Signüll of signull labs argues OpenAI's acquisition of X channel tbpn overvalues centralized distribution

@signulll roon is all you need

@paularambles roon is great but unfortunately not enough lmao.

@signulll enough for what? we saw what happened when a company on here gave their affiliate badge to a bunch of “influential” posters. most of these accounts can’t and shouldn’t represent a company

@signulll What would buying out 200 accounts look like? Replacing them with other random people? A lot of people would not accept that deal for any amount of money. Money doesn't solve everything. Just doesn't seem like a very good plan tbh

@signulll they kinda hired several x poasters who were into ai/devrel/consulting for devex

@signulll They did both bro. Before codex actually became useful I saw people clearly being paid to promote it. The game is big accounts quote tweet launch posts or whatever and say something sensational like "this is actually insane" and the quoted post gets boosted engagement

@full_kelly_ if you want to see how to curate influence without buying accounts look at what @eriktorenberg is doing.

@paularambles yeah maybe my buying thing was bad, i would’ve approached it more like what erik is doing with new media.

I think there would have been huge push back to something like this since there’d be no way to keep it private. (Trying with it inevitably getting out would be much worse).

What could the mandate have been that wouldn’t immediately kill the reputation of everyone they bought? Possibly just don’t say anything negative about us, but still v problematic.

@signulll how about you push the thought process and run a side by side bench with a16z new media and other similar plays / takes recently enabled

@signulll but could do definitely more.

@signulll Judging by the TBPN acquisition and the OpenClaw hire, SBF seems to have had a better eye for talent than OpenAI.

@signulll i mean they're sort of doing both, have lots of popular devrel/x ppl on here + now hiring substack folks as well

@signulll I still think TBPN will be a massive ad network / agency doing billions in a few years.

@signulll Pretty solid take. That probably would have been a more resilient strategy. Are we sure they are not doing that tho? just more covertly?

@signulll They shouldnt have bought tbpn and they shouldnt buy 200 influential accounts. Havent seen tbpn on my timeline since the acquisition

@signulll can you give us a examples of 5 such accounts so we might not miss anything?

@signulll Yeah TBPN’s reach was entirely X-driven. It just felt like they were everywhere.

I have seen those dudes like 5 times since OAI bought them. Big fumble

@signulll Exactly. They could have quietly bought influence across the actual conversation instead of buying the conversation itself.

Classic centralized mindset in a decentralized era.

The TBPN deal already looks like a hedge against the platform risk you flagged years ago.

I found this essay from @anuatluru to be really insightful to explain some of the dynamics at play here, and the bet being made around TBPN especially. It goes a bit beyond centralization vs decentralization.

I do think it’s conspicuous how their distribution seems to have diminished recently.