Elon Musk’s first year of owning Twitter – looking back on a tumultuous timeline
Start with the big idea and deal with any issues down the line.
That was the assessment of Elon Musk biographer Michael Vlismas a year ago when asked how the world’s richest man might go about running Twitter.
The SpaceX owner had just bought the bird app for $44bn (£38bn) with a vague goal of transforming it into an “everything app” called X.
Modelled on China‘s WeChat, it could become your one-stop shop for not just getting into arguments online and posting memes, but video calls, podcasts, and even banking.
All while being an internet town square, committed to free speech, where anyone’s views have as much cache as a celebrity, news outlet, or academic – no matter how controversial.
A noble goal, many would argue.
But as Vlismas had indicated, a plan light on detail. And the execution – from huge lay-offs to putting verification behind subscriptions – has been debatable at best.
“He always has a grand vision, but in this instance the details have been a quagmire for him,” says Vlismas.
“Perhaps it’s showing you can’t be everything to everyone – and that’s the challenge with an ‘everything app’.
“It’s got to be a clear vision in terms of what he wants out of it.”
Elon Musk has brought some big changes to the platform formerly known as Twitter
A tumultuous timeline
Musk’s own Twitter timeline was rarely dull, so perhaps it should come as no surprise that once he ruled the roost, Twitter’s own timeline would follow suit.
His first act (other than carrying a sink into the firm’s San Francisco HQ for the sake of a bad pun) was firing executives and thousands of employees quickly suffered the same fate.
Skittish advertisers, concerned about Musk’s stance on content moderation, helped see revenues fall and within a month even the prospect of bankruptcy was being mooted.
Musk’s flagship attempt to drive up company income was to offer verification ticks as a paid-for benefit in a subscription that has expanded to include features like an edit button and longer posts.
A fake Tony Blair, OJ Simpson, and very naughty Super Mario later, it was clear there were flaws in this plan to allow anyone to pay to add the once-respected blue tick to their account.
According to analysis by research group AMPLYFI, which used AI to judge user sentiment on Twitter over time, the furore was “the initial catalyst for things turning sour” for much of the platform’s audience.
“It created chaos,” says Drew Benvie, founder of communications agency Battenhall.
“People don’t know if they’re talking to the real deal.”
Ahead of a year that will include a US presidential election, and with ever-improving AI deepfakes, it’s an issue that could become even more serious.
Many famous faces were initially left without a blue tick when Musk changed the policy
Other changes have included reinstating banned accounts like those of Andrew Tate and Donald Trump, raising further concerns about the proliferation of hate speech on the platform.
The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), a group X has sued over its damning assessments of its content moderation standards, says Musk has welcomed back a host of bad actors “with open arms”.
Speaking to mark the Muskiversary, CCDH founder Imran Ahmed condemned it as a “grave betrayal of users, advertisers and the wider public”.
That, coupled with the gutting of the company’s trust and safety teams, damaged Twitter’s reputation as a place to seek out verified news – an issue brought home by the Israel-Hamas war.
And then, of course, came rebranding Twitter into X.
A name so embedded in modern society that “tweet” had entered the Oxford and Cambridge dictionaries, now one which would have once done nothing but arouse suspicion in your browsing history.
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Twitter sign removed in ‘X’ rebrand
‘He has decimated the business’
Musk said Twitter’s transition from talking shop to everything app meant the name no longer made sense, and has claimed the rebranding reflects his ambitions.
Of course, some may have spotted an obvious trend and concluded he simply likes the letter X.
Not only is it part of the name of his successful rocket company, but one of his children; his AI start-up; and an internet banking firm he co-founded that became PayPal.
Social media expert Beth Caroll, of Wunderman Thompson, is sceptical of Musk’s apparent plans.
“There’s a vague possibility he could have this bigger picture idea, this super app like a WeChat, and if he were to deliver that then he might have a viable product,” she says.
“But for now he has just decimated the business.”
Indeed, earlier this year the company was valued at less than a third of the $44bn Musk paid for it.
Even the hiring of Linda Yaccarino, an experienced figure from NBCUniversal, as chief executive has done little to repair the monetary or reputational damage.
It’s worth remembering, Caroll says, that Musk did try awfully hard to back out of buying Twitter, and all the challenges he’s faced are perhaps a sign of why.
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Musk to start charging people to use X
Can Musk really have it all?
Yet despite it all, for its remaining users – whether enthusiastic or reluctant – X remains best at this particular type of social media, where real-time updates reign supreme.
For Dr Annmarie Hanlon, lecturer in digital and social marketing at Cranfield School of Management, would-be rivals from the “clunky” Mastodon to Meta‘s “basic” Threads have failed to offer a comparable experience.
“The everything app is still a work in progress,” she says.
“But when Threads opened, everyone said ‘this is the death of Twitter’. And it hasn’t been.”
Of course, given the contempt Musk and Mark Zuckerberg have for each other, don’t expect the Meta boss to abandon his company’s new app anytime soon.
Meta’s Threads emerged as a rival to X over the summer
And when it comes to “the death of Twitter”, Musk would happily claim responsibility, with X the phoenix rising from its ashes.
But unlike the rockets of SpaceX (well, most of them), biographer Vlismas doubts how far it can fly.
“With SpaceX, the grand vision is colonising Mars,” he says.
“But the core purpose is launching rockets into space and it’s very effective at that.
“If you wanted to do anything else with it, it dilutes that purpose.
“The longer X is a bit muddled like this, the worse it is. And the more people will turn away.”
US
Financial markets were always going to respond to Trump tariffs but they’re also battling with another problem
Stock markets around the world fell on Thursday after Donald Trump announced sweeping tariffs – with some economists now fearing a recession.
The US president announced tariffs for almost every country – including 10% rates on imports from the UK – on Wednesday evening, sending financial markets reeling.
While the UK’s FTSE 100 closed down 1.55% and the continent’s STOXX Europe 600 index was down 2.67% as of 5.30pm, it was American traders who were hit the most.
Trump tariffs latest: US stock markets tumble
All three of the US’s major markets opened to sharp losses on Thursday morning.
The S&P 500 is set for its worst day of trading since the COVID-19 pandemic. File pic: AP
By 8.30pm UK time (3.30pm EST), The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 3.7%, the S&P 500 opened with a drop of 4.4%, and the Nasdaq composite was down 5.6%.
Compared to their values when Donald Trump was inaugurated, the three markets were down around 5.6%, 8.7% and 14.4%, respectively, according to LSEG.
Worst one-day losses since COVID
As Wall Street trading ended at 9pm in the UK, two indexes had suffered their worst one-day losses since the COVID-19 pandemic.
The S&P 500 fell 4.85%, the Nasdaq dropped 6%, and the Dow Jones fell 4%.
It marks Nasdaq’s biggest daily percentage drop since March 2020 at the start of COVID, and the largest drop for the Dow Jones since June 2020.
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The latest numbers on tariffs
‘Trust in President Trump’
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told CNN earlier in the day that Mr Trump was “doubling down on his proven economic formula from his first term”.
“To anyone on Wall Street this morning, I would say trust in President Trump,” she told the broadcaster, adding: “This is indeed a national emergency… and it’s about time we have a president who actually does something about it.”
Later, the US president told reporters as he left the White House that “I think it’s going very well,” adding: “The markets are going to boom, the stock is going to boom, the country is going to boom.”
He later said on Air Force One that the UK is “happy” with its tariff – the lowest possible levy of 10% – and added he would be open to negotiations if other countries “offer something phenomenal”.
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How is the world reacting to Trump’s tariffs?
Economist warns of ‘spiral of doom’
The turbulence in the markets from Mr Trump’s tariffs “just left everybody in shock”, Garrett Melson, portfolio strategist at Natixis Investment Managers Solutions in Boston, told Reuters.
He added that the economy could go into recession as a result, saying that “a lot of the pain, will probably most acutely be felt in the US and that certainly would weigh on broader global growth as well”.
Meanwhile, chief investment officer at St James’s Place Justin Onuekwusi said that international retaliation is likely, even as “it’s clear countries will think about how to retaliate in a politically astute way”.
He warned: “Significant retaliation could lead to a tariff ‘spiral of doom’ that could be the growth shock that drags us into recession.”
Read more:
Do Trump’s ‘Liberation Day’ tariff numbers add up?
Tariffs about something more than economics: power
It comes as the UK government published a long list of US products that could be subject to reciprocal tariffs – including golf clubs and golf balls.
Running to more than 400 pages, the list is part of a four-week-long consultation with British businesses and suggests whiskey, jeans, livestock, and chemical components.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said on Thursday that the US president had launched a “new era” for global trade and that the UK will respond with “cool and calm heads”.
It also comes as Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney announced a 25% tariff on all American-imported vehicles that are not compliant with the US-Mexico-Canada trade deal.
He added: “The 80-year period when the United States embraced the mantle of global economic leadership, when it forged alliances rooted in trust and mutual respect and championed the free and open exchange of goods and services, is over. This is a tragedy.”
Tanking stock markets, collapsing world orders, devastating trade wars; economists with their hair ablaze are scrambling to keep up.
But as we try to make sense of Donald Trumps’s tariff tsunami, economic theory only goes so far. In the end this surely is about something more primal.
Power.
Understanding that may be crucial to how the world responds.
Yes, economics helps explain the impact. The world’s economy has after all shifted on its axis, the way it’s been run for decades turned on its head.
Instead of driving world trade, America is creating a trade war. We will all feel the impact.
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PM will ‘fight’ for deal with US
Donald Trump says he is settling scores, righting wrongs. America has been raped, looted and pillaged by the world trading system.
But don’t be distracted by the hyperbole – and if you think this is about economics alone, you may be missing the point.
Above all, tariffs give Donald Trump power. They strike fear into allies and enemies, from governments to corporations.
This is a president who runs his presidency like a medieval emperor or mafia don.
It is one reason why since his election we have seen what one statesman called a conga line of sycophants make their way to the White House, from world leaders to titans of industry.
The conga line will grow longer as they now redouble their efforts hoping to special treatment from Trump’s tariffs. Sir Keir Starmer among them.
President Trump’s using similar tactics at home, deploying presidential power to extract concessions and deter dissent in corporate America, academia and the US media. Those who offer favours are spared punishment.
His critics say he seeks a form power for the executive or presidential branch of government that the founding fathers deliberately sought to prevent.
Whether or not that is true, the same playbook of divide and rule through intimidation can now be applied internationally. Thanks to tariffs
Each country will seek exceptions but on Trump’s terms. Those who retaliate may meet escalation.
This is the unforgiving calculus for governments including our own plotting their next moves.
The temptation will be to give Trump whatever he wants to spare their economies, but there is a jeopardy that compounds the longer this goes on.
Read more:
Do Trump’s numbers on tariffs really add up?
Trump hits island home only to penguins with 10% tariffs
Could America’s traditional allies turn to China? Pic: AP
Malcolm Turnbull, the former Australian prime minister who coined the conga line comparison, put it this way: “Pretty much all the international leaders I have seen that have sucked up to Trump have been run over. The reality is if you suck up to bullies, whether it’s global affairs or in the playground, you just get more bullying.”
Trading partners may be able to mitigate the impact of these tariffs through negotiation, but that may only encourage this unorthodox president to demand ever more?
Ultimately the world will need a more reliable superpower than that.
In the hands of such a president, America cannot be counted on.
When it comes to security, stability and prosperity, allies will need to fend for themselves.
And they will need new friends. If Washington can’t be relied on, Beijing beckons.
America First will, more and more, mean America on its own.
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