Twitter has suffered a “massive drop in revenue” because of advertisers pausing advertising on the social media platform, Elon Musk, the new owner of the company, said Friday.
In a tweet, Musk cast blame on “activist groups pressuring advertisers.” He said Twitter hasn’t changed its content moderation strategy, and added that the company has done “everything we could to appease the activists.”
Musk reiterated that notion in an interview at the Baron Investment Conference on Friday.
“We’ve made no change in our operations at all,” Musk said on stage during the event. “And we’ve done our absolute best to appease them and nothing is working. So this is a major concern. And I think this is frankly an attack on the First Amendment.”
In recent days, a handful of brands have announced they plan to pause their advertising spending on Twitter after it was acquired by Musk for $44 billion. General Motors, General Mills, Audi and ad giant IPG are among the companies that have paused Twitter spending in the wake of Musk’s takeover.
Twitter informed employees Thursday evening, days after the SpaceX and Tesla CEO took control of the company, that it would begin laying off staff members, according to communications obtained by NBC News. Twitter’s content moderation team is expected to be among those impacted by the job cuts, Reuters reported, citing tweets by employees.
