Okay, we have to take a second to research the winners of X’s $1 million article competitors, as a result of whereas the outcomes are doubtless as many would count on, with regard to matters that align with Elon’s perspective, the precise winners chosen do completely nothing to change any notion about what X has grow to be as a platform.
As a fast recap, final month, as a part of a brand new push to get extra creators posting extra content material to the app, and particularly long-form content material, with the intention to maintain individuals studying (and feed extra data into its xAI database), X introduced that the top-performing article for January would win a $1 million money prize.
Which is an enormous carrot, although even then, as I famous on the time, the problem right here can be writing for the X viewers, and creating one thing that might resonate with customers of the app.
You possibly can take a guess at what matters can be extra more likely to resonate, primarily based on broader protection of X, and the way Elon Musk has modified the platform previously often called Twitter. And primarily based on the winners, you’d be proper.
Right here’s the complete checklist of winners in X’s inaugural $1 million article prize:
- The winner was an article on alleged authorities spending corruption through contracts with Deloitte, written by an X consumer with a historical past of posting racist commentary
- The runner-up appears at Trump’s tariff technique, and the way he’s utilizing volatility as a degree to accumulate Greenland (X awarded the creator $250k)
- X gave particular point out to a self-help article which appears at easy methods to improve your focus (X awarded the creator $250k)
X additionally gave 4 extra creators $100k every for his or her contributions:
- An article about welfare fraud in Minnesota
- An article concerning the strategic worth of the U.S. buying Greenland
- An article about how the West ended slavery
- An article about excessive climate patterns within the U.S.
So, yeah, all just about in alignment with Elon’s pet matters, and largely linked to right-wing views.
Nothing stunning, however it’s fascinating simply how a lot this content material skews in the direction of the viewers that you’d count on on X, and underlines, as soon as once more, simply how a lot nearer the platform now could be to Rumble or Fact Social, versus extra mainstream social platforms.
Which had all the time been Elon Musk’s intention, to amplify right-wing views with the intention to counter the left-wing bias that Twitter, in his view, had. However evidently steadiness might have swayed slightly too far the opposite approach, and now, X is extra consultant of extremist right-wing viewpoints than extra balanced takes.
Which is why these are probably the most mentioned articles, and what X sees as an alternative choice to mainstream media.
And I can see why X customers really feel like they’re being knowledgeable and educated by these takes, although I might query the fondness and educational rigor of at the least some components in these posts.
However general, it’s as anticipated, offering a snapshot of what X customers see as probably the most urgent problems with the day.
X hasn’t introduced a second spherical of prizes for prime articles, however it has prompt that it’s exploring additional applications to encourage long-form posting.
