X CEO: “There is no replacement for X”

“how cool is that?” Social media platform A few hours earlier, competitor Mark Zuckerberg had announced that he would launch a “community notes” system based on the model of.

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Yaccarino sees this as an affirmation of owner Elon Musk and the course he has taken at X. Community Notes is the best way to fact-check statements in an unbiased manner. “There’s no greater appreciation than that Mark and Meta understood this,” says the ex-boss, speaking with journalist Katherine Herridge on stage at the Venice Convention Center in Las Vegas. “Welcome to the club, Mark.”

“X has no replacement”

Meanwhile, X is performing well, claims Yaccarino, who joined the company in the summer of 2023. “There is growth everywhere we look,” the ex-boss said. “90 percent of advertisers have come back to X. There is no replacement for X. Since the acquisition, we have brought about 250 new products to the platform.” Musk took over short messaging service Twitter in late 2022 after some ups and downs.

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While Yaccarino likely has advertisers in mind, the platform is showing a slight decline in users, at least on this side of the Atlantic. In the EU, X must regularly report the average number of active users. Last summer, the company reported about 106 million active users in the EU, compared to about 111 million a year earlier. The sale of X is no longer public as the company is no longer listed on the stock exchange.

Still, Yaccarino and Musk look to the future with confidence. Young users of Generation Z in particular are engaged on the platform. Gen-Z cares about “fashion, culture, sports”. X has built a successful sports portal around the American football league NFL, with the aim of creating a blueprint for other sports around the world. “You’ll see more portals to other games around the world,” Yaccarino promises.

Yaccarino sidesteps the question of whether there will be a comparable portal for news. “X is a canvas for independent journalists,” says CEO. “The future of journalism is not in traditional media.” They will only perform “fan service” for their respective audiences. But Yaccarino revealed that the company has recruited former Wall Street Journal columnist and editor John Stoll to its news department.

Is Musk influencing the elections?

Yaccarino rejected European criticism that Musk is meddling in domestic political affairs and influencing elections with his statements on X. The manager insisted, “I don’t think it should have any bearing on the election.” “Leaders around the world speak their minds all the time. I don’t think it should be a problem.” On the contrary: “We encourage all business leaders to do the same, to share their opinions more, not less.”

Yaccarino is promising something new for the New Year: digital payments platform XMoney is coming. There was speculation about such ambitions since last year. “XMoney will forever change the way we get paid and what creators can do on the platform,” Yaccarino said at CES. “And of course we’ll be talking about Grok in 2025.”

Heise Median is the Official Media Partner of CES 2025.

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