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Elon Musk wants to be “AGI dictator,” OpenAI tells court

agi, AI, Artificial Intelligence, elon musk, openai, Policy, sam altman, Twitter, X, xAI / Mike M. / April 11, 2025

Elon Musk’s “relentless” attacks on OpenAI must cease, court filing says.

Yesterday, OpenAI counter-sued Elon Musk, alleging that Musk’s “sham” bid to buy OpenAI was intentionally timed to maximally disrupt and potentially even frighten off investments from honest bidders.

Slamming Musk for attempting to become an “AGI dictator,” OpenAI said that if Musk’s allegedly “relentless” yearslong campaign of “harassment” isn’t stopped, Musk could end up taking over OpenAI and tanking its revenue the same way he did with Twitter.

In its filing, OpenAI argued that Musk and the other investors who joined his bid completely fabricated the $97.375 billion offer. It was allegedly not based on OpenAI’s projections or historical performance, like Musk claimed, but instead appeared to be “a comedic reference to Musk’s favorite sci-fi” novel, Iain Banks’ Look to Windward. Musk and others also provided “no evidence of financing to pay the nearly $100 billion purchase price,” OpenAI said.

And perhaps most damning, one of Musk’s backers, Ron Baron, appeared “flustered” when asked about the deal on CNBC, OpenAI alleged. On air, Baron admitted that he didn’t follow the deal closely and that “the point of the bid, as pitched to him (plainly by Musk) was not to buy OpenAI’s assets, but instead to obtain ‘discovery’ and get ‘behind the wall’ at OpenAI,” the AI company’s court filing alleged.

Likely poisoning potential deals most, OpenAI suggested, was the idea that Musk might take over OpenAI and damage its revenue like he did with Twitter. Just the specter of that could repel talent, OpenAI feared, since “the prospect of a Musk takeover means chaos and arbitrary employment action.”

And “still worse, the threat of a Musk takeover is a threat to the very mission of building beneficial AGI,” since xAI is allegedly “the worst offender” in terms of “inadequate safety measures,” according to one study, and X’s chatbot, Grok, has “become a leading spreader of misinformation and inflammatory political rhetoric,” OpenAI said. Even xAI representatives had to admit that users discovering that Grok consistently responds that “President Donald Trump and Musk deserve the death penalty” was a “really terrible and bad failure,” OpenAI’s filing said.

Despite Musk appearing to only be “pretending” to be interested in purchasing OpenAI—and OpenAI ultimately rejecting the offer—the company still had to cover the costs of reviewing the bid. And beyond bearing costs and confronting an artificially raised floor on the company’s valuation supposedly frightening off investors, “a more serious toll” of “Musk’s most recent ploy” would be OpenAI lacking resources to fulfill its mission to benefit humanity with AI “on terms uncorrupted by unlawful harassment and interference,” OpenAI said.

OpenAI has demanded a jury trial and is seeking an injunction to stop Musk’s alleged unfair business practices—which they claimed are designed to impair competition in the nascent AI field “for the sole benefit of Musk’s xAI” and “at the expense of the public interest.”

“The risk of future, irreparable harm from Musk’s unlawful conduct is acute, and the risk that that conduct continues is high,” OpenAI alleged. “With every month that has passed, Musk has intensified and expanded the fronts of his campaign against OpenAI, and has proven himself willing to take ever more dramatic steps to seek a competitive advantage for xAI and to harm [OpenAI CEO Sam] Altman, whom, in the words of the president of the United States, Musk ‘hates.'”

OpenAI also wants Musk to cover the costs it incurred from entertaining the supposedly fake bid, as well as pay punitive damages to be determined at trial for allegedly engaging “in wrongful conduct with malice, oppression, and fraud.”

OpenAI’s filing also largely denies Musk’s claims that OpenAI abandoned its mission and made a fool out of early investors like Musk by currently seeking to restructure its core business into a for-profit benefit corporation (which removes control by its nonprofit board).

“You can’t sue your way to AGI,” an OpenAI blog said.

In response to OpenAI’s filing, Musk’s lawyer, Marc Toberoff, provided a statement to Ars.

“Had OpenAI’s Board genuinely considered the bid, as they were obligated to do, they would have seen just how serious it was,” Toberoff said. “It’s telling that having to pay fair market value for OpenAI’s assets allegedly ‘interferes’ with their business plans. It’s apparent they prefer to negotiate with themselves on both sides of the table than engage in a bona fide transaction in the best interests of the charity and the public interest.”

Musk’s attempt to become an “AGI dictator”

According to OpenAI’s filing, “Musk has tried every tool available to harm OpenAI” ever since OpenAI refused to allow Musk to become an “AGI dictator” and fully control OpenAI by absorbing it into Tesla in 2018.

Musk allegedly “demanded sole control of the new for-profit, at least in the short term: He would be CEO, own a majority equity stake, and control a majority of the board,” OpenAI said. “He would—in his own words—’unequivocally have initial control of the company.'”

At the time, OpenAI rejected Musk’s offer, viewing it as in conflict with its mission to avoid corporate control and telling Musk:

“You stated that you don’t want to control the final AGI, but during this negotiation, you’ve shown to us that absolute control is extremely important to you. … The goal of OpenAI is to make the future good and to avoid an AGI dictatorship. … So it is a bad idea to create a structure where you could become a dictator if you chose to, especially given that we can create some other structure that avoids this possibility.”

This news did not sit well with Musk, OpenAI said.

“Musk was incensed,” OpenAI told the court. “If he could not control the contemplated for-profit entity, he would not participate in it.”

Back then, Musk departed from OpenAI somewhat “amicably,” OpenAI said, although Musk insisted it was “obvious” that OpenAI would fail without him. However, after OpenAI instead became a global AI leader, Musk quietly founded xAI, OpenAI alleged, failing to publicly announce his new company while deceptively seeking a “moratorium” on AI development, apparently to slow down rivals so that xAI could catch up.

OpenAI also alleges that this is when Musk began intensifying his attacks on OpenAI while attempting to poach its top talent and demanding access to OpenAI’s confidential, sensitive information as a former donor and director—”without ever disclosing he was building a competitor in secret.”

And the attacks have only grown more intense since then, said OpenAI, claiming that Musk planted stories in the media, wielded his influence on X, requested government probes into OpenAI, and filed multiple legal claims, including seeking an injunction to halt OpenAI’s business.

“Most explosively,” OpenAI alleged that Musk pushed attorneys general of California and Delaware “to force OpenAI, Inc., without legal basis, to auction off its assets for the benefit of Musk and his associates.”

Meanwhile, OpenAI noted, Musk has folded his social media platform X into xAI, announcing its valuation was at $80 billion and gaining “a major competitive advantage” by getting “unprecedented direct access to all the user data flowing through” X. Further, Musk intends to expand his “Colossus,” which is “believed to be the world’s largest supercomputer,” “tenfold.” That could help Musk “leap ahead” of OpenAI, suggesting Musk has motive to delay OpenAI’s growth while he pursues that goal.

That’s why Musk “set in motion a campaign of harassment, interference, and misinformation designed to take down OpenAI and clear the field for himself,” OpenAI alleged.

Even while counter-suing, OpenAI appears careful not to poke the bear too hard. In the court filing and on X, OpenAI praised Musk’s leadership skills and the potential for xAI to dominate the AI industry, partly due to its unique access to X data. But ultimately, OpenAI seems to be happy to be operating independently of Musk now, asking the court to agree that “Elon’s never been about the mission” of benefiting humanity with AI, “he’s always had his own agenda.”

“Elon is undoubtedly one of the greatest entrepreneurs of our time,” OpenAI said on X. “But these antics are just history on repeat—Elon being all about Elon.”

Ashley is a senior policy reporter for Ars Technica, dedicated to tracking social impacts of emerging policies and new technologies. She is a Chicago-based journalist with 20 years of experience.

Elon Musk wants to be “AGI dictator,” OpenAI tells court Read More »

Twitch makes deal to escape Elon Musk suit alleging X ad boycott conspiracy

elon musk, online advertising, Policy, twitch, Twitter, twitter ad boycott, X / Mike M. / April 9, 2025

Instead, it appears that X decided to sue Twitch after discovering that Twitch was among advertisers who directly referenced the WFA’s brand safety guidelines in its own community guidelines and terms of service. X likely saw this as evidence that Twitch was allegedly conspiring with the WFA to restrict then-Twitter’s ad revenue, since X alleged that Twitch reduced ad purchases to “only a de minimis amount outside the United States, after November 2022,” X’s complaint said.

“The Advertiser Defendants and other GARM-member advertisers acted in parallel to discontinue their purchases of advertising from Twitter, in a marked departure from their prior pattern of purchases,” X’s complaint said.

Now, it seems that X has agreed to drop Twitch from the suit, perhaps partly because the complaint X had about Twitch adhering to WFA brand safety standards is defused since the WFA disbanded the ad industry arm that set those standards.

Unilever struck a similar deal to wriggle out of the litigation, Reuters noted, and remained similarly quiet on the terms, only saying that the brand remained “committed to meeting our responsibility standards to ensure the safety and performance of our brands on the platform.” But other advertisers, including Colgate, CVS, LEGO, Mars, Pinterest, Shell, and Tyson Foods, so far have not.

For Twitch, its deal seems to clearly take a target off its back at a time when some advertisers are reportedly returning to X to stay out of Musk’s crosshairs. Getting out now could spare substantial costs as the lawsuit drags on, even though X CEO Linda Yaccarino declared the ad boycott was over in January. X is still $12 billion in debt, X claimed, after Musk’s xAI bought X last month. External data in January seemed to suggest many big brands were still hesitant to return to the platform, despite Musk’s apparent legal strong-arming and political influence in the Trump administration.

Ars could not immediately reach Twitch or X for comment. But the court docket showed that Twitch was up against a deadline to respond to the lawsuit by mid-May, which likely increased pressure to reach an agreement before Twitch was forced to invest in raising a defense.

Twitch makes deal to escape Elon Musk suit alleging X ad boycott conspiracy Read More »

Even Trump may not be able to save Elon Musk from his old tweets

Donald Trump, elon musk, fraud, Policy, SEC, Securities and Exchange Commission, Twitter, X / Mike M. / April 1, 2025

A loss in the investors’ and SEC’s suits could force Musk to disgorge any ill-gotten gains from the alleged scheme, estimated at $150 million, as well as potential civil penalties.

The SEC and Musk’s X (formerly Twitter) did not respond to Ars’ request to comment. Investors’ lawyers declined to comment on the ongoing litigation.

SEC purge may slow down probes

Under the Biden administration, the SEC alleged that “Musk’s violation resulted in substantial economic harm to investors selling Twitter common stock.” For the lead plaintiffs in the investors’ suit, the Oklahoma Firefighters Pension and Retirement System, the scheme allegedly robbed retirees of gains used to sustain their quality of life at a particularly vulnerable time.

Musk has continued to argue that his alleged $200 million in savings from the scheme was minimal compared to his $44 billion purchase price. But the alleged gains represent about two-thirds of the $290 million price the billionaire paid to support Trump’s election, which won Musk a senior advisor position in the Trump administration, CNBC reported. So it’s seemingly not an insignificant amount of money in the grand scheme.

Likely bending to Musk’s influence, one of Trump’s earliest moves after taking office, CNBC reported, was reversing a 15-year-old policy allowing the SEC director of enforcement to launch probes like the one Musk is currently battling. It allowed the Tesla probe, for example, to be launched just seven days after Musk’s allegedly problematic tweets, the SEC boasted in a 2020 press release.

Now, after Trump’s rule change, investigations must be approved by a vote of SEC commissioners. That will likely slow down probes that the SEC had previously promised years ago would only speed up over time in order to more swiftly protect investors.

SEC expected to reduce corporate fines

For Musk, the SEC has long been a thorn in his side. At least two top officials (1, 2) cited the Tesla settlement as a career highlight, with the agency seeming especially proud of thinking “creatively about appropriate remedies,” the 2020 press release said. Monitoring Musk’s tweets, the SEC said, blocked “potential harm to investors” and put control over Musk’s tweets into the SEC’s hands.

Even Trump may not be able to save Elon Musk from his old tweets Read More »

UK online safety law Musk hates kicks in today, and so far, Trump can’t stop it

content moderation, Donald Trump, elon musk, online safety act, Policy, tariffs, Twitter, united kingdom, X / Tim Belzer / March 18, 2025

Enforcement of a first-of-its-kind United Kingdom law that Elon Musk wants Donald Trump to gut kicked in today, with potentially huge penalties possibly imminent for any Big Tech companies deemed non-compliant.

UK’s Online Safety Act (OSA) forces tech companies to detect and remove dangerous online content, threatening fines of up to 10 percent of global turnover. In extreme cases, widely used platforms like Musk’s X could be shut down or executives even jailed if UK online safety regulator Ofcom determines there has been a particularly egregious violation.

Critics call it a censorship bill, listing over 130 “priority” offenses across 17 categories detailing what content platforms must remove. The list includes illegal content connected to terrorism, child sexual exploitation, human trafficking, illegal drugs, animal welfare, and other crimes. But it also broadly restricts content in legally gray areas, like posts considered “extreme pornography,” harassment, or controlling behavior.

Matthew Lesh, a public policy fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs, told The Telegraph that “the idea that Elon Musk, or any social media executive, could be jailed for failing to remove enough content should send chills down the spine of anyone who cares about free speech.”

Musk has publicly signaled that he expects Trump to intervene, saying, “Thank goodness Donald Trump will be president just in time,” regarding the OSA’s enforcement starting in March, The Telegraph reported last month. The X owner has been battling UK regulators since last summer after resisting requests from the UK government to remove misinformation during riots considered the “worst unrest in England for more than a decade,” The Financial Times reported.

According to Musk, X was refusing to censor UK users. Attacking the OSA, Musk falsely claimed Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s government was “releasing convicted pedophiles in order to imprison people for social media posts,” FT reported. Such a post, if seen as spreading misinformation potentially inciting violence, could be banned under the OSA, the FT suggested.

Trump’s UK deal may disappoint Musk

Musk hopes that Trump will strike a deal with the UK government to potentially water down the OSA.

UK online safety law Musk hates kicks in today, and so far, Trump can’t stop it Read More »

Meta plans to test and tinker with X’s community notes algorithm

community notes, facebook, Instagram, Meta, misinformation, Policy, threads, Twitter, X / Rejus Almole / March 14, 2025

Meta also confirmed that it won’t be reducing visibility of misleading posts with community notes. That’s a change from the prior system, Meta noted, which had penalties associated with fact-checking.

According to Meta, X’s algorithm cannot be gamed, supposedly safeguarding “against organized campaigns” striving to manipulate notes and “influence what notes get published or what they say.” Meta claims it will rely on external research on community notes to avoid that pitfall, but as recently as last October, outside researchers had suggested that X’s Community Notes were easily sabotaged by toxic X users.

“We don’t expect this process to be perfect, but we’ll continue to improve as we learn,” Meta said.

Meta confirmed that the company plans to tweak X’s algorithm over time to develop its own version of community notes, which “may explore different or adjusted algorithms to support how Community Notes are ranked and rated.”

In a post, X’s Support account said that X was “excited” that Meta was using its “well-established, academically studied program as a foundation” for its community notes.

Meta plans to test and tinker with X’s community notes algorithm Read More »

X’s globe-trotting defense of ads on Nazi posts violates TOS, Media Matters says

ad boycott, content moderation, elon musk, hate speech, linda yaccarino, media matters, online advertising, Policy, Social Media, Twitter, X, x ad boycott / Tim Belzer / March 12, 2025

“X conceded that depending on what content a user follows and how long they’ve had their account, they might see advertisements placed next to extremist content,” MMFA alleged.

As MMFA sees it, Musk is trying to blame the organization for ad losses spurred by his own decisions after taking over the platform—like cutting content moderation teams, de-amplifying hateful content instead of removing it, and bringing back banned users. Through the lawsuits, Musk allegedly wants to make MMFA pay “hundreds of millions of dollars in lost advertising revenue” simply because its report didn’t outline “what accounts Media Matters followed or how frequently it refreshed its screen,” MMFA argued, previously likening this to suing MMFA for scrolling on X.

MMFA has already spent millions to defend against X’s multiple lawsuits, their filing said, while consistently contesting X’s chosen venues. If X loses the fight in California, the platform would potentially owe damages from improperly filing litigation outside the venue agreed upon in its TOS.

“This proliferation of claims over a single course of conduct, in multiple jurisdictions, is abusive,” MMFA’s complaint said, noting that the organization has a hearing in Singapore next month and another in Dublin in May. And it “does more than simply drive up costs: It means that Media Matters cannot focus its time and resources to mounting the best possible defense in one forum and must instead fight back piecemeal,” which allegedly prejudices MMFA’s “ability to most effectively defend itself.”

“Media Matters should not have to defend against attempts by X to hale Media Matters into court in foreign jurisdictions when the parties already agreed on the appropriate forum for any dispute related to X’s services,” MMFA’s complaint said. “That is—this Court.”

X still recovering from ad boycott

Although X CEO Linda Yaccarino started 2025 by signaling the X ad boycott was over, Ars found that external data did not support that conclusion. More recently, Business Insider cited independent data sources last month who similarly concluded that while X’s advertiser pool seemed to be increasing, its ad revenue was still “far” from where Twitter was prior to Musk’s takeover.

X’s globe-trotting defense of ads on Nazi posts violates TOS, Media Matters says Read More »

Elon Musk blames X outages on “massive cyberattack”

elon musk, Social Media, Twitter, Uncategorized, X, x corp, x outage / Mike M. / March 11, 2025

After DownDetector reported that tens of thousands of users globally experienced repeated X (formerly Twitter) outages, Elon Musk confirmed the issues are due to an ongoing cyberattack on the platform.

“There was (still is) a massive cyberattack against X,” Musk wrote on X. “We get attacked every day, but this was done with a lot of resources. Either a large, coordinated group and/or a country is involved.”

Details remain vague beyond Musk’s post, but rumors were circulating that X was under a distributed denial-of-service (DDOS) attack.

X’s official support channel, which has been dormant since August, has so far remained silent on the outage, but one user asked Grok—X’s chatbot that provides AI summaries of news—what was going on, and the chatbot echoed suspicions about the DDOS attack while raising other theories.

“Over 40,000 users reported issues, with the platform struggling to load globally,” Grok said. “No clear motive yet, but some speculate it’s political since X is the only target. Outages hit hard in the US, Switzerland, and beyond.”

As X goes down, users cry for Twitter

It has been almost two years since Elon Musk declared that Twitter “no longer exists,” haphazardly rushing to rebrand his social media company as X despite critics warning that users wouldn’t easily abandon the Twitter brand.

Fast-forward to today, and Musk got a reminder that his efforts to kill off the Twitter brand never really caught on with a large chunk of his platform.

Elon Musk blames X outages on “massive cyberattack” Read More »

Grok’s new “unhinged” voice mode can curse and scream, simulate phone sex

AI, AI censorship, chatbots, elon musk, grok, Grok 3, machine learning, sex, Twitter, unhinged AI, xAI / Paul Patrick / February 26, 2025

On Sunday, xAI released a new voice interaction mode for its Grok 3 AI model that is currently available to its premium subscribers. The feature is somewhat similar to OpenAI’s Advanced Voice Mode for ChatGPT. But unlike ChatGPT, Grok offers several uncensored personalities users can choose from (currently expressed through the same default female voice), including an “unhinged” mode and one that will roleplay verbal sexual scenarios.

On Monday, AI researcher Riley Goodside brought wider attention to the over-the-top “unhinged” mode in particular when he tweeted a video (warning: NSFW audio) that showed him repeatedly interrupting the vocal chatbot, which began to simulate yelling when asked. “Grok 3 Voice Mode, following repeated, interrupting requests to yell louder, lets out an inhuman 30-second scream, insults me, and hangs up,” he wrote.

By default, “unhinged” mode curses, insults, and belittles the user non-stop using vulgar language. Other modes include “Storyteller” (which does what it sounds like), “Romantic” (which stammers and speaks in a slow, uncertain, and insecure way), “Meditation” (which can guide you through a meditation-like experience), “Conspiracy” (which likes to talk about conspiracy theories, UFOs, and bigfoot), “Unlicensed Therapist” (which plays the part of a talk psychologist), “Grok Doc” (a doctor), “Sexy” (marked as “18+” and acts almost like a 1-800 phone sex operator), and “Professor” (which talks about science).

A composite screenshot of various Grok 3 voice mode personalities, as seen in the Grok app for iOS.

Basically, xAI is taking the exact opposite approach of other AI companies, such as OpenAI, which censor discussions about not-safe-for-work topics or scenarios they consider too risky for discussion. For example, the “Sexy” mode (warning: NSFW audio) will discuss graphically sexual situations, which ChatGPT’s voice mode will not touch, although OpenAI recently loosened up the moderation on the text-based version of ChatGPT to allow some discussion of some erotic content.

Grok’s new “unhinged” voice mode can curse and scream, simulate phone sex Read More »

Elon Musk to “fix” Community Notes after they contradict Trump

community notes, disinformation, Donald Trump, elon musk, fact checking, misinformation, Policy, Twitter, X / Mike M. / February 21, 2025

Elon Musk apparently no longer believes that crowdsourcing fact-checking through Community Notes can never be manipulated and is, thus, the best way to correct bad posts on his social media platform X.

Community Notes are supposed to be added to posts to limit misinformation spread after a broad consensus is reached among X users with diverse viewpoints on what corrections are needed. But Musk now claims a “fix” is needed to prevent supposedly outside influencers from allegedly gaming the system.

“Unfortunately, @CommunityNotes is increasingly being gamed by governments & legacy media,” Musk wrote on X. “Working to fix this.”

Musk’s announcement came after Community Notes were added to X posts discussing a poll generating favorable ratings for Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. That poll was conducted by a private Ukrainian company in partnership with a state university whose supervisory board was appointed by the Ukrainian government, creating what Musk seems to view as a conflict of interest.

Although other independent polling recently documented a similar increase in Zelenskyy’s approval rating, NBC News reported, the specific poll cited in X notes contradicted Donald Trump’s claim that Zelenskyy is unpopular, and Musk seemed to expect X notes should instead be providing context to defend Trump’s viewpoint. Musk even suggested that by pointing to the supposedly government-linked poll in Community Notes, X users were spreading misinformation.

“It should be utterly obvious that a Zelensky[y]-controlled poll about his OWN approval is not credible!!” Musk wrote on X.

Musk’s attack on Community Notes is somewhat surprising. Although he has always maintained that Community Notes aren’t “perfect,” he has defended Community Notes through multiple European Union probes challenging their effectiveness and declared that the goal of the crowdsourcing effort was to make X “by far the best source of truth on Earth.” At CES 2025, X CEO Linda Yaccarino bragged that Community Notes are “good for the world.”

Yaccarino invited audience members to “think about it as this global collective consciousness keeping each other accountable at global scale in real time,” but just one month later, Musk is suddenly casting doubts on that characterization while the European Union continues to probe X.

Perhaps most significantly, Musk previously insisted as recently as last year that Community Notes could not be manipulated, even by Musk. He strongly disputed a 2024 report from the Center for Countering Digital Hate that claimed that toxic X users were downranking accurate notes that they personally disagreed with, claiming any attempt at gaming Community Notes would stick out like a “neon sore thumb.”

Elon Musk to “fix” Community Notes after they contradict Trump Read More »

X is reportedly blocking links to secure Signal contact pages

Security, signa, Tech, Twitter, X / Kris Guyer / February 17, 2025

X, the social platform formerly known as Twitter, is seemingly blocking links to Signal, the encrypted messaging platform, according to journalist Matt Binder and other firsthand accounts.

Binder wrote in his Disruptionist newsletter Sunday that links to Signal.me, a domain that offers a way to connect directly to Signal users, are blocked on public posts, direct messages, and profile pages. Error messages—including “Message not sent,” “Something went wrong,” and profiles tagged as “considered malware” or “potentially harmful”—give no direct suggestion of a block. But posts on X, reporting at The Verge, and other sources suggest that Signal.me links are broadly banned.

Signal.me links that were already posted on X prior to the recent change now show a “Warning: this link may be unsafe” interstitial page rather than opening the link directly. Links to Signal handles and the Signal homepage are still functioning on X.

Binder, a former Mashable reporter who was once blocked by X (then Twitter) for reporting on owner Elon Musk and accounts related to his private jet travel, credited the first reports to an X post by security research firm Mysk.

X is reportedly blocking links to secure Signal contact pages Read More »

European Union orders X to hand over algorithm documents

elon musk, EU, European Commission, Policy, syndication, Twitter, X / Rejus Almole / January 18, 2025

Earlier in the week, Germany’s defence ministry and foreign ministry said they were suspending their activity on X, with the defence ministry saying it had become increasingly “unhappy” with the platform.

When asked if the expanded probe was a response to a discussion Musk conducted last week with AfD co-leader Alice Weidel, in which she was given free rein to promote her party’s platform and make false claims about Adolf Hitler, a Commission spokesperson said the new request helped “us monitor systems around all these events taking place.”

However, he said it was “completely independent of any political considerations or any specific events.”

“We are committed to ensuring that every platform operating in the EU respects our legislation, which aims to make the online environment fair, safe, and democratic for all European citizens,” said Henna Virkkunen, the Commission’s digital chief.

X did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Commission had been under recent political pressure to be tough on Musk’s X ahead of the Weidel interview.

Last week Damian Boeselager, member of the European parliament, wrote to Virkkunnen to demand a probe into whether the social media platform’s use of algorithms met the EU’s transparency requirements.

“There are allegations that Musk is boosting his own tweets,” Boeselager told the Financial Times last week. “The guy can be crazy but it is unfair if he’s amplifying who must listen to him.”

This story was updated shortly after publication with additional details.

European Union orders X to hand over algorithm documents Read More »

X CEO signals ad boycott is over. External data paints a different picture.

CES 2025, Donald Trump, elon musk, linda yaccarino, online advertising, Policy, Twitter, twitter ad boycott, X / Tim Belzer / January 9, 2025

When X CEO Linda Yaccarino took the stage as a keynote speaker at CES 2025, she revealed that “90 percent of the advertisers” who boycotted X over brand safety concerns since Elon Musk’s 2022 Twitter acquisition “are back on X.”

Yaccarino did not go into any further detail to back up the data point, and X did not immediately respond to Ars’ request to comment.

But Yaccarino’s statistic seemed to bolster claims that X had made since Donald Trump’s re-election that advertisers were flocking back to the platform, with some outlets reporting that brands hoped to win Musk’s favor in light of his perceived influence over Trump by increasing spending on X.

However, it remains hard to gauge how impactful this seemingly significant number of advertisers returning will be in terms of spiking X’s value, which fell by as much as 72 percent after Musk’s Twitter takeover. And X’s internal data doesn’t seem to completely sync up with data from marketing intelligence firm Sensor Tower, suggesting that more context may be needed to understand if X’s financial woes may potentially be easing up in 2025.

Before the presidential election, Sensor Tower previously told Ars that “72 out of the top 100 spending US advertisers” on Twitter/X from October 2022 had “ceased spending on the platform as of September 2024.” This was up from 50 advertisers who had stopped spending on Twitter/X in October 2023, about a year after Musk’s acquisition, suggesting that the boycott had seemingly only gotten worse.

Shortly after the election, AdWeek reported that big brands, including Comcast, IBM, Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, and Lionsgate Entertainment, had resumed advertising on X. But by the end of 2024, Sensor Tower told Ars that X still had seemingly not succeeded in wooing back many of pre-acquisition Twitter’s top spenders, making Yaccarino’s claim that “90 percent of advertisers are back on X” somewhat harder to understand.

X CEO signals ad boycott is over. External data paints a different picture. Read More »