People are pointing out that it appears someone is juicing the views anyway, by promoting the video post as an ad… but without the (required by law) disclosure that it’s an ad. This certainly suggests that it’s being done by ExTwitter itself, rather than MrBeast directly. If it were being done by MrBeast or someone else, then it would say that it was a promoted/advertised slot. The fact that it’s hidden suggests the call is coming from inside the house.
The evidence that it’s an undisclosed ad is pretty strong. People are seeing it show up in their feeds without the time/date of the post, which is something that only happens with ads. Other tweets show that info.
Even stronger proof? If you click on the three dots next to the tweet… it says “Report ad” and “Why this ad?” which, um, is pretty damning.
Cody Johnston notes that he has refused to update his Twitter app in ages, and on the old app, it is properly designated as a “Promoted” tweet, which is how ads were normally disclosed.
Elon is denying that he’s done anything to goose the numbers, but the evidence suggests someone at the company is doing so, whether or not Elon knows about it.
Of course, the evidence still suggests otherwise. Meanwhile, Ryan Broderick was told by an ExTwitter employee that they don’t have to label promoted tweets that have videos because there’s also a pre-roll video and that is disclosed. Of course, that… makes no sense at all. Those are two totally separate things, and not labeling the promoted tweet is a likely FTC violation (and potentially fraudulent in misrepresenting to people how much they might make from videos posted to the platform).
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