Why did Elon Musk’s Twitter account go private? – Business AM
published in in •
5 min read
This first February, the American billionaire announced the transition of his Twitter account to private.
Why is this important?
Since taking over in October 2022, Elon Musk has tried to change Twitter. This caused some controversy as the overhaul of the company’s morale caused a massive wave of layoffs. The billionaire wants to make the social network more transparent. For this, he gave up access to the company’s internal documents. Subsequent revelations are called Twitter Files. Now, it is the algorithm that is causing a new controversy to which Musk will try to respond, again, with transparency.News: After a Tweet from a popular liberal-leaning account accused the bluebird algorithm of favoring tweets from private accounts, Elon Musk tested it on his account to test the truth of this hypothesis. .
To remember: Tweets from private accounts can only be seen by people who follow the account in question and cannot be shared. But, unlike public profiles, the user can accept or decline follow requests.
There are many theories, but no explanation yet
The details : According to The Independenttests by Twitter users showed that tweets got up to five times more views and engagement when accounts were private.
- The American billionaire explained his action: “I switched my account to private to see if my private tweets are seen more than my public tweets,” he said on his social network. Elon Musk’s account has 127 million subscribers, almost a third of the platform according to BFM businessmaking it a good sample for this test.
- This action led to many reactions including theories as to why the algorithm favors private tweets. There is, for example, the American journalist Jim Stinson who believes that this action was taken to “test the theories that the algorithms are designed to suppress open discussions of (mainly) conservative ideas. »
- There’s also Walid Phares, an American political scientist who supports the Republican Party (like Elon Musk), who thinks it’s an “electronic anti-personnel mine” left there by former leaders.
Transparency yes, but not always
The challenge : Elon Musk is once again in an exercise in transparency in an effort to differentiate himself from the old, more obscure leadership.
- After acquiring Twitter for $44 billion, Musk allowed some journalists to gain access to some internal company documents, called the Twitter files.
- The first part of the Twitter Files is about Hunter Biden, the son of the President of the United States of America, Joe Biden. Because the social network censored tweets attacking Hunter in the middle of the electoral campaign, it therefore had an influence on the presidential election.
- The second part has to do with Twitter’s Secret Blacklists “. A blacklist set up to prevent certain accounts or tweets from becoming too visible.
- The third part is devoted to the deletion of the Twitter account of Donald Trump, then President of the United States, after the attacks on Capitol Hill.
- However, despite the desire for transparency, the American billionaire suspended the accounts of several journalists who criticized the CEO of the blue bird.
