Tag Archives: social media

From the Justice Department: Daniela Rendon, 31, of Miami made her appearance in federal magistrate court today and was charged with fraudulently obtaining COVID-19 relief loans and grants under the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) and the Economic Injury Disaster Relief Program. According to the indictment, Rendon submitted fraudulent applications seeking COVID-19 relief funds from the Small Business Administration and PPP. …

The New York Times reports: Over 120,000 views of a video showing a boy being sexually assaulted. A recommendation engine suggesting that a user follow content related to exploited children. Users continually posting abusive material, delays in taking it down when it is detected and friction with organizations that police it. All since Elon Musk declared that “removing child exploitation …

Variety reports: Elon Musk’s Twitter needs cash — and now the mega-billionaire wants companies and brands to fork over $1,000 monthly to get verified check-marks on his social network. Twitter is asking organizations to pay $1,000 per month, plus an additional $50 monthly for each affiliated sub-account, to maintain the gold check-mark verification badges the company introduced in December, replacing …

The New York Times reports: Between posts about conspiracy theories and right-wing grievances was an unusual advertisement: a photo of former President Donald J. Trump holding a $1,000 bill made of gold, which he was apparently offering free to supporters. But there were a few catches: The bill was not free, it was not made of gold, and it was …

Reuters reports: Advertising spend on Twitter Inc dropped by 71% in December, data from an advertising research firm showed, as top advertisers slashed their spending on the social-media platform after Elon Musk’s takeover. The recent data by Standard Media Index comes (SMI) as Twitter is moving to reverse the advertiser exodus. It has introduced a slew of initiatives to win …

Courthouse News reports: Texas and Florida are behind the two laws now before the high court. The laws sprang up after former President Donald Trump’s ban from Twitter and suspension from Facebook. While the sites frame their actions as editorial discretion, lawmakers in the states have likened it to unconstitutional censorship. After considering challenges to the the laws at their …

The Daily Beast reports: Twitter’s revenue on Tuesday was down 40 percent year over year as the company continues its free-fall three months into Elon Musk’s takeover, according to Zoë Schiffer, a reporter for Platformer. Musk may also be staring down the barrel of a massive interest payment on the $13 billion in debt he took on to buy the …

The BBC reports: The Taliban have started using Twitter’s paid-for verification feature, meaning some now have blue ticks on their accounts. Previously, the blue tick indicated “active, notable, and authentic accounts of public interest” verified by Twitter, and could not be purchased. But now, users can buy them through the new Twitter Blue service. At least two Taliban officials and …

Business Insider reports: Elon Musk is closing many international Twitter offices as he continues to cut costs and try to find ways the company can make money. At least a dozen international offices are closed or in the process of closing, according to two people familiar with the company and messages seen by Insider, along with several more in the …

The Verge reports: Parlement Technologies began laying off workers in late November, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter. These layoffs continued through at least the end of December, when around 75 percent of staffers were let go in total, leaving approximately 20 employees left working at both Parler and the parent-company’s cloud services venture. A majority of the …

The Washington Post reports: Records of 235 million Twitter accounts and the email addresses used to register them have been posted to an online hacking forum, setting the stage for anonymous handles to be linked to real-world identities. That poses threats of exposure, arrest or violence against people who used Twitter to criticize governments or powerful individuals, and it could …

Politico reports: Twitter plans to lift its restrictions on political ads, saying it would immediately allow issue-based paid content on the platform while political advertisements will return “in the coming weeks.” The announcement comes as advertisers have fled the platform in droves after Elon Musk’s takeover last October, which was followed by a spike in hate speech and the reinstatement …

Politico reports: Elon Musk calls his next idea the “X App.” And if Musk-owned Twitter has already been a challenge for Washington’s politicians and regulators, the disruption caused by the X App could easily dwarf it. The idea is a Western version of WeChat, the Chinese super-app that more than a billion people use for messaging, payments, shopping, rideshares, gaming, …

The Wall Street Journal reports: Twitter Inc. was accused of not paying its rent in a lawsuit filed by the landlord for one of its offices in San Francisco. The landlord, Columbia Reit-650 California LLC, alleges that the social-media company has failed to pay $136,260 of rent due on the office space at 650 California St., according to the lawsuit …

Bloomberg News reports: Elon Musk was the second person ever to amass a personal fortune of more than $200 billion, breaching that threshold in January 2021, months after Jeff Bezos. The Tesla Inc. chief executive officer has now achieved a first of his own: becoming the only person in history to erase $200 billion from their net worth. Musk, 51, has seen …

Axios reports: Fidelity slashed its carrying value of Twitter by 56% during the first month of Elon Musk’s ownership, according to a new disclosure. Fidelity was among the group of outside investors that helped Musk finance his $44 billion takeover of the social media site, by purchasing equity. Fidelity’s Contrafund valued its Twitter shares at $53.47 million on Oct. 31, …

The New York Times reports: Over the past few weeks, Twitter had stopped paying millions of dollars in rent and services, and Mr. Musk had told his subordinates to renegotiate those agreements or simply end them. The company has stopped paying rent at its Seattle office, leading it to face eviction, two people familiar with the matter said. Janitorial and …

Axios reports: Twitter users around the world reported problems accessing the website and other technical glitches on Wednesday night. In the first widespread outage since Elon Musk completed his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter in late October, over 10,000 users in countries including the U.S., the U.K., Canada, Germany, Italy, France, Australia and New Zealand reported outage issues, starting in …

Reuters reports: Tesla Inc Chief Executive Elon Musk told employees that they should not be “bothered by stock market craziness” after the company’s shares fell nearly 70% this year on jitters over softening demand for electric vehicles and Musk’s distraction with running Twitter. In an email sent to staff, Musk said he believes that long term, Tesla will be the …

NBC News reports: Lawmakers and staffers must delete TikTok from any House-issued mobile phones and are prohibited from downloading the popular app on such devices, according to an internal memo obtained by NBC News. The memo, sent Tuesday by Catherine L. Szpindor, the chief administrative officer of the House, said the ban comes after her office’s cybersecurity unit found TikTok …