Twitter Blue Drama & Shenanigans; Supreme Court Will Decide if Officials Can Block on Social Media; Netflix Still Rules Very Fragmented Video Market; More on Apple AR Headset

After taking away thousands of legacy blue checkmarks on April 20th, Twitter has restored a number of them for accounts with large numbers of followers…even if they didn’t pay for Twitter Blue. This Blue check change has become a huge disaster for Elon Musk. Over the weekend, a number of dead celebrities have showed up with accounts after someone paid Twitter $8, and claimed to be the dead celeb. Accounts showed up with blue checks for Chadwick Boseman, Kobe Bryant, Anthony Bourdain, Paul Walker, Barbara Walters, Bob Saget, Kirstie Alley, and Michael Jackson…among others.

The Supreme Court has taken up a case on free speech and social media. According to reuters.com, the High Court will look at whether or not a public official can block their critics on social media. The case is an appeal of one from a couple school board members in Southern California. A lower court had ruled that they couldn’t block school parents on Facebook and Twitter when the parents were critical of the board members. Also rolled into the appeal is a case from a Michigan city official who blocked a citizen complaining about a local government’s COVID-19 response. It will be interesting to see the fusty old court wrangle with free speech as it applies on social media. 

The TV and video streaming market is quite fragmented at this point, but Netflix remains king of the hill for streaming. Bloomberg.com says Netflix accounts for between 7-8% of viewing every month, based on Nielsen research. No one else is close, except YouTube with a bit over 4%. In fact, Netflix has more watch time than Hulu, Disney+, and HBO Max combined. Netflix also has the most shows in the top 10, followed by Disney. 

More details about Apple’s mixed reality headset we think will be unveiled at WWDC in June. 9to5mac.com reports that it will have a MagSafe connector that will run to a battery pack which is about the size as an iPhone MagSafe one. The pack will go in a pocket or clip to your belt, and give about 2 hours of run time for the headset. Apple obviously expects people to carry an extra battery pack or two…so you can fork over more money to them if you want to use the thing for longer. The MagSafe cable is not removable from the battery pack, and it plugs into the headset and locks in with a turn. No change in one thing…it’s still expected to cost around three grand.

I’m Clark Reid and you’re ‘Technified’ for now.