Elon Musk says Apple has pulled Twitter ads: ‘Do they hate free speech?’
Global News
"Apple has mostly stopped advertising on Twitter. Do they hate free speech in America?," Elon Musk said in a tweet, launching into a series of complaints against the iPhone maker.
Elon Musk said on Monday that Apple Inc has mostly stopped advertising on Twitter, the most high-profile company to pull ads from the social media platform over concerns about content moderation policies under its new owner.
The move aligns the iPhone maker with a rising list of firms from General Mills Inc to luxury automaker Audi of America that have stopped or paused advertising on Twitter since the billionaire’s US$44 billion buyout last month.
“Apple has mostly stopped advertising on Twitter. Do they hate free speech in America?,” Musk said in a tweet. He later tagged Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook’s Twitter account in another tweet, asking “what’s going on here?”
Musk said “yes” in response to a user question on whether Apple was threatening Twitter’s presence in the App Store or making moderation demands.
Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The world’s most valuable firm spent an estimated $131,600 on Twitter ads between Nov. 10 and Nov. 16, down from $220,800 between Oct. 16 and Oct. 22, the week before Musk closed the Twitter deal, according to ad measurement firm Pathmatics.
Musk, a self-described free speech absolutist, had said earlier this month that Twitter had seen a “massive” drop in revenue and blamed activist groups for pressuring advertisers. Ad sales account for about 90 per cent of Twitter’s revenue.