Elon Musk takes U-turn on Twitter moderation council

A day after putting on hold the relaunch of Twitter Blue verification indefinitely, Twitter boss Elon Musk blamed a group of political/social activists for the absence of the council. The development comes a month after the new Twitter chief executive officer announced that Twitter will form a moderation council. 

However, taking a U-turn on Tuesday, Musk tweeted, “A large coalition of political/social activist groups agreed not to try to kill Twitter by starving us of advertising revenue if I agreed to this condition. They broke the deal!”

Ever since his hostile takeover of the social media platform, Musk is on a mission to make Twitter the most accurate source of verification. To do so, Musk had announced that no major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.

In a letter to the advertisers, Musk said Twitter “cannot become a free-for-all hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences.” 

Musk has been planning to introduce a new verification system for Twitter accounts. He earlier said parody accounts must include “parody” in their name and not just in their bio. He also said any Twitter handles engaging in impersonation without clearly specifying “parody” will be suspended without any warning. 

Also, the name change of any verified Twitter account will cause a temporary loss of the verified checkmark.

The Twitter Blue Tick subscription was slated to be rolled out in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the UK for $8 every month beginning November. Musk said the subscription cost will be utilised in ramping up the social media platform’s dampening revenue. 

 But Musk put an indefinite hold on its launch saying the pause will be in effect until there is high confidence in stopping impersonation. 

In a tweet, he said, “Holding off the relaunch of Blue Verified until there is high confidence of stopping impersonation. Will probably use different color check for organizations than individuals.” 

These developments come at a time when Twitter is facing mass resignations and mass layoffs. Last week, he told the Twitter staff that going forward the company will be revamped to Twitter 2.0, with a major focus on design and product. 

He said that Twitter 2.0 would require long hours of working at high intensity, while giving an ultimatum to the employees for either going ‘hardcore’ or going home with severance pay. Following this, several disgruntled employees resigned from the company.