Elon Musk, the CEO of Twitter, described his tenure at the social media platform as “quite a rollercoaster,” admitting to having committed “many mistakes” since acquiring the company for $44 billion (approximately Rs. 36,117,399 crores) six months ago.
In a recent live interview with the BBC, Musk acknowledged that one of the missteps involved labeling the broadcaster’s account as “government-funded media.” Following a protest from the broadcaster, he stated that he would modify the designation on the BBC’s Twitter account.
“We aim to ensure the label is as truthful and accurate as possible – we’re changing it to ‘publicly funded,'” Musk confirmed.
The BBC, the UK’s national broadcaster, primarily receives funding through an annual licensing fee set by the government, which is paid by individual households.
This labeling controversy echoes a previous incident with the U.S. radio network NPR, which Twitter briefly categorized as “state-affiliated,” similar to the tagging used for government-operated platforms in China and Russia. NPR subsequently stopped tweeting in protest.
Currently, Twitter designates NPR, boasting nearly 9 million followers, as “government-funded media,” and had applied the same label to the BBC’s account.
Musk has been critical of the media for years. In a notable move, he recently implemented an automatic response featuring a poop emoji to emails sent to the site’s primary media address.
During his conversation with the BBC, Musk also discussed the controversial decision to revoke the New York Times’ blue verified checkmark after the publication declined to pay for its retention. Starting April 20, verified accounts under the previous ownership of Twitter will be required to subscribe to Twitter Blue in order to maintain their verification.
Musk explained that one motivation behind this change is to avoid favoring “an anointed class of journalists” who dictate what constitutes news.
“I’m hopeful that this will allow the public to choose the narrative instead of the media imposing one,” he mentioned.
He emphasized that Twitter would aim to “treat everyone equally.”
Reflecting on his time as the head of the platform, Musk described the past several months as “a stressful situation.” He acknowledged the many errors made during this period, saying, “But all’s well that ends well. I feel like we’re headed to a good place.”
Musk indicated that Twitter is now “roughly breaking even” with the return of advertisers.
When asked about Twitter’s new CEO following his announcement that he would step down in response to a poll on the platform, Musk humorously named his dog, Floki.
