Elon Musk launches attack against Apple: Has CEO Tim Cook responded?

Elon Musk has launched a virtual Twitter attack on Apple after the technology giant pulled its ads from the social media platform.

The new Twitter CEO has posed about Apple eight times in the last six hours, attacking Apple, and making accusations that the company “hates” free speech and is demanding explanations from Apple for alleged “acts of censorship.”

The richest man in the world used his social network to tweet Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, which has not received a reply. Hilariously, as was pointed out by multiple people in Musk’s mentions was the fact that the tweets said that he was using iPhone.

Twitter flagged this tweet as misleading and provided more context, including a quote from a blog on Apple’s decision.

“Apple is exercising its right to free speech and appears to have agreed with its ad agency recommending a halt to advertising on Twitter,” reads the quote. Omnicom Media Group, the PR agency used by Apple, has made the same recommendation for all their clients.

Apple has pulled ads from Twitter and made other threats

According to Musk, the company founded by Steve Jobs “has stopped almost all advertising on Twitter” and has “threatened to withhold Twitter form its App Store,” but would not reveal why it would make such a decision.

Musk continues his attacks on Apple

Then, Musk went on to attack the thirty percent charge that Apple applies to app developers than make more than $1 million in revenue a year. The Twitter CEO described the charge as a “tax on everything [people] buy in their App Store.” However, this “tax” is on companies, not consumers, since the funds are taken from social media companies, not added on as an additional fee. Now that Twitter expects to increase revenue through in-app purchases for Twitter Blue, seeing a thirty percent decrease in the total sent to his platform may have him worried.

Similarly to Musk’s claim about Apple pulling their ads because they hate free speech, community moderators say that this statement is also misleading since the fact that the thirty percent is taken is not a secret. “This is not a secret. Apple takes a 30% fee from all sales made through their In App Purchase system, which accounts for processing. It’s not a tax.”

He also polled his followers to see whether they believed Apple “should publish all the censorship actions it has taken that affect its customers.” With 1.3 million votes, eighty-four percent of respondents said that tech-giant should release such information.

Unlike other polls that have influenced high-level decisions at Twitter, like reinstating Donald Trump, this poll will have no effect. Apple is a private company, just like Twitter, and is under no obligation to do Musk any favors. If Twitter were to be pulled from the App Store, it could be a death blow to the platform, and rushing to insult the company may not be a great long-term strategy.

After he ended his tirade, Musk began to retweet messages from other large accounts, including Lex Friedman, who said, “Twitter should support free speech.”

Apple has not made any public comments about the one-sided feud. Ironically, Musk is attacking Cook’s company for censorship when he has also placed clear limits on what users can post on Twitter.