Twitter CEO Elon Musk, in a surprise interview with the BBC on Wednesday, talked about the challenges he faced after taking over the microblogging platform in a hostile $44-billion bid in October last year. The billionaire entrepreneur spoke about how tough the mass layoffs have been at the company, sleeping at the office, the latest BBC-Twitter label row, who the real CEO of the firm is, if he would sell Twitter for the same amount he acquired it with. This marked Musk’s first major interview with the media ever since taking over Twitter.
The BBC said that Musk agreed “unexpectedly” to an interview at Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters. This was a bit surprising, especially since Musk’s Twitter has recently set an auto-response of the ‘poop’ emoji to emails from media organisations. The BBC, particularly, has been embroiled in a sort-of war with Twitter, as the platform labelled the organisation as “government funded media.”
While BBC had publicly rejected the tag and asked Twitter to remove it, Musk clarified that he had “a lot of respect for the BBC” and added the interview was intended “to get some feedback on what we should be doing different.”
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Commenting on the BBC-Twitter row, Musk said, “We want it as truthful and accurate as possible — we’re adjusting the label to [the BBC being] publicly funded — we’ll try to be accurate.”
Musk On Mass Layoffs At Twitter
Musk said that his time at Twitter has “been quite a rollercoaster.” Speaking on technical performance, he said that there have been some glitches as well as some outages on the site, but clarified that none of them have lasted too long and that the platform is doing “reasonably well.”
Musk added that before he took over, Twitter was “spending money like it’s going out of fashion.” The company’s “$4.5 billion in revenue, $4.5 billion in cost” situation had led to a negative cash flow situation, Musk claimed, adding that it was being run “like a non-profit.”
He added that since that there was a $3 billion negative cash flow situation, Twitter had “four months to live.” Hence, Musk decided to take the drastic reaction of laying off employees. He said the company was roughly “breaking even” now, without providing further details.
Musk added that the company had “just under 8,000” employees earlier, and now is left with 1,500 workers. Commenting on the layoff process, the CEO claimed that the whole experience was “not fun at all” and can at times be “painful”.
During the mass layoffs last year, several stories surfaced about how some employees were sleeping in the office to avoid being fired and to get work done. Musk revealed that he, too, sleeps in the office “sometimes,” adding that his chosen spot is a couch in the office library, where “no one goes to.”
Musk On Twitter Misinformation
Twitter has been under the scanner on how the site is being used by many to spread misinformation. “Who’s to say what’s right and wrong?” asks Musk as he says that no one can give a solid example of increasing hateful content on Twitter. “I’m asking for a single example and you can’t name one,” Musk tells the BBC correspondent.
When asked about why Twitter brought changes to its Covid misinformation labels, Musk simply said, “Covid is no longer an issue.”
Musk On Returning Advertisers, The ‘Real’ Twitter CEO
Owing to Twitter’s new business policies, several advertisers including the likes of General Motors and Volkswagen have left the platform last year. However, Musk — without naming anyone — said that brands are returning to Twitter with ads, and more will return soon.
Musk in December last year had said that he’d give up the seat of CEO if he found someone “foolish enough to take to take the job.” During the latest interview, Musk said that he is “no longer the CEO of Twitter,” before adding as a joke that his pet dog Floki is the new CEO.
Musk On Selling Twitter
When asked if Musk would consider selling Twitter for $44 billion right now, he simply rejected the idea. But then he clarified that he would go on to sell the company if he did find a buyer as committed to the truth as he was, he might just consider.
He added that he even considered paying less during his takeover when he discovered that the platform was infested with automated bots.
Musk On AI Regulation
When asked about the sudden boom of artificial intelligence (AI), Musk said that AI has always been around, but what was needed was an “easy interface” as OpenAI’s ChatGPT has provided. He also called for a regulatory body “to make sure it doesn’t present a dange to the public.”