That’s why Elon Musk is so obsessed with Tim Cook and Apple
On Monday, in a series of tweets, Musk claims Apple has “largely stopped” its advertising on Twitter. That’s bad news, since Apple’s $48 million in ad spend accounted for more than 4% of Twitter’s revenue in the first quarter of this year Washington Post reported.
“Hate free speech in America,” Musk wrote. In a separate tweet, he asked Apple’s CEO, “what’s going on here @tim_cook?”
Twitter has seen an exodus of advertisers since Musk acquired it last month, and Apple isn’t the only advertiser heading towards the exit. Other big companies like Volkswagen, Pfizer and General Mills have suspended their ad spending. Not to mention that since its acquisition, Twitter has lost half of its top 100 advertisers, according to a Media Matters report. has musk previously accused the “massive drop in sales” from activist groups pressuring advertisers.
But for all of Musk’s hawkish words about Apple pulling back its Twitter ad, a much bigger problem is looming in the relationship between the two companies.
musk tweeted on Monday that Apple “has threatened” to withhold Twitter from its App Store. Apple has not confirmed this, but there has been widespread speculation that such a decision would be linked to Musk’s efforts to eviscerate Twitter’s content moderation team, something that human rights groups have warned could risk the platform engaging in harassment and abuse .
Apple is a key arbiter of content across the web, as it decides which apps are available to iPhone users. A few years ago, Apple reportedly considered kicking Uber off the App Store for violating Apple’s rules. If that happened, it would have effectively destroyed the company — people wouldn’t be able to yell for an Uber on their iPhones.
Twitter’s former head of trust and safety, Yoel Roth, who quit shortly after Musk took over, wrote a comment for the New York Times It outlines what could happen in a post-Musk takeover of Twitter, particularly in regards to Musk’s self-proclaimed devotion to “freedom of speech.” In addition to advertisers and regulators, Roth specifically named Google and Apple as powerful forces that Twitter must contend with in terms of how it handles content moderation.
“Failing to follow Apple and Google’s policies would be disastrous, risking Twitter’s ban from their app stores and making it more difficult for billions of potential users to obtain Twitter’s services,” Roth wrote. “This gives Apple and Google tremendous power to influence the decisions Twitter makes.”
On Tuesday, Musk responded to investor David Sacks, who called Microsoft, Apple, Google and Amazon “gatekeepers.” tweeted that “it’s a real problem”.
“Apple and Google control access to most of the internet through their app stores,” he said.
Twitter did not immediately respond Wealth’s request for comment. Apple didn’t respond immediately Wealth’s request for comment.
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