Twitter had a humble 338.6 million per thirty days international customers closing yr, in step with the estimates. And whilst politicians, newshounds and celebrities — or even Musk, with greater than 84 million fans — use it as a megaphone, it’s now not essentially the most consequential platform globally.
Musk, a billionaire who leads electric-car corporate Tesla and aerospace corporate SpaceX, has argued he used to be motivated to shop for Twitter out of shock that the corporate had imposed overly competitive content material moderation practices, which he mentioned endangered “loose speech” on a platform that had change into a very powerful to politics and govt.
“Loose speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the virtual the town sq. the place issues essential to the way forward for humanity are debated,” Musk mentioned within the information unencumber pronouncing his acquire.
Twitter declined to remark. Musk didn’t reply to requests for remark.
Nonetheless, the corporate has an elite and devoted target audience. A few of the customers who frequently discuss with Twitter, only a handful of them are liable for the majority of content material showing at the social community.
Essentially the most-active quarter of grownup Twitter customers in america produced just about all the content material by means of all grownup customers within the nation, in step with a 2021 learn about by means of the Pew Analysis Heart. That suggests 75 p.c of grownup Twitter customers in america rarely tweet.
Nearly all of the most-prolific customers discuss with Twitter day by day, and greater than 20 p.c of them say they discuss with the website “too again and again to depend” on a daily basis, in step with Pew.
“The item about Twitter is, it’s if truth be told somewhat a difficult platform,” mentioned Ethan Porter, an assistant professor of media and public affairs at George Washington College. “In different phrases, to in reality take part on Twitter, you wish to have to be a in reality energetic Twitter person, and the quantity of people that have jobs that permit them to be energetic Twitter customers is beautiful small.”
- Barack Obama (132 million fans; 16,463 tweets)
- Justin Bieber (114 million fans; 31,399 tweets)
- Katy Perry (109 million fans; 11,628 tweets)
- Rihanna (106 million fans; 10,627 tweets)
- Cristiano Ronaldo (99 million fans; 3,781 tweets)
- Taylor Swift (90 million fans; 716 tweets)
- Woman Gaga (85 million fans; 9,745 tweets)
- Elon Musk (84 million fans; 17,539 tweets)
- Narendra Modi (78 million fans; 32,603 tweets)
- “The Ellen Display” (78 million fans; 23,822 tweets)
Mavens mentioned Musk isn’t fallacious to focus on Twitter if he desires to have an have an effect on on public discourse. Just about 70 p.c of U.S. Twitter customers say they get information from the social media community, in accordance to Pew. The majority of the ones Twitter information customers say they’ve used the social media community to apply reside occasions, Pew’s file discovered.
Although their tweets succeed in simplest an elite target audience at the social media community, politicians, corporations and activists steadily depend at the platform to set the inside track time table extra widely.
In all probability no public determine has been simpler at dominating the bigger media ecosystem thru Twitter than Donald Trump. A contemporary file by means of the anti-misinformation crew First Draft discovered that the 3 primary cable networks — MSNBC, Fox Information and CNN — confirmed 1,954 of Trump’s tweets making up 32 hours of airtime between Jan. 1, 2020, and Jan. 19, 2021.
In all probability the most important query dealing with Musk as the brand new proprietor of Twitter is what he’s going to do about Trump. The previous president — who used to be some of the adopted customers at the platform — used to be booted following his tweets within the lead-up and aftermath of the Jan. 6, 2021 assault at the U.S. Capitol.
Whilst it’s unclear how Musk may deal with the Trump ban, he mentioned at a TED convention this month he would wish to be “very wary” with everlasting bans, who prefer timeouts.
“Trump had a courting with Twitter the place he used to be in reality just right at the use of the platform to get consideration in his presidential marketing campaign after which throughout the finish of his presidency,” Porter mentioned. “If folks’s perspectives towards Trump have completely shifted, then it’s simple to foresee a post-Musk Twitter the place Trump nonetheless has get right of entry to to get to the website however is solely merely much less impactful.”
However for years, analysts have argued Twitter may just do higher — in particular at earning money.
After activist investor Elliott Control took a stake within the corporate in 2020, Twitter introduced bold targets to spice up its industry, together with expanding person expansion and doubling its annual earnings by means of 2023. To deal with the ones problems, newly put in Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal pledged to transport extra temporarily to unencumber merchandise and to impose new control techniques.
There used to be a just right reason why he sought after to switch direction. Ultimate yr, the Fb core app earned just about $70 billion in promoting earnings — greater than 15 occasions the volume Twitter earned in the similar duration, in step with estimates from Insider Intelligence. Estimates by means of Insider Intelligence are according to knowledge from analysis companies, govt businesses and public corporations, amongst different assets.
Many traders — together with some from Musk’s Tesla — have mentioned they’re excited to look how he may be able to flip the corporate’s monetary efficiency round.
For his section, Musk mentioned on the TED convention this month that his bid for Twitter wasn’t about earning money. The Tesla CEO is hanging up a good portion of his wealth to again the deal.
“My sturdy intuitive sense is that having a public platform this is maximally relied on and widely inclusive is terribly essential to the way forward for civilization. I don’t care in regards to the economics in any respect,” he mentioned.
Rachel Lerman contributed to this file.
