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- [Narrator] This is "Future Tech,"

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where each week we
discuss the good, the bad,

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and the ugly of where tech
is headed in 2023 and beyond.

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(air whooshing)

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- News outlets are beginning to push back

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against Elon Musk's antics at Twitter.

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Blake Montgomery, deputy
editor at Gizmodo,

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joins us now, and Blake,

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NPR, we learned this week,
is pulling back from Twitter

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over how Elon is deciding to label

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some of these news organizations.

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What more can you tell us?

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- Yeah, so NPR is saying
that Elon Musk questioned

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its editorial independence,

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and NPR is an editorially
independent news organization,

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unlike other media outlets

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that were labeled
state-affiliated media on Twitter.

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That label implies that there is some sort

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of government control and affiliation

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between NPR and the US
government, which there isn't.

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NPR gets about 2% of its funding,

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according to the news organization,

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from the federal government,

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which is along the same
lines as things like

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"The Washington Post"
and "The New York Times,"

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places that we think of as much
more editorially independent

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or at least Elon Musk does.

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- So, Elon Musk was, you know,
receiving a lotta pushback

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from the state-owned or
state-affiliated label

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on some of those news organizations.

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And so he did kinda walk back.

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He was like, "Okay, okay, okay,"

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and then he changed it to,

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I believe it was government-funded.

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- Yeah, there was government-funded,

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and then there was a promise
to call it publicly-funded.

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And NPR is publicly funded.
- Sure.

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- They solicit donations
from people like you and me,

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but we don't get to say,

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"NPR should cover this
story and not this story."

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- Right.
- So public funding

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still can have editorial independence,

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unlike other places that are
labeled state-affiliated,

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like "Russia Today," a lot
of Chinese news outlets,

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which do have heavy government influence

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on their day-to-day editorial operations.

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- Right.
- And we see that bear out.

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- So what's interesting is,

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the BBC was also recently
relabeled by Twitter, right?

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At first, they went with
the state-affiliated label,

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and now it's more of a
government-funded type label.

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So, the BBC, they're not saying,

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"Hey, we're gonna get off Twitter."

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They actually were like, "Elon, um,"

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- "Do you wanna talk to us?"
- "Can we have an-"

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Yeah.
- The other night,

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Elon Musk sat down with a BBC reporter

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in this like sort of surprise interview,

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gave a pretty wide-ranging interview.

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He said he was sleeping
on the couch at Twitter.

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He made a joke that his dog
Floki is the CEO of Twitter.

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He admitted again that like,

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labeling NPR the state-affiliated
media was a mistake

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and kind of walked that back.

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He said he only bought Twitter
because a judge made him.

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He signed a legal agreement to do that,

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so like a judge making him
is having to follow the law

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and that's like, he's clearly trying to,

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I don't know, put some distance

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between the more unsavory
elements of what has happened

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and say like, "Well, I had to do it."

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Well, you signed an agreement.

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- Exactly, but it seems like
he's just all buying Twitter

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just to already have
an established platform

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to make it X or whatever he wants

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- Right.
- His all-in-one platform

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to be that he's-
- Right,

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so he's changed the name

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from Twitter
- Thinking about.

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- On its legal filings from Twitter to X.

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There have been reports

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that he started a generative
AI project within the company.

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Like he's trying to integrate
a lot of different things

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that he's been thinking about
into what one could call

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like a super app, a la WeChat in China,

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an app that you use to do like
a whole range of functions

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and is like wildly profitable,

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becomes basically like infrastructure.

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- You know, what is
interesting, though, is,

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you know, after this
whole BBC and NPR thing,

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the labels being switched
on them on the app,

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when you look at Twitter's,
you know, guidelines

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from before Elon Musk or even recently

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before this whole change,

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they were both listed as
examples of news outlets

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that were editorial independent.

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- It's further evidence that
Elon doesn't really understand

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how Twitter works,
despite being its owner.

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And I would say Twitter needs NPR more so

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than NPR needs Twitter.

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Twitter is this thing that like,

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a lot of journalists use

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and inspires news and makes news.

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There's a lot of like
newsworthy statements happening

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on Twitter, but as for traffic,

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like as for people
clicking on your articles,

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an NPR reporter was
tweeting that NPR's traffic

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is only comprised like
2% of views from Twitter.

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So, losing that is not so,

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you put your emphasis on
like another platform,

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you can remake that like pretty easily.

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- [Leann] And NPR has how many
different Twitter handles?

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- Yeah, so it had the company said

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that it had 52 accounts.

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The main NPR account has
nearly nine million followers.

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It's clearly a big draw
of users to Twitter.

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So it's a big boon for
Twitter for NPR to be there,

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and it's a big loss for them to leave.

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- Yeah, well, you know,

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we'll continue to follow this.

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I mean, we don't need Twitter.

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We'll still be on it, though,
(Blake laughing)

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probably, but for more
information on this story

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and all things Twitter,
all things Elon Musk,

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visit gizmodo.com.

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(light music continues)