Author: @Web3Mario
Abstract: The US election has come to an end, and Trump has swept the United States with a crushing momentum and made a strong comeback. In my previous article, I have fully discussed the political and economic plans of both parties and the impact on the future cryptocurrency market, and there are many articles describing related views, so I will not repeat them. During this period, in addition to paying attention to the dynamics of the election, I also felt and observed a relatively subtle phenomenon. I found some experience very interesting, so I summarized it and shared it with you. In general, in this US election, the "media war" between the two parties will greatly weaken the credibility of the mainstream media and X social media, while Web3 social media platforms may usher in new development opportunities. On the one hand, Democratic followers need to cultivate new and self-controllable propaganda channels, which brings convenience to related competing products in terms of financing channels; on the other hand, under Musk's rule, X will become increasingly dictatorial, and this "Dark MAGA" will inevitably favor conservatism on many cultural issues, such as abortion, immigration, LGBTQ multiculturalism, etc. The dictator's preference will greatly affect the logic of the recommendation algorithm in X, so the trend of user loss on the opposite side of it is inevitable, and X's self-defeating martial arts will be conducive to related competing products reshaping more competitive product differentiation, thereby reducing promotion difficulty.
The poll results are greatly distorted, and the indecision in the statement on Harris has greatly damaged the credibility of the American mainstream media. The Democratic Party needs to find a new propaganda position
In the period before the election, I believe that everyone has more or less some uncertainty about the results of this election, especially in the days close to the election, Harris's election situation seems to have surpassed Trump. I am no exception. In the previous article, it was predicted that this election would be an unusually fierce process, so the results may not be confirmed until the last batch of votes are counted, so the entire cycle may last for a while. But in fact, Trump's election situation can be described as crushing, sweeping almost all the swing states, and has been leading throughout the counting process.
So how did this shake come about? The main reason comes from the final efforts of the so-called "mainstream media" in the United States. We know that for a long time in the past, the mainstream media has been the traditional propaganda position of the American establishment represented by the Democratic Party. These so-called "mainstream media" cover a variety of forms such as television, newspapers, and online platforms. They often play a key role in guiding public opinion on major events at home and abroad. In fact, these media are not neutral in their political preferences. Most of them are staunch supporters of the Democratic Party, such as Cable News Network (CNN), (New York Times) (The New York Times), (Washington Post) (The Washington Post), Columbia Broadcasting Corporation (CBS), American Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC), Yahoo News, Google News, etc. Some of these media claim to be neutral, but on "anti-Trump", they seem to have reached a consensus. The only mainstream media that really stands with Trump is Fox News (Fox News) and (Wall Street Journal) (The Wall Street Journal).
In the days leading up to the election, most of what you could see from these media outlets was biased towards Harris, including accounts of minor incidents during the campaign process, dynamic poll results, and even creating the advantage of Harris in early voting. This information will naturally affect the judgment of the subscribers of these mainstream media and believe that there is a possibility of a reversal in the election. However, the results are naturally very different. In addition, the mainstream media has made a readjustment to Harris's campaign support. We know that the Democratic Party has undergone a change of coach in this election. After the Trump shooting incident, Biden's election situation has plummeted. At that time, before the大佬 such as Obama and Pelosi made a clear statement, the mainstream media had a lot of criticism about Harris taking over the election, including doubts about his past political achievements. However, after the successful integration within the party, all the voices of doubt completely disappeared and he fully supported Harris. From the perspective of the election, this is naturally beneficial to the Democratic Party, but it also shows that the so-called mainstream media has completely abandoned the neutrality and fairness of the media as a media, and more serves the interests behind it. Therefore, it is very clear from the final election results that the American people have become disgusted with this and have not been moved. Therefore, I believe that the credibility of the mainstream media has been greatly hit in this election.
We know that for electoral politics, whoever controls the media has the initiative, and can not only influence the ideology of potential voters by weaving information cocoons, but also discredit political opponents or interfere with the implementation of policies through Fake News. And against the backdrop of the decline in the credibility of the American mainstream media, the American establishment represented by the Democratic Party urgently needs to find a "Plan B" to make up for its own shortcomings in internal propaganda, and there is no shortage of capital related to technology and globalization in the interest groups behind the Democratic Party. Therefore, it is relatively convenient to support a social media platform that they can control and that is beneficial to themselves, which also brings convenience to related products in terms of financing and resource acquisition.
With the privatization of Twitter, Musk has in fact become the "dictator" of X, and his ideology is bound to raise questions about X's neutrality among users
This election has proved the efficiency of self-media-driven social media platforms represented by X in information dissemination and public opinion guidance, but in fact, in this media war, X is also a loser, because in the entire election process, X uses recommendation algorithms for users. The woven information cocoon greatly affects users' political preferences, and its fairness will inevitably be questioned more after this election.
We know that the reason why Trump's first term was able to run for success, in addition to the self-destruction of the Democratic candidate Hillary's "email door", is due to his influence on Twitter, sending more than 36,000 tweets in four years, with 88 million fans. However, after the Capitol Hill incident in 21, Twitter announced that Trump would be "permanently banned", and the microphone was turned off. Immediately after Twitter, Facebook and YouTube also took action to ban Trump from speaking on their social platforms; tech giants Google, Apple and Amazon removed the app Parler, which was widely used by Trump supporters, and stopped providing Parler with related network services.
During that period, Trump's propaganda channels were scarce, and he had to launch his own social media platform Truth Social to deal with this dilemma. The reason why social media companies do this is still profit. We know that a large part of the emerging "tech aristocracy" was born in Silicon Valley, California, and California is the Democratic Party's iron ticket warehouse. Naturally, there are many related interests. In addition, since the Internet and other technology industries usually need the support of the international market, while supporting globalization, they suppress potential competitors by funding lawmakers who favor strong regulatory policies. These are naturally in line with the Democratic Party's policy of "big government" and multilateral cooperation, so in the context of the same interests, it is natural to choose to cooperate to suppress the populist Trump.
However, these were broken by Musk. In October 22, after half a year, he successfully completed the privatization of the listed company Twitter for US$44 billion, which means that Musk has the unparalleled authority over the company. At that time, for a long time after the acquisition was completed, the market questioned whether this operation was a failed attempt, because it seemed that no return on investment could be seen. However, combined with the current results, his original intention is also very clear. Under the cover of "maintaining freedom of speech", he escaped the obstruction of many Democratic forces, wrapped up the momentum of the world's richest man to complete the acquisition, and completed the internal integration through large-scale layoffs. He made it clear his support for Trump. I believe that many friends who use X must have noticed that during the entire election period, any post by Musk will easily appear in your recommended list. I believe that this must have been done in the recommendation algorithm. some treatment.
In this political gamble, Musk is undoubtedly a winner. However, in terms of X's overall performance throughout the election, it has not become more neutral and fair because of this acquisition, but has only gone from one extreme to another. Moreover, with X being privatized by Musk, this "Dark MAGA" is bound to favor conservatism on many cultural issues, such as abortion, immigration, LGBTQ multiculturalism, etc. Its preference will greatly affect the logic of the recommendation algorithm in X, so I believe that in the next period of time, the trend of user loss on the opposite side of it is inevitable, and X's self-defeating martial arts will be conducive to related competing products reshaping more competitive product differentiation, thereby reducing promotion difficulty.
Facing the resource dividend and market dividend, how can Web3 social media platforms better capture this opportunity
We know that in the Web3 industry, there are also some decentralized social media platform products, such as Farcaster, Lens, etc., but I think that for a long time before, these products have not achieved very good results in promotion. The reason I think is the most The core is that Twitter's long-term monopoly position ensures that it has a scale advantage in competing for "bulk information", which is the most important manifestation of the competitiveness of social media platforms. In popular terms, there is a lot of information on Twitter, the information is complete, and the information is interesting. Naturally, it will attract user attention, and the diversity of information can also allow the platform to better adapt to the fast-paced real-time hot spot changes. There are always hot spots and always hot, and this will further stimulate users' creative desire and keep the entire UGC ecology. vitality.
And this monopoly naturally forces many competing products to choose extremely细分fields to build their own differences, which will naturally dwarf them into toys in the subculture circle. The information deposited on it will inevitably become focused, which greatly reduces the core network effect value of the social media platform. When the hot spots in the track are exhausted, it will naturally enter a dormant period, and at this time, the lack of popularity will also cause the user attention that is not easy to attract to be lost. We can easily find this phenomenon in Farcaster and Lens.
So in the face of the inevitable trend of user loss on X, how can we better capture this opportunity? I believe that Web3 social media platforms can start from the following key points:
（1）With more transparent recommendation algorithms and data storage technology features, boldly compete with X in the field of "bulk information": In the past, in the promotion of related products, it seems that we have been too obsessed with using the wealth effect of cryptocurrency to attract users, whether it is the so-called "content monetization" or various reward airdrop logics. In my opinion, these are just scratching the surface. I believe that the biggest advantage of Web3 social media platforms compared to traditional centralized social media platforms is the transparency and fairness of the recommendation algorithms and information storage brought by technical solutions. This is undoubtedly the most suitable for social media platforms that take freedom of speech as their core value. Therefore, in the process of product promotion, we still need to always focus on this feature and directly compete with X, instead of attracting cryptocurrency users first and then seeking to break the circle. And X's dictatorship has created an opportunity for this product operation path. Imagine if the "Prism Gate" incident had not been exposed, would the Bitcoin system still develop to the current situation? This kind of large-scale centralized credit breach is a rare opportunity for Web3 products. In addition, I believe that in terms of product innovation, a modular recommendation algorithm combined with AI is a good direction for thinking. By introducing AI functions, users are allowed to customize recommendation algorithms, while opening up the algorithm market or platform to stimulate user UGC. This design that helps users break the information cocoon may win the favor of users. （2）More aggressive in marketing, grasp hot social events, and actively attract "X's disadvantaged groups" from top to bottom: In terms of event marketing, I believe that Web3 social media platforms should be more proactive and support "non-MAGA" values in a more clear-cut manner, such as relaxing illegal immigration policies, LGBTQ rights protection, women's rights, human rights, anti-authoritarian politics, support for abortion, minority rights, and colored people's rights. Grasp the relevant social hot spots and let your own platform become a channel for expressing your voice, so as to break the circle. At the same time, in this process, actively adopt a top-down promotion strategy. We know that in this election, a number of celebrities in the entertainment, art, and sports circles have clearly supported Harris, so by integrating resources and striving for a number of bigwigs to migrate from the X platform to this platform, it will have a multiplier effect on the promotion effect.
