Elon Musk’s latest effort to woo broadcasters and podcasts to post their content direct to Twitter has been met with an emphatic rejection.
Mr Musk appealed to the makers of the popular Fall of Civilizations show on Twitter on Sunday, asking them to “please upload your podcasts to this platform too”.
The podcast’s Twitter account issued a polite but firm no, saying that the social media platform had become a “safe haven for hate speech” under the Tesla CEO’s ownership.
“Hi Elon, at present the platform is too compromised for me to consider it,” the Paul Cooper-hosted podcast wrote back.
“It’s become a safe haven for hate speech, and meanwhile crypto scammers and bots are paying to be boosted to the top of replies. Everything that once made Twitter special seems to be leaching away.”
Tech entrepreneur William LeGate mocked the exchange, tweeting: “Elon asked his favorite podcast to upload their episodes to Twitter… this was their response,” along with several crying emojis.
Mr Musk tweeted a link to a Fall of Civilization episode last August, but it’s unclear whether it is in fact his favourite podcast.
Hi Elon, at present the platform is too compromised for me to consider it. It's become a safe haven for hate speech, and meanwhile crypto scammers and bots are paying to be boosted to the top of replies. Everything that once made Twitter special seems to be leaching away.
— Fall of Civilizations Podcast (@Fall_of_Civ_Pod) June 11, 2023
The multi-billionaire has repeatedly warned of his fears that artificial intelligence, declining birth rates or a “single world government” could lead to the collapse of civilisation.
Since acquiring Twitter for $44bn last October, Mr Musk has fired most content moderators and allowed neo-Nazis and white nationalists back onto the platform while regularly promoting accounts that spread anti-LGBTQ+ hate speech.
With advertisers fleeing from the platform, and US ad sales down by 59 per cent, Mr Musk has tried to push a subscription-based business model.
He has said he is trying to reinvent Twitter as a “digital town square for all” where cable news hosts and podcasters can publish their content free from corporate oversight or censorship.
Since his firing from Fox News in April, former primetime anchor host Tucker Carlson has launched a new show on the platform.
Fox is engaged in a bitter contract dispute with Carlson over the show, sending him a cease-and-desist letter last week.
Mr Musk last week urged other broadcasters to follow Carlson’s lead.
“It’d be great to have @maddow, @donlemon & others on the left put their shows on this platform,” he wrote last Thursday while retweeting Carlson’s show.
“You will receive our full support. The digital town square is for all,” Mr Musk added.
It’s not the first time Mr Musk has publicly clashed with the creators of history podcasts.
Last July, Mr Musk wrote that he “highly recommend Revolutions by Mike Duncan, especially Season 10”.
The feeling was not mutual however. In January, Mr Duncan wrote in a since-deleted tweet: “Longtime Revolutions listener Elon Musk is a living personification of The Great Idiot Theory of History.”
