Elon Musk really wants you to see his tweets. So much so that he’s turning Twitter into what many are likening to his own version of the Jeremy Renner app, the actor’s short-lived foray into the land of vanity apps.
The shift began after Musk noticed that his tweets weren’t doing as well as they used to. The billionaire tweetlord began reportedly obsessing about why he wasn’t getting as many Twitter impressions. He even fired an engineer who made the mistake of telling him he simply isn’t as popular as he once was, per Platformer.
Unlike the plebes who become reply guys or tweet question prompts for engagement, Musk has the power to change his algorithmic woes. He is owner and chief executive officer of the company, after all.
On Monday, people noticed something strange: Their timelines were suddenly filled with Musk.
That’s intentional. Musk was reportedly so distressed that President Joe Biden’s tweet about supporting the Philadelphia Eagles in the Super Bowl got more engagement than his that he demanded the skeleton crew keeping Twitter online change the system to show people his tweets first, the Verge reports.
Judging by the reaction online, Twitter users view the change as a pathetic way to get attention. They say he’s basically morphed the highly influential platform into a much larger version of Renner’s app, which was at least honest that its purpose was only to force-feed the actor’s content to his fans.
“Spending $44 billion to turn Twitter into his own version of the Jeremy Renner app, mad respect,” @PatBlanchfield tweeted sarcastically.
The Jeremy Renner app allowed Renner to post updates and pictures of himself, which users could then interact with in the comments. With Twitter forcing so many Elon tweets in front of people, to the expense of all other posts, people saw it to be very similar.
“We all made a lot of fun of the Jeremy Renner App but now we’re all posting on a Jeremy Renner App dedicated to a much less cool guy,” @coolranchzaku commented.
Either a whole bunch of people decided to engage with Musk’s tweets again or his new system is working just as he intended.
Whereas his tweet about the Eagles only received a paltry 9 million views before he deleted it, all his tweets in recent days have garnered tens of millions of impressions or more, much to his delight.
Yesterday, he posted a tweet glorifying in forcing people to see his tweets.
Twitter users are less pleased with the new system that shows them so much Musk.
“This is like if I went to the supermarket and the guy who owned the supermarket climbed out from behind one of the shelves to explain that he has the power to make me look at him while I’m inside his building,” @alecrobbins tweeted with a screenshot of Musk’s meme about force feeding users his tweets.
One person suggested people report and block Musk for “spamming” them with his tweets. Others said muting him also works. “Block Elon” even started trending on the platform.
You can also avoid his tweets by unfollowing him and choosing to view tweets from people you follow, rather than those selected “for you”—until he changes that too.
