> that it has knowingly been massively understating the number of bot accounts in order to trick companies into buying Twitter ads and shareholders into buying Twitter stock
Wasn’t Google Ads 80% fake clicks on some studies? It won’t be surprising Twitter Ads is actually worse. There is so zero incentive to clean it up and so many shady reasons to do it.
That might actually hurt Musk's argument, because Google is incredibly lucrative despite the belief that ad clicks are overwhelmingly fake. The rule of thumb Levine (an attorney) gave a few posts ago for MAE's in Delaware courts is "sufficient to cause a 40% drop in profitability". Not stock price, not mDAU numbers, but income statements.
If the claimed rate of fake clicks is significantly wrong advertisers are unhappy. But whether it's high is irrelevant. For an advertiser, $1 per click with 0% fake or $0.50 per click with 50% fake are equivalent, except the first one requires tremendous overhead to maintain likely making the whole endeavor less efficient.
Tesla bots are some of the most active on Twitter, or at least some of the most efficient in achieving their goal of manipulating Tesla interest, sentiment, and ultimately stock price. Musk knows this. I wouldn't be surprised if he knows who controls these bots.
It depends on your perspective. As far as I'm concerned the whole target advertising industry is a blight on society. The more click fraud undermines it, the better.
On then other hand, bot accounts help get bozos elected, encourage mass shootings, etc.
Come to think of it, I don't think it depends on your perspective. Bot accounts are a much bigger issue than click fraud.
But who does the click fraud ultimately hurt? It's not Googs. They get paid for the clicks. The people spending the money on Goog's platform are the ones hurt. Why would Googs want to put a stop to it?
> The people spending the money on Goog's platform are the ones hurt.
It goes deeper. The increased marketing costs due to the 'fraud tax' are passed through to customers. So it's we the people who are getting screwed by fraud.
Wasn’t Google Ads 80% fake clicks on some studies? It won’t be surprising Twitter Ads is actually worse. There is so zero incentive to clean it up and so many shady reasons to do it.