Platform X strikes back: Musk declares 'war' on advertisers
According to the AP agency, Platform X, formerly known as Twitter, sued a group of advertisers on Tuesday, claiming that "their mass boycott" deprived the company of billions of dollars in revenue. "Now it's war," commented X's owner, billionaire Elon Musk.
8:23 PM EDT, August 7, 2024
The advertisers' actions were said to have occurred after Musk took over the company at the end of 2022.
Platform X filed a lawsuit in federal court in Texas against the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) and companies Unilever, Mars, CVS Health, and Orsted. It accused the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM), an initiative of the WFA, of helping coordinate the exodus of advertisers after Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion at the end of 2022. It also alleged a violation of antitrust laws.
Elon Musk "stopped being nice"
"Now it's war," wrote Elon Musk on Platform X. He added that two years after acquiring the platform, he "stopped being nice," because during this period he "received [from advertisers] only empty words."
Platform X CEO Linda Yaccarino said that the lawsuit is partially based on evidence revealed by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, which she believes showed that "a group of companies organized a systematic illegal boycott" of X.
The Republican-led committee held a hearing in July to analyze whether current legal provisions are sufficient to prevent "collusion among online advertisers."
