Noosa Temple of Satan.
Musk-free feed
Idea: For a special fee, users will never have to see any tweets, updates, threats, dismissal notices or brain-farts from the Chief Twit himself.
Pros: Free up space currently swamped by Musk’s river of missives.
Cons: Users who opt out of the Elon drip would have to find another over-caffeinated megalomaniac to project their fears onto.
Coder-dependant
Idea: Users upset by the recent mass sackings at Twitter could sponsor an offboarded coder or content moderator so they can go back to work for Elon.
Pros: Twitter gets free labour.
Cons: Slavery is such a divisive word.
Twitter flutter
Idea: Explore tie-ins with online sports-betting companies and create a punting market based on high-profile tweeters. Players could bet on which tweet will get the most likes, who’ll be ratioed, what time the first vomit emoji will appear, who’ll be the first to post that it’s all Dan Andrews’ fault, who has the least intelligible hashtag, and who posts the most obsequious “Elon is a genius” comment.
Pros: Money, money, money. Tech bros meets mates with multis.
Cons: The bedwetters and pearl-clutchers will lose their shit.
Space X joint venture
Idea: Have a golden ticket deal whereby users, for a large fee, can put themselves in the running to fly to Mars with Elon and his sycophantic band of medicated frontier scouts.
Pros: It’s a fanciful, cynical ploy to separate fanboys from their crypto, so completely on brand.
Cons: Musk and his Martian minions might come back one day.
