Strange coincidence between Elon Musk and Jim Watkins
Musk's management, which took the world by surprise after acquiring Twitter, is oddly similar to that of Jim Watkins, who acquired 2chan in 2014
After acquiring Twitter for $44 billion on October 27, 2022, Elon Musk made a number of radical business decisions in just three weeks, and the world has been so astonished by Musk's decisions that there is even a discourse that Twitter will disappear within days or weeks because of the unorthodox and disruptive nature of his decisions.
Elon Musk fired about half of Twitter's employees, including those working to ensure the trust and security of Twitter, and fired any employee who openly disagreed with Elon Musk. Musk cut back on employees in departments that moderate posts of hate speech and Internet trolls, including those who have been banned from Twitter for discriminatory remarks, in order to uphold free speech, which has led to a surge in anti-Semitic discourse and other hate speech on Twitter since Musk took over. Since Twitter relies on advertising for 90% of its revenue, this is considered to be a major blow to the company's operations. Musk is also introducing new subscriptions to improve Twitter's operations, but the Twitter Blue subscription, which he sees as the centerpiece of his reforms, has destructively undermined the reliability of Twitter's authentication system, which can be purchased for $8. Trolls using Twitter Blue-derived authentication have spread numerous false information that has even had a major impact on the stock prices of major companies.
Such is the management of Elon Musk's destructive Twitter company, but I see another way of looking at it, as a long-time user of the infamous original Japanese chan forum, 2chan, and a volunteer staff member for about 4 years at this Japanese chan forum, which was renamed 5chan since October 1, 2017.
In fact, the events that followed Jim Watkins' little-known 2014 management seizure of 2chan and Elon Musk's Twitter Inc. have some similarities to the reforms that took place.
The original chan series of hate and far-right extremist nests such as 4chan and 8chan, which spawned QAnon, the Japanese 2chan was born in Arkansas, USA, in 1999 by Japanese student Hiroyuki Nishimura. Jim Watkins, who was in the U.S. military until 1998, was in charge of managing the servers of 2chan's porn-only PINKchan since about 2001 and received rights to the profits of 2chan's paid services. Jim Watkins, who had been making money from this paid service for many years, took control of 2chan from Hiroyuki Nishimura in April 2014 after a 2013 incident involving the leak of customer information for 2chan's paid service put him at odds with Hiroyuki Nishimura over financial issues.
The change of control of 2chan in 2014 was the beginning of a long-running court battle in Japan between Hiroyuki Nishimura and Jim Watkins over the ownership of 2chan. The long-running court battle in Japan between Hiroyuki Nishimura and Jim Watkins over ownership of 2chan has been in the news several times since then, so it is relatively well known to many people in Japan. However, surprisingly few people are aware of the changes that occurred in the management of 2chan after Jim Watkins took control of the site. This is probably due to the fact that the number of users of 2chan had already decreased considerably due to restrictions on posting on an unusual scale at the end of Hiroyuki Nishimura's management. Few people used 2chan operated by Jim Watkins, and even fewer were interested in how the operation had been changed. This is evidenced by the fact that very little information about the management of 2chan after Jim Watkins' management is even left on the Internet.
To find out, one would have to examine 2chan's logs of posts from that time.
What happened in 2014 was a massive reduction in the 2chan management staff and the resulting crisis in operations, the disappearance of advertising revenue, and the establishment of a new paid service. One article explains that the disappearance of advertising revenue at 2chan under Jim Watkins' management was due to the fact that Hiroyuki Nishimura, with whom he had a conflict, was in charge of contracts with advertising agencies and was not passed on to Jim Watkins.
Since Jim Watkins' seizure in 2014, almost all of 2chan's staff has been fired. Those who remained were Japanese staff working for Jim Watkins' company RaceQueen in the Philippines, and Jim Watkins' business partner since around 1998, the Japanese Yoshihiro Nakao, who has a company in Sapporo, Hokkaido Japan, and his staff seemed to be the only ones left. Originally, 2chan's management staff was assembled by Hiroyuki Nishimura, so it is not surprising that Hiroyuki Nishimura's management staff could not be trusted, and that he could not hire staff because he had no advertising revenue and no funds. What is curious, however, is that 2chan continued to operate with such an extremely small staff until around 2017.
What in the world changed at 2chan with a small staff? First, a few top-level staff members took charge of the minimum amount of work required to run the site by themselves. Due to the volume of his work, Ace★ (Before 2017, his name was Jack★, His real name is unknown), who has been in charge of 2chan operations since 2014, has been suffering from health problems to the extent that he was hospitalized three times in one year.
What affected users the most was that requests to delete posts with discriminatory remarks, unauthorized personal information, etc. were rarely responded to. I surveyed the processing of post deletions since 2014 and found that very little work was done except on boards in certain areas. Many boards did not respond at all. However, they were working more closely with lawyers and the Japanese police than in the days of Hiroyuki Nishimura, so it seems that there were fewer legal problems caused by not deleting posts. The major impact was on those who did not take legal action against 2chan even though they were the target of a collective attack by trolls. They were attacked by trolls and exposed to personal information, but 2chan did not respond voluntarily.
On the other hand, there were two boards where deletions were frequently processed. One was a board that dealt with topics about news, which took an extreme right turn after Jim Watkins' operation. Posts or threads critical of conservative politicians or the ruling Liberal Democratic Party were deleted without question, and in a short period of time, the board became a place where people with a very right-wing political bias could post their opinions. The other board was for the topic of underground idols, an indie female talent. Oddly enough, a civil movement on Twitter triggered by an incident regarding an idol group that was uncovered in January 2019. A number of 5chan staff members were involved in the movement. And it was during that movement that the underground idol boards were frequently deleted.
Since the days of Hiroyuki Nishimura's management, the 2channel platform has been rife with racist and offensive comments due to a lack of proper moderation and inappropriate deletions. I did not perceive any change in the way that Jim Watkins' operation increased hate speech. So it may be inappropriate to compare the current Twitter Inc. It is true that inappropriate moderation can lead to a violent deterioration of speech on the platform. This is perhaps more readily understood after Hiroyuki Nishimura's acquisition of 4chan in 2015 and after Jim Watkins became a co-owner of 8chan in 2014.
2chan (after October 1, 2017, 5 Chan), where I worked as a staff member for about four years starting in 2017, I found it very strange that all the other staff members acted as if they knew each other in real life. I was hired by Yoshihiro Nakao by chance to work as a staff member, but without pay, and was harassed by other staff members. After I met 8chan founder Fredrik Brennan on Twitter in August 2020, he told me that the rest of the staff, except me, were paid by Japanese female staff in the Philippines.
I have heard several times from staff who work with him that Jim Watkins would never trust anyone unless he met them and would not hire them as staff. A Japanese man named Ace★, who oversees 2chan's operations, moved to the Philippines in 2010 and has been working with Jim Watkins in his office. Brennan told me that the Japanese woman who manages the staff's payroll and handles the deletions is also a RaceQueen employee in the Philippines and was originally Jim Watkins' Japanese-English translator. I worked at 2chan and 5chan for four years, and I do not know the real names or identities of anyone other than the management team, whose names are publicly available, and the staff in the Philippines, whom Brennan told me about. From the very beginning of my job, I was told by other staff members that I should not reveal my true identity publicly. What was this thorough secrecy?
I was told by a 5chan staff member in the fall of 2019, when QAnon was not at all well known in Japan, about Q and the leader of the QAnon organization QAJF in Japan I heard about Eri. Cullen Hoback, director of the HBO documentary Q: Into The Storm, has indicated that QAJF could be Jim Watkins' Japanese operation. I too think Hoback's speculation is quite possible, since Eri has publicly stated that he has a channel to interact with Jim Watkins.
What if Jim Watkins' small-group policy, his autocratic management policy of forcing thorough secrecy on his staff without allowing dissent, and his management not relying on advertising were for "covert operations" such as QAnon's? I find the current management policy at Twitter, which appears to be without thought by Elon Musk, who does not conceal his appearance as a member of MAGA, very creepy.