Lisa Wilkinson takes a swipe at Elon Musk after Twitter takeover: The Project
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Lisa Wilkinson has brutally berated Elon Musk after the world’s richest man completed his first week as the new owner of Twitter.
In seven days, Musk, 51, fired about half of Twitter’s 7,500 employees, including top executives, and revealed a plan to sell the blue verification badges for $8US a month.
“I’m still waiting for the bit where Elon Musk is going to improve humanity by owning Twitter, I haven’t seen any sign of that yet,” Wilkinson told the Sunday Project.
Musk made the bold claim when he took over Twitter, adding that he wanted to “create a communal digital city square, where a wide range of beliefs can be discussed in a healthy way.”
Lisa Wilkinson took aim at Twitter’s new owner Elon Musk at The Sunday Project (pictured)
“There is currently a great danger that social media will splinter into far-right and far-left echo chambers that generate hatred and divide society,” Musk said.
He has yet to elaborate on exactly how he plans to solve Twitter’s problems, other than targeting the “bots” he believes are plaguing the platform.
However, he has called himself an “absolutist of free speech,” so any significant crackdown on trolling or hate speech seems unlikely.
About 900,000 Twitter accounts have been closed since Musk took ownership of the company, suggesting that many are unsure where Musk will take the social media giant.
Wilkinson’s The Sunday Project co-host Elfy Scott said she wasn’t sure she’d join those making the exodus.
“I think there are so many positive aspects to Twitter, that’s been proven historically,” she said.
“It’s an incredible place for people to meet and join forces, without Twitter we wouldn’t have seen such a massive mobilization from #metoo or #blacklivesmatter.”
“But I think I kind of agree with that 900,000 right now and I think there are a lot of people in my age group who do that too.”
Twitter Blue also offers subscribers a priority ranking for ‘quality content’ meaning it will increase subscriber visibility in replies, mentions and reach
Wilkinson’s The Sunday Project co-host Elfy Scott (pictured) said she wasn’t sure she’d join those making the exodus
The company has officially kicked off the launch of Twitter Blue, a new subscription-based system proposed by new boss Elon Musk that allows users to pay $7.99 per month for a verified checkmark next to their username, along with features such as fewer ads and longer videos.
An in-app iOS notification Saturday revealed the features that will be available to Twitter Blue subscribers, including seeing half the ads a normal user would see and the ability to upload longer videos of up to 10 minutes.
The service is currently available in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the UK to begin with, but Musk has indicated that it will be available globally soon.
Once we confirm it works well in the first set of countries and we have done the translation work, it will be rolled out globally,” Musk tweeted on Saturday.
Musk (pictured) bought Twitter for Twitter for $44 billion after months of negotiations
It will also provide subscribers with a priority ranking for “quality content,” meaning it will increase subscriber visibility in replies, mentions, and reach.
According to the company, this will “reduce the visibility of scams, spam and bots.”
The $44 billion purchase was completed on October 27.
Within the first week, 3,700 of the 7,500 Twitter employees were emailed — a decision Musk defended by saying he had “no choice” because the company was losing $4 million a day.
He has fired a number of executives, and reports indicate the layoffs have fired targeted teams in the sales, trust and security, marketing, product, engineering and legal departments.
Entire sections of the company have also been cut, including Twitter’s human rights team and its “ethics AI” team.