The power of this community to bring global conversations to life was the reason I was so excited to join X as CEO in June 2023.
After a career in media and advertising, I thought I had seen everything. Then I read the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee’s report entitled “GARM’s (Global Alliance for Responsible Media) Harm” last month. The report disclosed that their investigation had found evidence of an illegal boycott against many companies, including X.
As their report found: "Evidence obtained by the Committee shows that GARM and its members directly organized boycotts and used other indirect tactics to target disfavored platforms, content creators, and news organizations in an effort to demonetize and, in effect, limit certain choices for consumers."
The consequence - perhaps the intent - of this boycott was to seek to deprive X’s users, be they sports fans, gamers, journalists, activists, parents or political and corporate leaders, of the Global Town Square.
To put it simply, people are hurt when the marketplace of ideas is undermined and some viewpoints are not funded over others as part of an illegal boycott.
This behavior is a stain on a great industry, and cannot be allowed to continue.
That is why, today, X has filed an antitrust lawsuit against the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM), the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), and GARM members CVS Health, Mars, Orsted and Unilever. This is not a decision we took lightly, but it is a direct consequence of their actions.
The illegal behavior of these organizations and their executives cost X billions of dollars.
Since arriving at X, I made it my mission to continue to build a platform where people, brands and advertisers can thrive in our unique, dynamic and safe environment.
And because of this commitment to our users, even despite the boycott, usage has reached all time highs. Using a Twitter legacy metric, user active minutes, in August 2022, people spent 7.2 billion active minutes on the platform. Today, that number is more than 9 billion, a 25% increase.
The same is true for video - even compared to last year, daily video views are up 45% to 8.2 billion. X is innovating and growing.
We have met and surpassed the requests made by advertisers and groups such as GARM for new tools, both to improve advertiser controls and the effectiveness of our products to drive increased value for our customers.
We have proven our platform provides advertisers a way to showcase their brands and reach their target audiences safely, efficiently and effectively. That’s why I’ve worked in good faith with marketers across the globe to showcase our innovations and allay any concerns with brands whom I’ve partnered with for decades. The unfortunate reality is that despite all our efforts, hundreds of meetings and research to the contrary, many companies chose to dismiss the facts.
To those who broke the law, we say enough is enough. We are compelled to seek justice for the harm that has been done by these and potentially additional defendants, depending what the legal process reveals.
It's also clear that there are likely others who suffered at the hands of this activity. This case is about more than damages - we have to fix a broken ecosystem that allows this illegal activity to occur.
We will continue to innovate and ensure X has a vibrant future while the courts will hold accountable those who engaged in illegal behavior.
To all of you who have been part of the transformative journey we are on, thank you. Rest assured, we will not stop defending our global town square.
Linda
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