Twitter CEO Elon Musk seeks comparisons with iPhone maker Apple on his social media. In a long series of tweets, he accuses Apple of everything, including the installation of censorship. “Does Apple Hate Free Speech in America?” he wonders.
Musk makes this assumption because Apple would no longer advertise on Twitter, a decision that countless other major companies have also made since Musk ran it and installed an “anything goes, anything goes” approach. Musk also claims that Apple is “threatening to kick Twitter out of the App Store without telling us why.” This may have to do with the rise of Twitter dredging, such as racism and hate speech. Apple has previously removed apps from the app store that violated Apple’s rules on moderation and harmful content.
Notable: Last weekend, Phil Schiller, an Apple executive who oversees the app store, deleted his much-followed Twitter account.
But Musk’s biggest problem appears to be the 30 percent Apple subtracts from in-app purchases. Musk, who wants to make Twitter profitable with all kinds of payment options, isn’t willing to pay what he calls the “secret tax.” Others, like Spotify and Fortnite maker Epic, have already clashed with Apple over this.
