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    Elon Musk’s X Sues Advertisers Over Alleged “Illegal Boycott” After Twitter Takeover

    By SHOOTNo Comments361 Views
    Elon Musk arrives before a joint meeting of Congress at the Capitol in Washington, July 24, 2024. (AP Photo/Julia Nikhinson, File)
    WICHITA FALLS, Tex. (AP) --
    Elon Musk’s social media platform X has sued a group of advertisers, alleging that a “massive advertiser boycott” deprived the company of billions of dollars in revenue and violated antitrust laws.
    The company formerly known as Twitter filed the lawsuit Tuesday in a federal court in Texas against the World Federation of Advertisers and member companies Unilever, Mars, CVS Health and Orsted.
    It accused the advertising group’s brand safety initiative, called the Global Alliance for Responsible Media, of helping to coordinate a pause in advertising after Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion in late 2022 and overhauled its staff and policies.
    Musk posted about the lawsuit on X on Tuesday, saying “now it is war” after two years of being nice and “getting nothing but empty words.”
    X CEO Linda Yaccarino said in a video announcement that the lawsuit stemmed in part from evidence uncovered by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee which she said showed a “group of companies organized a systematic illegal boycott” against X.
    The Republican-led committee had a hearing last month looking at whether current laws are “sufficient to deter anticompetitive collusion in online advertising.”
    The lawsuit’s allegations center on the early days of Musk’s Twitter takeover and not a more recent dispute with advertisers that came a year later.
    In November 2023, about a year after Musk bought the company, a number of advertisers began fleeing X over concerns about their ads showing up next to pro-Nazi content and hate speech on the site in general, with Musk inflaming tensions with his own posts endorsing an antisemitic conspiracy theory.
    Musk later said those fleeing advertisers were engaging in “blackmail” and, using a profanity, essentially told them to go away.
    The Belgium-based World Federation of Advertisers and representatives for CVS, Orsted, Mars and Unilever didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment Tuesday.
    A top Unilever executive testified at last month’s congressional hearing, defending the British consumer goods company’s practice of choosing to put ads on platforms that won’t harm its brand.
    “Unilever, and Unilever alone, controls our advertising spending,” said prepared written remarks by Herrish Patel, president of Unilever USA. “No platform has a right to our advertising dollar.”
    Category:News
    Tags:Elon MuskGlobal Alliance for Responsible MediaUnileverWorld Federation of AdvertisersX



    Michael Gracey Delves Into The Evolution of “Better Man”

    Friday, December 20, 2024

    Michael Gracey’s feature directorial debut--The Greatest Showman, released in 2017--garnered assorted honors, including a Golden Globe nomination for Best Motion Picture, Musical or Comedy, followed shortly thereafter by an Oscar nod for Best Original Song (“This is Me”). During the making of that film, Gracey got a chance to connect with a real-life showman, British pop superstar Robbie Williams, who lent some musical support and morale boosting to its star, Hugh Jackman.

    Gracey and Williams developed a rapport with one another on The Greatest Showman and kept in touch. They swapped life experiences and Gracey, who clearly knows a worthwhile story when he hears it, became intrigued by Williams--and how entertaining his tales were. Gracey found it remarkable that despite drug and alcohol abuse, Williams vividly remembered so many details of his life.

    Given that Williams had a recording studio at his home, Gracey implored him to commit those memories to audio. With that, a routine was born. Whenever Gracey visited Los Angeles, he’d come to Williams’ home where they’d kibitz in the studio and Williams would talk into the microphone, recollecting different aspects and stages of his life. While the original intent was just to get Williams to share and preserve his story, Gracey began chronologically rearranging these audio clips collected over a year and a half, patching together an a spoken mosaic of William’s life. It was during that process that Gracey realized he had the framework for an engaging narrative film.

    That narrative took a seemingly bizarre turn as Gracey sought a departure from the traditional musical biopic. What struck Gracey was Williams referring to himself repeatedly as “a performing... Read More

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