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The Twitter Files are over.
At least, that’s what Elon Musk expressed following his falling out with the project’s head writer Matt Taibbi.
“At a certain point, I think we need to move on from the Twitter Files,” Musk said(Opens in a new tab) in a Twitter Space audio chat earlier this week. “I think there’s a few things left. General, there’s not a lot that I’m aware of that’s left.”
“It’s mostly just like, you know, let’s move on to the future,” said Musk.
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Remember, the Twitter Files were promoted by Musk and his supporters as a big deal. Matt Taibbi, Bari Weiss, and a few other writers hand-picked by Musk began publishing reports based on internal Twitter documents and access provided to them by Musk. These documents supposedly showed Twitter’s bias against conservatives as well as interference by the U.S. government to censor certain posts and users.
In reality, the released information showed former Twitter employees engaging in fairly even-handed, basic content moderation found on almost any social media platform. Nevertheless, Musk’s curated narrative broke through with conservatives and Musk fans. There were even Congressional hearings held based on the Twitter Files where former employees shared just how much was missing from Musk’s chosen documents.
Still though, Congressional hearings were held! Multiple Twitter Files were published. Conservative media ran with these stories again and again. These Twitter Files were a big deal according to Musk and his supporters.
And yet, Musk is now just saying it’s time to move on after saying there would be more Twitter Files. Musk even teased that he’d be releasing(Opens in a new tab) a supposed “Fauci Files” regarding Twitter and the pandemic back in January, going after former White House chief medical advisor Dr. Anthony Fauci. These “Fauci Files” have never been released. Neither have the Twitter Files regarding Musk-run Twitter, which Musk said he would also release for the sake of transparency.
That’s quite an uneventful ending for what many Musk supporters framed as huge, important revelations.
Where did Musk say this?
Much has been said about Elon Musk’s interview(Opens in a new tab) earlier this week with the BBC by now. It’s been covered by multiple outlets in great detail.
BBC reporter James Clayton was granted a last-minute interview with Musk late Tuesday night where the two discussed Musk’s Twitter acquisition and subsequent layoffs, misinformation, and hate speech on the website. The interview, which was filmed for BBC and streamed live on Twitter Spaces, was unfortunately not very good. Musk sidestepped questions, turning them back around against the BBC and its reporter seemed unprepared to respond to such pushback.
But, there was one very interesting nugget of information that came towards the end of the Twitter Spaces discussion. And judging by the lack of coverage, it seems like most people missed it.
After BBC ended its portion of the interview, Musk brought on some of his favorite fans, consisting of right-wing influencers and cryptocurrency accounts. One of them, Malaysia-based right-wing influencer Ian Miles Cheong, asked Musk about the future of the Twitter Files after saying he received numerous messages asking him to inquire.
Just days earlier, Musk’s relationship with Twitter Files’ lead writer Taibbi came to an end over Musk’s feud with Substack. Unhappy that Substack launched a Twitter-like feature called Substack Notes, Musk had Twitter block interactions on tweets that included Substack links. Being that Taibbi publishes the vast majority of his writing on his Substack, the two had a disagreement over the issue which led to Musk unfollowing Taibbi and Taibbi leaving Twitter.
In a statement(Opens in a new tab), Taibbi confirmed that these events would affect his Twitter Files work, as ostensibly Musk will no longer provide Taibbi with further documents or access. Since then, Taibbi has moved(Opens in a new tab) to other platforms such as Donald Trump’s Truth Social and has been working to move the Twitter Files threads he had already published on Twitter to his new homes.
So, there might be a few Twitter Files reports left to be published from before Musk’s feud with Taibbi. But, listening to Musk in that Twitter Space, he didn’t seem too excited about them. And again, according to Musk, it’s time to “move on” from the Twitter Files anyway.
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