- Jack Dorsey criticizes Elon Musk’s leadership at Twitter: ‘It all went south’ CNBC
- Twitter founder Jack Dorsey says Musk wasn’t an ideal leader after all The Washington Post
- Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey strongly criticizes Elon Musk’s handling of the app New York Daily News
- Jack Dorsey once called Elon Musk the ‘singular solution’ for taking Twitter private. Now, the app’s co-founder says Musk never should have bought it: ‘I think he should have walked away’ Yahoo! Voices
- Twitter Co-Founder Dorsey Rues Musk Deal: ‘It All Went South’ Bloomberg
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Tag Archives: Dorsey
Jack Dorsey criticizes Elon Musk’s leadership at Twitter: ‘It all went south’ – CNBC
- Jack Dorsey criticizes Elon Musk’s leadership at Twitter: ‘It all went south’ CNBC
- Twitter founder Jack Dorsey says Musk wasn’t an ideal leader after all The Washington Post
- Jack Dorsey once called Elon Musk the ‘singular solution’ for taking Twitter private. Now, the app’s co-founder says Musk never should have bought it: ‘I think he should have walked away’ Yahoo! Voices
- Twitter Co-Founder Dorsey Rues Musk Deal: ‘It All Went South’ Bloomberg
- Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey strongly criticizes Elon Musk’s handling of the app New York Daily News
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Twitter-Elon Musk Timeline: Pay-for-Verification Appears in App, Dorsey Speaks
Twitter’s new owner and CEO, Elon Musk, has wasted little time putting his stamp on the influential social network.
Immediately after Musk bought Twitter on Oct. 27, the billionaire set to work making changes to the platform. From firing executives to proposing a new content moderation council, a lot has unfolded with Musk at the helm.
But Twitter’s saga with Musk was chaotic even before he took control. The two sides secured a pact for him to buy the company in April, but Musk later attempted to back out of the deal, leading Twitter to sue him. After months of messy pretrial skirmishes, the SpaceX and Tesla leader finally closed his acquisition of the company right before a deadline that would have forced him to go head to head with Twitter in court.
Here’s the most recent news about Musk’s takeover of Twitter:
Nov. 5: Paying for check marks, hearing from Dorsey
Pay-for-verification plan shows up in iOS update
On Saturday, version notes for the latest iteration of Twitter’s app for the Apple iPhone showed up in the App Store, with a What’s New section that pointed to the verification feature. The notes tell users that “starting today” if you “sign up now” for an $8-a-month Twitter Blue subscription, “your account will get a blue checkmark, just like the celebrities, companies, and politicians you already follow.” It appears, though, that the program hasn’t actually kicked in yet. Read more here.
Dorsey weighs in
With news reports saying Twitter had laid off about half its work force, co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey took to the service Saturday to offer words of encouragement and to place blame on himself.
“I own the responsibility for why everyone is in this situation: I grew the company size too quickly. I apologize for that,” Dorsey tweeted. He also called Twitter staffers past and present “resilient” and said, “I am grateful for, and love, everyone who has ever worked on Twitter. I don’t expect that to be mutual in this moment.”
In April, Dorsey expressed his support of Elon Musk taking over the company, but he also said that in principle, he thought no one should own or run Twitter and that it should instead be “a public good.”
Nov. 4: Musk says Twitter has had ‘massive drop’ in revenue
Since Musk’s takeover, several major advertisers, such as Tesla rival General Motors, food company General Mills and pharmaceutical corporation Pfizer, have temporarily paused their ad campaigns on Twitter. Musk tweeted that Twitter has had a “massive drop” in revenue, which he blamed on activist groups pressuring advertisers. Musk didn’t say in his tweet how much Twitter’s revenue has fallen, nor did he identify the activists. In the tweet, Musk also said Twitter hasn’t changed its content moderation policies.
Musk also made an appearance at the Baron Investment Conference, where he noted that Twitter grappled with revenue challenges before the acquisition and that he tried to get out of the deal.
His remarks came after Twitter started laying off employees. Late Friday, Musk tweeted that there was “no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day.” Without specifying how many people were laid off or what percentage of the workforce, Musk added they were “offered 3 months of severance.” Reportedly, about half of Twitter’s 7,500-person work force was laid off.
Civil rights groups that met with Musk earlier this week spoke out about the layoffs.
“For starters, there’s no way to keep election integrity in place if you are cutting capacity to do the monitoring in #TwitterLayoffs,” tweeted Rashad Robinson, president of racial justice group Color of Change. The group is part of #StopToxicTwitter, a coalition of more than 60 organizations that are urging major advertisers to pause spending and invest in content moderation. Partners listed on the coalition’s website include the Anti-Defamation League, the NAACP, Public Citizen, and the Union of Concerned Scientists.
The Volkswagen Group and others reportedly paused ad spending because of concerns that ads could appear alongside problematic content on the platform.
Nov. 3: Musk looks for ways to cut costs, lawsuit filed
Musk wants to cut costs and make Twitter less dependent on advertising.
Reuters, citing two sources familiar with the matter and an internal Slack message, reported that Musk directed Twitter’s team to find more than $1 billion in infrastructure cost savings.
The company is looking at other ways to make money outside of advertising, including “paywalled” videos and paid direct messages, The New York Times reported, citing two people with knowledge of the matter and internal documents.
Musk is already making changes to Twitter’s work culture. Bloomberg reported that Musk has removed “days of rest” from Twitter’s employee calendars and plans to cancel the company’s remote work policy. Twitter didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Twitter reportedly told employees in an email that layoffs would happen. A lawsuit seeking class action status, filed Thursday, accused Twitter of violating the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act, which requires large companies to give least 60 days of advance notice before mass layoffs, as previously reported by Bloomberg.
Nov. 2: Musk reportedly plans to cut half of Twitter’s workforce
Musk plans to cut about 3,700 jobs at Twitter, or half of the social media company’s workforce, Bloomberg reported. Affected staffers are to be informed of their fate by Friday, sources told the news outlet.
Musk also plans to reverse the company’s existing work-from-anywhere policy, requiring remaining employees to report to an office, the unidentified sources said.
In one scenario for reducing Twitter’s workforce being considered, laid off workers will be offered 60 days’ worth of severance pay. Twitter users have been bracing for layoffs since Musk announced his bid for Twitter in April. One report indicated that Musk planned to cut 75% of jobs at Twitter.
Nov. 1: Musk suggests charging for verification
In a series of tweets, Musk floated the idea that Twitter charge $8 per month for a verified blue check mark as part of its subscription plan. The company’s subscription service, known as Twitter Blue, currently costs $5 per month but doesn’t include verification as a perk.
Twitter currently doesn’t charge to verify accounts with a blue check mark, and the badge is supposed to be given out to accounts that the company determines are “notable, authentic and active.” The blue check mark is meant to help users determine if an account of a celebrity, journalist or other public figure is fake or not.
Musk tweeted that the price would be adjusted by country and that the subscription would include “priority in replies, mentions & search, which is essential to defeat spam/scam,” as well as the “ability to post long video & audio.” He also said users would see “half as many ads.”
Earlier in the day, The Wall Street Journal reported that Twitter Blue subscribers will lose access to ad-free articles from publishers like Vox, the Los Angeles Times and Insider. There have been various reports of different prices for a Twitter Blue subscription, with the company also reportedly having considered increasing the subscription price to $20 a month.
It’s unclear from Musk’s tweets if verified users would have to pay for a subscription or lose their blue check mark. Musk tweeted there would be “a secondary tag” for public figures, like the one now used for politicians.
The company’s chief customer officer, Sarah Personette, also revealed in a tweet that she resigned on Friday.
Hi folks, I wanted to share that I resigned on Friday from Twitter and my work access was officially cut off last night.
— Sarah Personette (@SEP) November 1, 2022
Meanwhile, Twitter said it has removed 1,500 accounts since Saturday for posting hateful content.
Oct. 31: Official CEO, board dissolved, layoff plans, no Trump decision yet, content moderation limited
Days after naming himself “Chief Twit” on his Twitter profile, Musk confirmed he’s the company’s CEO through a securities filing. Other changes to Twitter’s leadership are also underway. A related securities filing shows Twitter’s board of directors was dissolved the day Musk took over and identified Musk as the “sole director” of the company.
He also reportedly plans to lay off 25% of Twitter’s workforce, The Washington Post reported, citing anonymous sources.
Musk, who has previously said he would reverse former US President Donald Trump’s permanent ban from Twitter, is still getting questions about whether he’ll follow through on that. Twitter booted Trump from its platform in 2021 following the deadly US Capitol Hill riot because of concerns that his remarks could incite more violence.
“If I had a dollar for every time someone asked me if Trump is coming back on this platform, Twitter would be minting money!” Musk tweeted.
Twitter also limited some Trust and Safety employee access to internal tools, Bloomberg reported, curbing their ability to moderate content and address misinformation ahead of next week’s US elections. They can apparently still edit or remove posts that could result in real-world harm.
“This is exactly what we (or any company) should be doing in the midst of a corporate transition to reduce opportunities for insider risk. We’re still enforcing our rules at scale,” Yoel Roth, Twitter’s head of safety and integrity, tweeted in response to Bloomberg’s story.
Oct. 30: Musk toys with checkmark changes and Vine revival, tweets misinformation
Musk has been busy suggesting changes to Twitter. He tweeted a poll about whether Twitter should bring back Vine, a short-form video app that Twitter shut down in 2017.
Twitter also reportedly plans to charge $20 per month for its Twitter Blue subscription service, and verified users would lose their blue checkmark if they don’t do so in 90 days, The Verge reported, citing anonymous sources. Platformer’s Casey Newton reported that Twitter is thinking about charging $5 a month to verified users if they want to keep their blue checkmarks.
Musk also tweeted and then deleted a link to an article with a baseless conspiracy theory about last week’s attack on Paul Pelosi, the husband of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in San Francisco. The article came from a website called the Santa Monica Observer. Fact-checking website Media Bias/Fact Check noted the outlet publishes right-wing misinformation.
Oct. 29: Twitter battles a surge in racist slurs
Twitter is trying to combat anonymous accounts that started to tweet racist slurs hours after Musk took over Twitter.
Twitter head of safety and integrity Yoel Roth tweeted that the company has “seen a small number of accounts post a ton of tweets that include slurs and other derogatory terms.” He added that “more than 50,000 tweets repeatedly using a particular slur came from just 300 accounts.”
“Bottom line up front: Twitter’s policies haven’t changed. Hateful conduct has no place here. And we’re taking steps to put a stop to an organized effort to make people think we have,” he tweeted.
Let’s talk for a minute about slurs, hateful conduct, and trolling campaigns.
Bottom line up front: Twitter’s policies haven’t changed. Hateful conduct has no place here. And we’re taking steps to put a stop to an organized effort to make people think we have.
— Yoel Roth (@yoyoel) October 30, 2022
Oct. 28: Twitter to form content moderation council
Advocacy groups have raised concerns that Musk’s control over Twitter would allow more hate speech and misinformation to surface on the platform. Musk has vowed publicly he doesn’t want Twitter to become a “free-for-all hellscape” but has also said that he’s “against censorship that goes far beyond the law.”
Musk said the company would form a content moderation council with “widely diverse viewpoints.” The company won’t make any major content decisions or account reinstatements before the council convenes, he tweeted.
Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints.
No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 28, 2022
A securities filing on Oct. 28 also noted that Twitter’s stock is being delisted on the New York Stock Exchange. Twitter, a publicly traded company, became a private one.
Oct. 27: Musk takes over Twitter, fires executives
Musk became Twitter’s new owner and reportedly fired key executives at the company, including Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal and Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s head of legal policy, trust and safety.
Earlier in the day, Musk tweeted a letter to advertisers. The billionaire, who once tweeted that he hated advertising, now posted that “advertising, when done right, can delight, entertain and inform you.”
Musk met with employees throughout the week, carried a sink into Twitter’s headquarters as a photo op and changed his profile to “Chief Twit” before news broke that the deal had been completed.
Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey says company-wide layoffs are his fault
Jack Dorsey says he can “understand” if current and former Twitter employees blame him for the state of the company . The co-founder and of Twitter took to the platform on Saturday to say he was to blame for the situation. “Folks at Twitter past and present are strong and resilient. They will always find a way no matter how difficult the moment,” Dorsey . “I realize many are angry with me. I own the responsibility for why everyone is in this situation: I grew the company size too quickly. I apologize for that.”
Dorsey went on to add he was grateful to everyone who had ever worked at Twitter. “I don’t expect that to be mutual in this moment… or ever… and I understand,” he wrote. Dorsey posted the apology after published a story earlier in the day claiming he is now “hated at Twitter.” Many employees reportedly “blame” him for Musk’s takeover and the company-wide layoffs that will see about 50 percent of Twitter’s workforce cut.
The thread marks Dorsey’s first public comment on Twitter since Musk closed his $44 billion deal to buy the company on October 27th. When the SpaceX founder first announced the takeover, Dorsey put his support behind it. “Elon is the singular solution I trust,” . “This is the right path… I believe it with all my heart.” Dorsey was quiet after Musk attempted to , but in texts that , it became clear that he had wanted Musk to take a more active role at Twitter for some time.
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Former Twitter chief Jack Dorsey issues apology amid mass layoffs | Twitter
Former Twitter chief executive officer Jack Dorsey has gone on the platform recently acquired by billionaire Elon Musk to apologize for the state of the site, which has laid off thousands of workers.
On Saturday Dorsey published a series of tweets in response to the layoffs across Twitter’s workforce, which began on Friday. As many as half of the company’s 7,500 staffers could be axed since Musk acquired the company for $44bn last week.
“Folks at Twitter, past and present, are strong and resilient,” Dorsey wrote. “They will always find a way no matter how difficult the moment. I realize many are angry with me.
“I own the responsibility for why everyone is in this situation: I grew the company size too quickly. I apologize for that.”
Dorsey added: “I am grateful for, and love, everyone who has ever worked on Twitter. I don’t expect that to be mutual in this moment … or ever … and I understand,” along with a heart emoji.
Response to Dorsey’s comments have been mixed. Many users have blamed Dorsey for issues at Twitter after being bought by Musk.
“Oof. Too little. Too late,” wrote one user.
Another user wrote: “Dude, you suck.”
A number of divisions at Twitter suffered deep cuts or were eliminated altogether, including the company’s human rights and algorithm ethics teams.
At least one class-action lawsuit has been filed against Twitter on behalf of former employees who say they were not given adequate notice of their termination.
“Elon Musk has a history of violating California’s labor laws, as Tesla has been hit with a shocking number of sexual and racial harassment lawsuits,” said prominent lawyer Lisa Bloom, who confirmed to the Guardian that she has been in contact with several Twitter employees.
“His workers are human beings who are all entitled to respectful treatment. This time a hard-hitting class-action lawsuit will finally educate him that even the world’s richest man is not above the law.”
UK-based Twitter workers who face losing their jobs have been given three days to nominate a representative for a formal consultation about their employment.
Musk has defended the layoffs, tweeting that fired employees are receiving three months of severance as the company reportedly loses over $4m a day.
But several companies have announced that they will no longer be advertising on Twitter amid fears that misinformation and hate speech will proliferate on the app as protections against each are scaled back.
Audi, General Motors, General Mills and other advertisers have halted ads on the site.
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and other groups have also pushed for advertisers to pause their spending on the site in the face of the hate speech concerns.
Twitter-Elon Musk Timeline: Pay-for-Verification Appears in App, Dorsey Speaks
Twitter’s new owner and CEO, Elon Musk, has wasted little time putting his stamp on the influential social network.
Immediately after Musk bought Twitter on Oct. 27, the billionaire set to work making changes to the platform. From firing executives to proposing a new content moderation council, a lot has unfolded with Musk at the helm.
But Twitter’s saga with Musk was chaotic even before he took control. The two sides secured a pact for him to buy the company in April, but Musk later attempted to back out of the deal, leading Twitter to sue him. After months of messy pretrial skirmishes, the SpaceX and Tesla leader finally closed his acquisition of the company right before a deadline that would have forced him to go head to head with Twitter in court.
Here’s the most recent news about Musk’s takeover of Twitter:
Nov. 5: Paying for check marks, hearing from Dorsey
Pay-for-verification plan shows up in iOS update
On Saturday, version notes for the latest iteration of Twitter’s app for the Apple iPhone showed up in the App Store, with a What’s New section that pointed to the verification feature. The notes tell users that “starting today” if you “sign up now” for an $8-a-month Twitter Blue subscription, “your account will get a blue checkmark, just like the celebrities, companies, and politicians you already follow.” It appears, though, that the program hasn’t actually kicked in yet. Read more here.
Dorsey weighs in
With news reports saying Twitter had laid off about half its work force, co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey took to the service Saturday to offer words of encouragement and to place blame on himself.
“I own the responsibility for why everyone is in this situation: I grew the company size too quickly. I apologize for that,” Dorsey tweeted. He also called Twitter staffers past and present “resilient” and said, “I am grateful for, and love, everyone who has ever worked on Twitter. I don’t expect that to be mutual in this moment.”
In April, Dorsey expressed his support of Elon Musk taking over the company, but he also said that in principle, he thought no one should own or run Twitter and that it should instead be “a public good.”
Nov. 4: Musk says Twitter has had ‘massive drop’ in revenue
Since Musk’s takeover, several major advertisers, such as Tesla rival General Motors, food company General Mills and pharmaceutical corporation Pfizer, have temporarily paused their ad campaigns on Twitter. Musk tweeted that Twitter has had a “massive drop” in revenue, which he blamed on activist groups pressuring advertisers. Musk didn’t say in his tweet how much Twitter’s revenue has fallen, nor did he identify the activists. In the tweet, Musk also said Twitter hasn’t changed its content moderation policies.
Musk also made an appearance at the Baron Investment Conference, where he noted that Twitter grappled with revenue challenges before the acquisition and that he tried to get out of the deal.
His remarks came after Twitter started laying off employees. Late Friday, Musk tweeted that there was “no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day.” Without specifying how many people were laid off or what percentage of the workforce, Musk added they were “offered 3 months of severance.” Reportedly, about half of Twitter’s 7,500-person work force was laid off.
Civil rights groups that met with Musk earlier this week spoke out about the layoffs.
“For starters, there’s no way to keep election integrity in place if you are cutting capacity to do the monitoring in #TwitterLayoffs,” tweeted Rashad Robinson, president of racial justice group Color of Change. The group is part of #StopToxicTwitter, a coalition of more than 60 organizations that are urging major advertisers to pause spending and invest in content moderation. Partners listed on the coalition’s website include the Anti-Defamation League, the NAACP, Public Citizen, and the Union of Concerned Scientists.
The Volkswagen Group and others reportedly paused ad spending because of concerns that ads could appear alongside problematic content on the platform.
Nov. 3: Musk looks for ways to cut costs, lawsuit filed
Musk wants to cut costs and make Twitter less dependent on advertising.
Reuters, citing two sources familiar with the matter and an internal Slack message, reported that Musk directed Twitter’s team to find more than $1 billion in infrastructure cost savings.
The company is looking at other ways to make money outside of advertising, including “paywalled” videos and paid direct messages, The New York Times reported, citing two people with knowledge of the matter and internal documents.
Musk is already making changes to Twitter’s work culture. Bloomberg reported that Musk has removed “days of rest” from Twitter’s employee calendars and plans to cancel the company’s remote work policy. Twitter didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Twitter reportedly told employees in an email that layoffs would happen. A lawsuit seeking class action status, filed Thursday, accused Twitter of violating the federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act, which requires large companies to give least 60 days of advance notice before mass layoffs, as previously reported by Bloomberg.
Nov. 2: Musk reportedly plans to cut half of Twitter’s workforce
Musk plans to cut about 3,700 jobs at Twitter, or half of the social media company’s workforce, Bloomberg reported. Affected staffers are to be informed of their fate by Friday, sources told the news outlet.
Musk also plans to reverse the company’s existing work-from-anywhere policy, requiring remaining employees to report to an office, the unidentified sources said.
In one scenario for reducing Twitter’s workforce being considered, laid off workers will be offered 60 days’ worth of severance pay. Twitter users have been bracing for layoffs since Musk announced his bid for Twitter in April. One report indicated that Musk planned to cut 75% of jobs at Twitter.
Nov. 1: Musk suggests charging for verification
In a series of tweets, Musk floated the idea that Twitter charge $8 per month for a verified blue check mark as part of its subscription plan. The company’s subscription service, known as Twitter Blue, currently costs $5 per month but doesn’t include verification as a perk.
Twitter currently doesn’t charge to verify accounts with a blue check mark, and the badge is supposed to be given out to accounts that the company determines are “notable, authentic and active.” The blue check mark is meant to help users determine if an account of a celebrity, journalist or other public figure is fake or not.
Musk tweeted that the price would be adjusted by country and that the subscription would include “priority in replies, mentions & search, which is essential to defeat spam/scam,” as well as the “ability to post long video & audio.” He also said users would see “half as many ads.”
Earlier in the day, The Wall Street Journal reported that Twitter Blue subscribers will lose access to ad-free articles from publishers like Vox, the Los Angeles Times and Insider. There have been various reports of different prices for a Twitter Blue subscription, with the company also reportedly having considered increasing the subscription price to $20 a month.
It’s unclear from Musk’s tweets if verified users would have to pay for a subscription or lose their blue check mark. Musk tweeted there would be “a secondary tag” for public figures, like the one now used for politicians.
The company’s chief customer officer, Sarah Personette, also revealed in a tweet that she resigned on Friday.
Hi folks, I wanted to share that I resigned on Friday from Twitter and my work access was officially cut off last night.
— Sarah Personette (@SEP) November 1, 2022
Meanwhile, Twitter said it has removed 1,500 accounts since Saturday for posting hateful content.
Oct. 31: Official CEO, board dissolved, layoff plans, no Trump decision yet, content moderation limited
Days after naming himself “Chief Twit” on his Twitter profile, Musk confirmed he’s the company’s CEO through a securities filing. Other changes to Twitter’s leadership are also underway. A related securities filing shows Twitter’s board of directors was dissolved the day Musk took over and identified Musk as the “sole director” of the company.
He also reportedly plans to lay off 25% of Twitter’s workforce, The Washington Post reported, citing anonymous sources.
Musk, who has previously said he would reverse former US President Donald Trump’s permanent ban from Twitter, is still getting questions about whether he’ll follow through on that. Twitter booted Trump from its platform in 2021 following the deadly US Capitol Hill riot because of concerns that his remarks could incite more violence.
“If I had a dollar for every time someone asked me if Trump is coming back on this platform, Twitter would be minting money!” Musk tweeted.
Twitter also limited some Trust and Safety employee access to internal tools, Bloomberg reported, curbing their ability to moderate content and address misinformation ahead of next week’s US elections. They can apparently still edit or remove posts that could result in real-world harm.
“This is exactly what we (or any company) should be doing in the midst of a corporate transition to reduce opportunities for insider risk. We’re still enforcing our rules at scale,” Yoel Roth, Twitter’s head of safety and integrity, tweeted in response to Bloomberg’s story.
Oct. 30: Musk toys with checkmark changes and Vine revival, tweets misinformation
Musk has been busy suggesting changes to Twitter. He tweeted a poll about whether Twitter should bring back Vine, a short-form video app that Twitter shut down in 2017.
Twitter also reportedly plans to charge $20 per month for its Twitter Blue subscription service, and verified users would lose their blue checkmark if they don’t do so in 90 days, The Verge reported, citing anonymous sources. Platformer’s Casey Newton reported that Twitter is thinking about charging $5 a month to verified users if they want to keep their blue checkmarks.
Musk also tweeted and then deleted a link to an article with a baseless conspiracy theory about last week’s attack on Paul Pelosi, the husband of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in San Francisco. The article came from a website called the Santa Monica Observer. Fact-checking website Media Bias/Fact Check noted the outlet publishes right-wing misinformation.
Oct. 29: Twitter battles a surge in racist slurs
Twitter is trying to combat anonymous accounts that started to tweet racist slurs hours after Musk took over Twitter.
Twitter head of safety and integrity Yoel Roth tweeted that the company has “seen a small number of accounts post a ton of tweets that include slurs and other derogatory terms.” He added that “more than 50,000 tweets repeatedly using a particular slur came from just 300 accounts.”
“Bottom line up front: Twitter’s policies haven’t changed. Hateful conduct has no place here. And we’re taking steps to put a stop to an organized effort to make people think we have,” he tweeted.
Let’s talk for a minute about slurs, hateful conduct, and trolling campaigns.
Bottom line up front: Twitter’s policies haven’t changed. Hateful conduct has no place here. And we’re taking steps to put a stop to an organized effort to make people think we have.
— Yoel Roth (@yoyoel) October 30, 2022
Oct. 28: Twitter to form content moderation council
Advocacy groups have raised concerns that Musk’s control over Twitter would allow more hate speech and misinformation to surface on the platform. Musk has vowed publicly he doesn’t want Twitter to become a “free-for-all hellscape” but has also said that he’s “against censorship that goes far beyond the law.”
Musk said the company would form a content moderation council with “widely diverse viewpoints.” The company won’t make any major content decisions or account reinstatements before the council convenes, he tweeted.
Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints.
No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 28, 2022
A securities filing on Oct. 28 also noted that Twitter’s stock is being delisted on the New York Stock Exchange. Twitter, a publicly traded company, became a private one.
Oct. 27: Musk takes over Twitter, fires executives
Musk became Twitter’s new owner and reportedly fired key executives at the company, including Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal and Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s head of legal policy, trust and safety.
Earlier in the day, Musk tweeted a letter to advertisers. The billionaire, who once tweeted that he hated advertising, now posted that “advertising, when done right, can delight, entertain and inform you.”
Musk met with employees throughout the week, carried a sink into Twitter’s headquarters as a photo op and changed his profile to “Chief Twit” before news broke that the deal had been completed.
As Elon Musk finalized his Twitter deal, Jack Dorsey launched a beta for his new social-media company
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Jack Dorsey’s decentralized social-media platform, Bluesky Social, is now accepting beta users.
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The news coincides with Musk’s takeover of Twitter, which Dorsey founded and ran for several years.
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Dorsey left Twitter in 2021 and named Parag Agrawal, whom Musk quickly fired, as his successor.
Just as Elon Musk was finalizing his purchase of Twitter, Jack Dorsey, the company’s founder and former CEO, announced a beta for a new social-media company.
Dorsey’s blockchain-based Bluesky Social announced last Tuesday that it’s launching soon and is currently enlisting users for beta testing. The initial news drew 30,000 sign-ups within two days, company representatives said. Users can still sign up to join the app to become a beta user before the platform is publicly available.
Bluesky’s website said it’s intended to support “a new foundation for social networking which gives creators independence from platforms, developers the freedom to build, and users a choice in their experience.” According to Gizmodo, one of its Bluesky’s main selling points is that its technology — which it calls “AT Protocol” — will give users control of their algorithms.
Dorsey had said in 2019 that Twitter was funding work into developing “an open and decentralized standard for social media.”
In private text messages between Dorsey and Musk that became public in the course of Musk and Twitter’s months-long legal saga, Dorsey said, “A new platform is needed. It can’t be a company. That’s why I left.” He went on to say Twitter should have an “open-sourced protocol” similar to the encrypted-messaging app Signal, adding that Twitter “can’t have an advertising model.”
Dorsey cofounded Twitter in 2006 and had several years-long stints as CEO, most recently from 2015 to November of 2021, when he stepped down. Parag Agrawal, who was then chief technology officer of the company, replaced him. Shortly after taking over Twitter this week, Musk fired Agrawal, as well as Ned Segal, the chief financial officer; Vijaya Gadde, the legal chief; and Sean Edgett, the general counsel.
Musk reportedly fired them “for cause” to avoid having to pay severance payments and unvested stock awards, a person familiar with the matter told The Information.
Read the original article on Business Insider
Twitter Founder Jack Dorsey Launching Test Of Rival Social Network
The app, Bluesky, is gearing up for a test run just after Musk plunked down $44 billion to buy Twitter. It already has a waiting list of users waiting to try out the app’s beta version.
It’s not yet clear what Blueksky will eventually look like or how it will function, but it has been noted as a rival to Twitter.
Bluesky’s “AT Protocol” is being touted as the critical element of a revolutionary “federated social network” that integrates ideas from the latest “decentralized technologies into a simple, fast, and open network,” according to a company blog. Users will presumably be able to move between several social media platforms using a single browser — Bluesky.
As for being a potential Twitter competitor, Dorsey tweeted earlier this month that it’s a rival to “any company trying to own the underlying fundamentals for social media or the data of the people using it.”
(But some critics believe Bluesky could be part of a stealth collaboration between Dorsey and Musk.)
Twitter customers could be in the market for a new place to land even as Musk has tried to calm concerns about what Twitter might become under his helmsmanship. He told potential advertisers in a message earlier this week that Twitter will not become a completely uncensored “free-for-all hellscape,” as he has indicated in the past. But his latest actions hint that might be exactly what he’s creating.
Musk quickly repeated that he doesn’t support lifetime Twitter bans, no matter how appalling users’ messages and attacks.
And Kanye West, now legally known as Ye, is already back on Twitter after he was bounced for appalling antisemitic screeds. But Musk claims he played no role in the rapper’s return and that his account was restored before he finalized the Twitter purchase.
Several high-profile celebrity users have already announced they’re quitting Twitter now that Musk is in charge.
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Musk seeks documents from Jack Dorsey in fight over Twitter deal
WILMINGTON, Del., Aug 22 (Reuters) – Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk is seeking documents from Twitter Inc(TWTR.N) co-founder Jack Dorsey as the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX pursues his legal fight to walk away from his $44 billion deal for the social media company, according to a court filing.
Dorsey, who resigned as Twitter’s chief executive in November and left the board in May, was asked for documents and communications about Musk’s April agreement to buy the company and about spam accounts on the platform, according to a copy of the subpoena.
Dorsey, who is CEO of payments processing company Block Inc, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Block was co-founded by Dorsey and changed its name last year from Square Inc(SQ.N).
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Musk, the world’s richest person due to his stake in Tesla Inc
, told Twitter in July he was ending the agreement to buy the company for $54.20 per share because he alleged Twitter had violated the deal contract. Twitter and Musk have since sued each other, with Twitter asking a judge on the Delaware Court of Chancery to order Musk to close the deal. A five-day trial is set to start on Oct. 17.
The subpoena sought documents and communications about Twitter’s use of mDAU, a measure of active users on its platform. Musk has alleged the company defrauded him by hiding the number fake accounts in its regulatory filings, which Musk said he used to value the company.
Twitter has denied Musk’s spam allegations.
Musk also wanted documents and communications regarding alternative measures of active users that the company has considered and information about the use of mDAU in executive pay and annual targets.
Twitter declined to comment.
Dorsey had supported Musk’s buyout offer for Twitter as the two men have agreed on the need for more transparency for its algorithm and allowing users more control over the content they see.
Dorsey has also tweeted that he believes Twitter is held back by the advertising model and Musk has said Twitter should rely more on subscription fees and services such as money transfers between users.
Musk and Dorsey held discussions in March about Musk joining the Twitter board before Musk revealed he had acquired a 9.1% stake in Twitter. Musk accepted a board seat but before he began his term, he changed course and offered to buy the company.
Shares of Twitter were down 2.5% at $42.89 in late Monday trade.
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Reporting by Tom Hals in Wilmington, Delaware; additional reporting by Katie Paul in San Francisco; Sheila Dang in Dallas; Editing by David Gregorio
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Western Notes: Wiseman, Lundberg, Dorsey, Brunson, Tampering
July 4th 2022 at 5:28pm CST by Dana Gauruder
Warriors center James Wiseman remains on track to play in the Las Vegas summer league, Anthony Slater of The Athletic tweets. He played 5-on-5 full contact on Sunday for the first time since he had a setback in his right knee rehab late in the regular season. The No. 2 pick of the 2020 draft missed all of last season.
We have more from the Western Conference:
- Gabriel Lundberg is not on the Suns’ summer league roster and he could be on the move, Duane Rankin of the Arizona Republic tweets. Lundberg, who signed a two-way contract with Phoenix in March and appeared in four regular season games, has a possible deal overseas, Rankin hears. Lundberg left CSKA Moscow after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
- Tyler Dorsey had a private workout with the Mavericks on Sunday, Krysten Peek of Yahoo Sports tweets. Dorsey appeared in a combined 104 regular season games for Atlanta and Memphis from 2017-19. He played for Olympiacos (Greece) last season and was its second-leading scorer.
- Will the Knicks be penalized for tampering after securing a commitment from Mavericks free agent guard Jalen Brunson? Fred Katz and Tim Cato of The Athletic tackle that subject, with Katz hearing that there’s an expectation around the league that the Knicks will get charged with tampering, unless they work out a sign-and-trade with Dallas. Katz notes that New York started dumping salary on draft night and continued to do so amid reports prior to the start of free agency that Brunson was going to the Knicks.