Elon Musk Wants to Build a Digital Town Square. But His Debut for DeSantis Had a Tech Failure.

FILE PHOTO: Tesla CEO Elon Musk and his security detail depart the company’s local office in Washington, US January 27, 2023.  REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
FILE PHOTO: Tesla CEO Elon Musk and his security detail depart the company’s local office in Washington, US January 27, 2023. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
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Elon Musk Wants to Build a Digital Town Square. But His Debut for DeSantis Had a Tech Failure.

FILE PHOTO: Tesla CEO Elon Musk and his security detail depart the company’s local office in Washington, US January 27, 2023.  REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
FILE PHOTO: Tesla CEO Elon Musk and his security detail depart the company’s local office in Washington, US January 27, 2023. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

Elon Musk wants to turn Twitter into a “digital town square,” but his much-publicized Twitter Spaces kickoff event, with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis announcing his run for president, struggled with technical glitches and a near half-hour delay Tuesday.

The billionaire Twitter owner said the problems were due to “straining” servers because so many people were trying to listen to the audio-only event. But even at their highest, the number of listeners listed topped out at around 420,000, far from the millions of viewers that televised presidential announcements attract, The Associated Press.

“There’s so many people,” said host David Sacks amid the disruptions. “We’ve got so many people here that we are kind of melting the servers, which is a good sign.”

After it concluded without further disruptions, Musk, DeSantis and Sacks played off the event as a success, with Sacks quipping “it's not how you start, it's how you finish — and we finished really strong."

Musk a day earlier dubbed the event a historic first for Twitter, saying it would be “the first time something like this is happening on social media.” The webcast was scheduled to start at 6 p.m. ET but nearly 30 minutes passed with users getting kicked off, hearing microphone feedback and enduring other technical problems before it finally began. The audience remained under 500,000.

DeSantis opponents had a field day with the delayed announcement.

"Glitchy. Tech issues. Uncomfortable silences. A complete failure to launch. And that’s just the candidate!” said Steven Cheung, a spokesperson for former President and current candidate Donald Trump.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat from New York, tweeted, “We had more people join when I played Among Us,” referencing the popular video game.

Twitter has suffered a host of technical issues since Musk took over and fired or laid off roughly 80% of its staff — including engineers tasked with keeping the site running. A day before the DeSantis event, speaking at The Wall Street Journal’s CEO Council Summit in London, Musk expressed confidence about Twitter's future and said he is “going to start adding people to the company” but gave no further details.

Musk bought Twitter last fall for $44 billion. Since then, he has upended the platform's verification system, loosened its content moderation policies in line with his views as a “free speech absolutist,” spread misinformation and engaged with far-right figures, all the while working to attract jittery advertisers back to the platform to turn it profitable. His grand vision, he has said repeatedly, is to eventually turn Twitter into an “ everything app ” for everyone — a digital town square where people can hear from world leaders and politicians without the need for traditional media as a go-between.

But he seems to mainly be courting conservatives and Republicans lately, referring to Democrats and liberals as infected by the “woke mind virus” and reinstating extremist accounts that were banned by Twitter's previous administration.

Wednesday's campaign launch event with DeSantis continued the trend — though it remains to be seen whether the platform can become a go-to destination for mainstream politicians when it continues to show evidence of instability. For instance, the word “DeSaster” was trending on Twitter Wednesday evening as users mocked the botched campaign launch.

In the world of traditional media and politics, a glitchy half-hour delay and an audience in the hundreds of thousands rather than millions, Wednesday's Twitter Spaces event might look like a failure. But in Silicon Valley, failure is often spun as positive, even essential in developing new products and improving existing ones. Twitter Spaces — which Twitter launched in 2020 to compete with the then-popular audio chat site Clubhouse — is generally not used for audiences in the hundreds of thousands, so in some ways it was not a surprise that the event was marred with technical problems.

“It's much worse for DeSantis than it is for Musk,” said Jo-Ellen Pozner, a business professor at Santa Clara University, noting that just a month ago Musk's SpaceX launched a rocket that exploded minutes after its launch from Texas. After the explosion, Musk called it “an exciting test launch of Starship! Learned a lot for next test launch in a few months" in a tweet.

“It is clearly a difficult situation for DeSantis, who wants to project competence, who wants to forestall criticism,” she said. “Musk has an easier out by just saying that ‘this was the first time we tried it, it didn’t work out perfectly, but next time we’ll do much better,’ in the classic Silicon Valley approach to failing fast and learning more.”

Pozner said it remains an “open question” how Twitter is going to be valued as a broad digital platform down the line.

“I think will depend on, you know, how he and the top management react to this and how they spin it,” she said.

After DeSantis logged off, Musk and Sacks extended an open invitation to any other presidential candidate who wants to do a Twitter Spaces event. Whether or not they get any takers could signal what the future holds for Twitter as a “public square."



Video Game Actors Are Voting on a New Contract. Here’s What It Means for AI in Gaming

A picketer holds a sign for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. (AP)
A picketer holds a sign for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. (AP)
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Video Game Actors Are Voting on a New Contract. Here’s What It Means for AI in Gaming

A picketer holds a sign for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. (AP)
A picketer holds a sign for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. (AP)

An 11-month strike by video game performers could formally end this week if members ratify a deal that delivers pay raises, control over their likenesses and artificial intelligence protections.

The agreement feels "like diamond amounts of pressure suddenly lifted," said Sarah Elmaleh, a voice actor and chair of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists' interactive branch negotiating committee.

Union members have until Wednesday at 5 p.m. Pacific to vote on ratifying the tentative agreement.

Voice and body performers for video games raised concerns that unregulated use of AI could displace them and threaten their artistic autonomy.

"It’s obviously far from resolved," Elmaleh said. "But the idea that that we’re in a zone where we might have concluded this feels like a lightening and a relief."

AI concerns are especially dire in the video game industry, where human performers infuse characters with distinctive movements, shrieks, falls and plot-twisting dialogue.

"I hope and I believe that our members, when they look back on this, will say all of the sacrifices and difficulty we put ourselves through to achieve this agreement will ultimately be worth it because we do have the key elements that we need to feel confident and moving forward in this business," said Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, the SAG-AFTRA national executive director and chief negotiator.

Here’s a look at the contract currently up for vote, and what it means for the future of the video game industry.

How did the current strike play out? Video game performers went on strike last July following nearly two years of failed negotiations with major game studios, as both sides remained split over generative AI regulations.

More than 160 games signed interim agreements accepting AI provisions SAG-AFTRA was seeking, the union said, which allowed some work to continue.

The video game industry is a massive global industry, generating an estimated $187 billion in 2024, according to game market forecaster Newzoo.

"OD," and "Physint" were two games delayed due to the strike during the filming and casting stage, video game developer Hideo Kojima wrote in December. Riot Games, a video game developer, announced that same month that some new skins in "League of Legends" would have to use existing voice-overs, since new content couldn't be recorded by striking actors. Skins are cosmetic items that can change the visual appearance of a player and is sometimes equipped with new voice-overs and unique recorded lines.

The proposed contract "builds on three decades of successful partnership between the interactive entertainment industry and the union" to deliver "historic wage increases" and "industry-leading AI provisions," wrote Audrey Cooling, a spokesperson for the video game producers involved in the deal.

"We look forward to continuing to work with performers to create new and engaging entertainment experiences for billions of players throughout the world," Cooling wrote.

Video game performers had previously gone on strike in October 2016, with a tentative deal reached 11 months later. That strike helped secure a bonus compensation structure for voice actors and performance capture artists. The agreement was ratified with 90% support, with 10% of members voting.

The proposed contract secures an increase in performer compensation of just over 15% upon ratification and an additional 3% increase each year of the three-year contract.

How would AI use change in video games? AI concerns have taken center stage as industries across various sectors attempt to keep up with the fast-evolving technology. It’s a fight that Hollywood writers and actors undertook during the historic film and TV strikes that forced the industry to a stop in 2023.

"In the last few years, it’s become obvious that we are at an inflection point where rules of the road have to be set for AI, and if they aren’t, the consequences are potentially very serious," Crabtree-Ireland said. "I think that really made this negotiation extra important for all of us."

SAG-AFTRA leaders have billed the issues behind the labor dispute — and AI in particular — as an existential crisis for performers. Game voice actors and motion capture artists’ likenesses, they say, could be replicated by AI and used without their consent and without fair compensation.

The proposed contract delineates clear restrictions on when and how video game companies can create digital replicas, which use AI to generate new performances that weren't recorded by an actor.

Employers must obtain written permission from a performer to create a digital replica — consent which must be granted during the performer’s lifetime and is valid after death unless otherwise limited, the contract states. The time spent creating a digital replica will be compensated as the same amount of work time it would have required for a new performance.

The agreement also requires the employer to provide the performer with a usage report that details how the replica was used and calculates the expected compensation.

Elmaleh, who has been voice acting since 2010 and had to turn down projects throughout the strike, said securing these gains required voice actors bring vulnerability and openness to the bargaining table.

"We talked a lot about the personal, the way it affects our displacement as workers and just the sustainability of our careers," Elmaleh said. "Our work involves your inner child. It’s being very vulnerable, it’s being playful."

What’s next for the video game industry? The tentative agreement centers on consent, compensation and transparency, which union leaders say are key elements needed for the industry to keep progressing.

As the contract is considered by union members, Elmaleh and Crabtree-Ireland said further work needs to be done to ensure the provisions are as broad as necessary.

"Even though there’s a deal that’s been made now, and we’ve locked in a lot of really crucial protections and guardrails, the things that we haven’t been able to achieve yet, we’re going to be continuing to fight for them," Crabtree-Ireland said. "Every time these contracts expire is our chance to improve upon them."

Elmaleh said she hopes both the video game companies and performers can soon work collaboratively to develop guidelines on AI as the technology evolves — a process she said should start well the proposed contract would expire in October 2028.

Leading negotiations has felt like a full-time job for Elmaleh, who took on the role in a volunteer capacity. As the efforts die down, she said she anxiously anticipates returning to video game acting in a landscape that is safer for performers.

Voice acting "is core to who I am. It’s why I fought so hard for this. I wouldn’t do this if I didn’t love what I do so much. I think it’s so special and worthy of protection," she said.