If you have been following along, you will know that I am a big fan of Lockhead and Category Design. But on this one - I totally disagree. It’s only 15 minutes - less if you remove the top and tail. For example - jump right in at 1’ 56” and you can stop at 12’ 50# - so what 11 minutes?

🔗 Elon Musk’s New Category Design For Twitter: Will it work? - Lochhead on Marketing

I do agree that Musk is up to something. BUT

The thesis of Category Pirates lands on how this Blue Checkmark fiasco is the start of ‘great thinking … marketing even … from Musk … in that this is ‘the first time we have seen an attempt to deliver a paid for social platform at scale’. Me - no idea if that is true, BUT riffing on ‘Theodore’ for a moment … people are on Twitter not because they want a blue checkmark - but rather to ‘say and write stuff and have it pushed out to the unsuspecting world’.

I don’t disagree that Musk is up to something as he works through the monetisation question - BUT - the idea of faffing around with the check mark is the result of some great marketing mind is nuts. The idea that he is in the process of creating an entirely new category is nuts. Trying maybe - but not yet creating,