Lisa Wilkinson slams Elon Musk’s Twitter takeover

Lisa Wilkinson has taken a swipe at Elon Musk as the billionaire’s takeover of Twitter sparks threats to abandon the platform.

3 min read

November 7, 2022 - 8:36AM

Lisa Wilkinson has taken a swipe at Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter.

The Sunday Project panel was discussing the controversial $US44 billion ($A69 billion) deal, which has seen the Tesla and SpaceX mogul sack nearly 50 per cent of staff and enact sweeping changes to the social media site.

Amid fears the gutting of “human rights” and content moderation teams could lead to a rise of misinformation and hate speech, many Twitter users have threatened to leave the platform altogether.

Since Musk took over late last month, nearly 900,000 Twitter accounts have been deactivated.

The Sunday Project co-host Elfy Scott. Picture: Channel 10

Elfy Scott, co-host of The Sunday Project, was asked what was the “benefit, the positive of being on that platform” now Musk had taken over.

“It’s a very good question now,” Scott said.

“I do think that there are so many positive aspects to Twitter and they’ve proved that historically. It is an incredible place for people to meet and join forces, like we wouldn’t have seen such a huge mobilisation of Me Too or Black Lives Matter without Twitter.

“But look, I do think at this point I’m agreeing with the 900,000 people who are leaving their accounts, and I think that there are a lot of people in my age group who are doing it too.”

Co-host Hamish Macdonald asked: “Are you thinking about getting off it?”

“Oh God yes,” Scott said. “Look, if it’s not today, it might be tomorrow. Oh wait, no I have to commit to it on live TV, don’t I? Oh no. I’m still thinking about it.”

Wilkinson then said: “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.”

“Maybe by writing it off, that might be the contribution he makes,” Macdonald said.

Lisa Wilkinson on The Sunday Project. Picture: Channel 10

In a message seeking to calm Twitter’s advertisers last month, Musk said he bought the platform because “it is important to the future of civilisation to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner”.

“That is why I bought Twitter,” he wrote. “I didn’t do it because it would be easy. I didn’t do it to make more money. I did it to try to help humanity, whom I love.”

Those pleas fell on deaf ears, with Musk revealing over the weekend that Twitter had seen a “massive drop in revenue, due to activist groups pressuring advertisers, even though nothing has changed with content moderation and we did everything we could to appease the activists”.

“Extremely messed up!” he wrote. “They’re trying to destroy free speech in America.”

Musk said Twitter was losing more than $US4 million ($A6.2 million) a day, and so had “no choice” but to sack as many as 3700 people on Friday.

Twitter, which generates most of its revenue from advertising, has accelerated plans to boost subscription revenue with its $US7.99-a-month Twitter Blue service – which now includes verification.

New Twitter owner Elon Musk. Picture: Frederic J. Brown/AFP

Musk had sparked outrage from some verified users for demanding they begin paying to keep their coveted blue ticks, slamming the “current lords and peasants system” as “bulls**t”.

“Get Twitter Blue if you sign up now,” read the announcement on Saturday launching the new service.

“Blue checkmark: Power to the people. Your account will get a blue checkmark, just like the celebrities, companies and politicians you follow. Coming soon … Half the ads and much better ones. Since you’re supporting Twitter in the battle against the bots, we’re going to reward you with half the ads and make them twice as relevant.”

Twitter also promised that users will be able to post longer videos and that there will be a “priority ranking for quality content”.

Twitter Blue with verification is available on iOS in the US, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and the UK, according to the company.

Musk added in a tweet: “Trash me all day, but it’ll cost $8.”