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April 2022 – A shock bid for Twitter from the world’s richest person

Tech-billionaire and Tesla chief Elon Musk made a bid to buy social media platform Twitter for 43.4 billion US dollars in April 2022. Musk held a 9.2 percent stake in the company, making him the largest shareholder, and declared that he would reconsider his position as shareholder if his offer to buy the company was not accepted. Additionally, Musk declined to be on the board of directors when offered a seat.

October 2022 – ‘the bird is freed’

In October 2022, after months of debating spam, fake accounts, and what almost became a lawsuit, Musk finally acquired Twitter for 44 billion US dollars. As a result of the deal, the company was taken off the stock market. “The bird is freed”, tweeted Musk.

He assigned himself the positions of CEO and sole director – firing the current Twitter CEO Agrawal, as well as CFO Ned Segal, and policy chief Vijaya Gadde. Musk, a self-described free speech absolutist, repeated that his plan for Twitter was to prevent echo chambers, defeat bots, and make algorithms freely available, all for the good of humanity. Much to the dismay of Twitter’s 7,500 employees, Musk also stated he planned to make major cuts to the workforce.

Although a triumph for Musk, European regulators were quick to remind the new CEO that his platform would still have to abide by the policies of the Digital Services Act or face large fines.

November 2022 – is it sinking in?

November 2022 saw the beginnings of mass staff layoffs – within days, 50 percent of the workforce had been let go. Additionally, former president Donald Trump had his previously banned Twitter account reinstated, and Musk made big changes to the famous blue checkmark system, previously used to confirm the authenticity of journalists, politicians, and public figures.

Twitter began offering the Twitter Blue Subscription for eight US dollars per month to all users. Very quickly, problems with the new system were apparent, as users created impersonation and parody accounts.

July 2023 – tweet goodbye to Twitter

In July 2023, Musk officially changed Twitter’s name to X. After a somewhat staggered rebranding, X.com was redirected to Twitter.com, and the much-recognized Twitter bird was replaced with a new, minimal ‘X’ logo. As of August 2023, one quarter of X/Twitter users in the United States reported feeling neutral about the new logo, whilst 22 percent said they were confused. As the platform stepped away from the bird-related theme, ‘tweets’ were simply renamed posts. Furthermore, the platform’s subscription service was retitled ‘X Premium’. As well as being able to write longer posts, X Premium users can edit posts, opt to see fewer advertisements, and are prioritized in conversations, amongst other things.

July 5th saw the release of Meta Platform’s new social network Threads. Integrated with Instagram, this new service from Mark Zuckerberg is a text-focused one, and comparisons were immediately made between Threads and X/Twitter.

August 2023 – there may be trouble ahead

In August 2023, X began proceedings to sue the anti-hate organization the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), claiming that the organization improperly gained access to X’s data. This came about after the not-for-profit group stated that X failed to remove posts containing hate speech and harmful content after they were reported. Even though the reported accounts were in violation of X’s policies, the posts remained active on the platform.

Another change made by Musk was the removal of the blocking feature, which had allowed users to restrict accounts of their choosing from seeing and engaging with their content.

September 2023 – the EU doubles down

In September 2023, the EU reaffirmed that X must comply with the new laws set by the Digital Service Act (DSA) constructed to tackle fake news and Russian propaganda, and stressed the point that X was found to have the highest ratio of disinformation of all the large social networks. Overall, Facebook, Google, TikTok, and Microsoft were undertaking the code of practice drawn up by the EU, and even though X opted out of the code of conduct, the platform must abide by the regulations set out or risk being shut down in the region. European commissioner Věra Jourová reported that accounts responsible for disinformation on X had more followers than non-disinformation accounts and had also been created more recently than other accounts.

With regards to changes to the user experience, Musk suggested one way of tackling bots was to put the platform behind a paywall completely, proposing that a fully paid-for service was the solution to fake accounts and spam.

At the end of September, the feature on X that allows users to report misleading information was removed. The ability to report accounts that posted misleading content had been available since 2021 and was recognized by the company as a key tool on the platform, especially around the times of elections. This significant change to X comes at a crucial time for Australia in particular, with only a few weeks left before a referendum on an Indigenous voice in parliament.

March 2024 - X Hiring makes an impact

Fortunately for the platform, X Hiring is off to a strong start. As part of its top-tier Verification for Organizations package, X first launched job listings on business profiles in August last year, and there are now around one million open jobs posted on the service. Job advertisements are available as part of all X Premium packages, and, as of last month, on personal profiles for X Premium subscribers in the United States.

At the end of March 2024, X lost the lawsuit against the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH). It was ruled that it was evident that Musk's X Corp. had filed a lawsuit against the non-profit due to the disapproval of its criticism and the belief that its research would harm X's image and discourage advertisers.

In addition, X is expanding access to its Grok AI chatbot to all Premium subscribers. The launch of Grok in November 2023 marked the arrival of X's answer to ChatGPT, with the system relying on user posts to generate responses.

August to October 2024 – Brazil axes X

On August 30, 2024, Brazil's Supreme Federal Court judge Alexandre de Moraes ordered internet service providers to block access to X’s 21.5 million users in Brazil, the platform's sixth-largest audience, and freeze Starlink's finances after Musk refused to appoint a legal representative in the country. Musk was investigated by the Brazilian Supreme Court after X reinstated accounts that had been suspended under a court order that requested the removal of far-right accounts associated with the 2023 Brazilian Congress attack. The block was lifted on October 8, 2024, after the platform settled 5.2 million U.S. dollars in fines, appointed legal representation in Brazil, and complied with orders to deactivate accounts.

September 2024 – X’s first transparency report

X published its first transparency report since Musk’s takeover in September 2024, covering content moderation reports and actions throughout the first half of the year. At 15 pages, compared to Twitter’s 50 pages for the first half of 2021, the report shows that abuse and harassment content were the most widely reported violations on the platform, followed by hateful content, and violent content, respectively. In total, over five million accounts had been suspended during the examined period, and 10 million posts had been removed or labeled. Additionally, there were a total of 18,737 data requests from governments, with 3,329 of these being requested by the United States government. A further 7,872 data requests were made by the European Union.

November 2024 - 2024 U.S. Presidential Election

Elon Musk was a supporter of Donald Trump in the run-up to the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election and used the platform to show support for Trump, by posting frequently and holding live discussions about the election; one of which included Trump himself. As one of Trump’s most prominent backers, Musk donated more than 119 million U.S. dollars to fund a Super PAC aimed at re-electing Trump. SuperPACs, formally known as ‘independent expenditure-only political action committees,’ can raise unlimited amounts from individuals, corporations, and unions to spend on advertisements for political candidates. Additionally, Musk conducted daily giveaways of one million U.S. dollars to voters in battleground states.

January 2025 – legal challenges

In January 2025, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) voted to sue Musk over allegations of delayed disclosure regarding his purchase of Twitter shares. The lawsuit claims Musk violated laws by not disclosing his stake within the required 10-day period, allowing him to underpay other investors by at least 150 million U.S. dollars for shares they bought during that period. As of March 2025, the proceedings are still ongoing.

March 2025 – valuation estimates and a major outage

X has reportedly regained its 44 billion U.S. dollar valuation, matching the amount Musk paid during the acquisition of Twitter back in 2022. In September 2024, the company’s valuation was said to be less than 10 billion USD. More conservative estimations valued X at closer to 32 billion U.S. dollars. In November 2023, these fluctuations saw X’s value sink to approximately 11.8 billion USD.

On March 10, 2025, X experienced a major outage that affected over 40,000 users worldwide, including major disruptions in the United States, India, the UK, Australia, and Canada. Musk said that X was the target of a large coordinated cyberattack, but there is no evidence to support the claim. During the attack, tweets failed to appear and displayed a ‘something went wrong’ message.