Is that a sufficiently complex excuse?
Elon Musk revealed Friday that there had been a massive drop in Twitter revenue thanks to advertisers fleeing the company, which he blamed on unnamed “activists” who are “trying to destroy free speech in America.”
“Twitter has had 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,” Musk tweeted out Friday. “Extremely messed up! They’re trying to destroy free speech in America.”
The reality, however, is that advertisers are fleeing because it’s not clear what his actual plan for the website is besides a massive layoff, but what we have seen so far is chaotic and alarming. For example, immediately after buying the website, Musk posted and then deleted an article falsely claiming that Paul Pelosi was attacked by a male sex worker and not a right-wing conspiracy theorist looking for his wife, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. A Reuters report revealed that at least one major ad buyer planned to meet with Musk over that incident. Internal documents shown to Reuters already suggested that advertisers were bearish on the website because of the growth of crypto and gambling content and an “absolute decline” in users who post frequently.
And away we go!
Eideard 
(Bloomberg) Billionaire Elon Musk has unloaded another batch of Tesla Inc. shares to help fund his buyout of Twitter Inc., bringing his sales of the electric-vehicle maker’s stock to about $36 billion in the past year. https://finance.yahoo.com/news/musk-sells-another-batch-tesla-133550551.html
Musk disposed of 19.5 million shares worth $3.95 billion in the latest transactions, according to regulatory filings late Tuesday in New York.
The filings come despite assurances from Tesla’s chief executive officer and single-largest shareholder (AKA self-proclaimed “Twitter Complaint Hotline Operator”) that he was done offloading the stock. Musk claimed in April no further sales were planned, then again in August, saying it was important to avoid an “emergency sale” in case he needed to close the Twitter acquisition and struggled to bring in additional equity partners.
Tesla shares gained less than 1% during pre-market trading in New York on Wednesday. The stock tumbled 46% this year through Tuesday’s close, and has lost $600 billion in market capitalization since peaking last November.
“Tesla cancels solar projects en masse, scales back solar division” (11/10/22) https://electrek.co/2022/11/10/tesla-cancels-solar-projects-scales-back-division/
“Almost nothing has gone according to plan since Elon Musk took control over Twitter last month—and whether there even is a plan seems doubtful. Case in point: Musk’s flagship idea, an $8 paid-verification scheme, kicked off Wednesday night and immediately spiraled into complete disaster.” https://www.vice.com/en/article/n7z5nz/elon-musks-dollar8-twitter-verification-has-begun-is-a-complete-disaster
Elon Musk@elonmusk 9:44 AM · Nov 9, 2022·
Please note that Twitter will do lots of dumb things in coming months.
We will keep what works & change what doesn’t.
“Exodus continues at Twitter as Elon Musk hints at possible bankruptcy
Departures of top figures handling safety, security, privacy and compliance come amid warnings from Federal Trade Commission” https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/nov/10/exodus-twitter-elon-musk-possible-bankruptcy
“Without significant subscription revenue, there is a good chance Twitter will not survive the upcoming economic downturn,” Musk said in the email. “We need roughly half of our revenue to be subscription.”
Twitter drama too much? Mastodon, others emerge as options https://apnews.com/article/elon-musk-twitter-inc-business-6e8bff97bb33d53b87c3d9a7c6a509cf
p/s: if you are leaving Twitter and want to preserve your tweet history, you can download it by going to your profile settings and clicking on “your account” then “download an archive of your data.”
After laying off half its staff earlier this month, Twitter on Saturday started culling its vast ranks of contract staff, sources confirmed to Axios. https://www.axios.com/2022/11/13/elon-musk-twitter-contractor-layoffs
Like many companies, Twitter’s staff is made up of a mix of full-time employees as well as contract workers who work for a third party.
Many contractors’ status has been in limbo since Twitter cut half its staff earlier this month, with some not knowing whom to even report to, since their counterparts inside the company have been laid off.
Now some worry about their final paychecks since their teams no longer have any full-time Twitter employees to sign off on their time cards, sources tell Axios.
In at least some cases, if not all, workers did not get any direct communication from Twitter saying that their work had ended.
They instead found out by seeing their access to Twitter computer systems had been shut off.
This parallels the scene when full-time employees found out they had lost their job, not from a promised e-mail on Friday, but overnight on Thursday as they lost access to e-mail and other corporate computing systems.
Twitter has cut its entire communications staff and there was no immediate response to an e-mail to the company’s press account from Axios.
After a fake $8 blue-check Twitter account impersonating Eli Lilly & Co. that announced “insulin is free now” went viral on Thursday the pharmaceutical giant’s stock dropped 4.37%, erasing over $15 billion in market cap. The company subsequently ordered a stop to all its Twitter ad campaigns and Twitter activity, which by some accounts was worth millions of dollars. https://gizmodo.com/twitter-eli-lilly-elon-musk-insulin-1849779323
As more brands pull out of Twitter, SpaceX buys a big Twitter ad package https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/11/as-more-brands-pull-out-of-twitter-spacex-buys-big-twitter-ad-package/
Elon Musk has delayed the relaunch of his paid subscription service for Twitter after the billionaire’s overhaul of the platform’s verification policies led to an explosion in impostor accounts.
“Punting relaunch of Blue Verified to November 29th to make sure that it is rock solid,” Musk tweeted on Tuesday.
Large companies, including General Motors, Audi, General Mills and United Airlines, have pulled or suspended advertising on Twitter amid concerns about the future of the platform under Musk.
Speaking at a G20 business forum on Monday, Musk said he has had “too much work on my plate” since taking over Twitter and he doubted that most people would want to be him. https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2022/11/16/musk-delays-relaunch-of-twitters-beleaguered-paid-service