Elon Musk reinstates Kanye West’s Twitter account after ban
Elon Musk has backflipped on his decision to suspend rapper and designer Kanye West’s Twitter account. See what it means.
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X, the social media platform previously known as Twitter, has apparently reinstated rapper and designer Kanye West around eight months after his account was suspended.
Last year, West posted an image that appeared to show a swastika interlaced with a Star of David, and tycoon Elon Musk suspended the artist from the platform, which he had bought weeks earlier.
Musk at the time labelled West’s post as an “incitement to violence.”
X’s press office did not immediately respond to a query about West’s account. By Monday morning, West had yet to post anything new.
West, who now goes professionally as Ye, assured the platform he would not use his account to share antisemitic content or use harmful language, according to the Wall Street Journal.
He would not be able to monetise his account – a function introduced earlier this year by which people can subscribe to certain accounts whose profiles otherwise remain private, the WSJ reported, citing X.
Anti-Semitic remarks by West last year cost him heavily in lost business deals. Adidas cut ties with him after a nearly decade-long partnership, abandoning his Yeezy-branded sneakers.
In May, the German company said the end of its highly successful collaboration with West hit sales by about 400 million euros ($A663 million) in the first quarter of the year.
Gap and Balenciaga also cut ties with the rapper and designer.
Since Musk bought Twitter for $US44 billion ($A66b) last October, he has fired thousands of employees and cut moderation of content.
In December, he reinstated former president Donald Trump’s Twitter account although Trump has yet to return to the platform.
A week ago, Musk and his newly hired chief executive, Linda Yaccarino, announced the rebranding of Twitter as X and said it would become an “everything app” that would allow users to handle all their finances as well as socialising.
Musk also killed off the Twitter logo, replacing the world-recognised blue bird with a white X.
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