Featured Image Credit: Chesnot/ Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto/Getty Images
Topics: Elon Musk, Twitter, Technology, Social Media
Gerrard Kaonga
Topics: Elon Musk, Twitter, Technology, Social Media
Elon Musk has announced major changes to X after it was reported that the company lost a staggering $25 billion this year.
The owner of the social media giant, formerly known asTwitter, is looking at changing the algorithm in a bid to help smaller accounts.
Posting on X on 10 November, Elon Musk explained his intention and welcomed ‘critical feedback’ from users.
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“A major update to the recommendation algorithm is rolling out over the next few days,” he wrote.
“This will help surface smaller accounts and posts outside of your friend-follows network.
“As always, this will be made open source and undergo continuous improvement.”
Seemingly unbothered by the difficult financial year the company has reportedly had, on the same day, Musk praised X for the total visits and page views it had received.
“Total visits on 𝕏.com last month: 6.1 Billion (up 5% from September),” X user DogeDesigner posted.
“Total page views on 𝕏.com last month: 62 Billion (up 7.6% from September)
“Meanwhile traditional media is reporting that 𝕏 is losing traffic.”
Musk shared the post and added: “Turns out that if a product is compelling, people use it lol.”
Musk bought the social media company for $44 billion in October 2022 and the company has since lost an estimated $25 billion in value since its acquisition, according to a report by Fortune.
In late October of this year, Musk rolled out a new employee equity compensation plan, which allowed staff to have shares in the company.
It was during this process that it was revealed X is now worth around $19 billion, according to the Fortune report.
Since taking over the company Musk has not been a stranger to making some changes, though many of his decisions have proven to be controversial.
Most notably, removing the blue checkmark for verified accounts and allowing anyone to buy the honor for $8 per month.
However, on the upcoming algorithm change, some X users praised the billionaire for the decision.
“On behalf of all of us small accounts, thank you,” one user wrote.
Another added: “Good move. I think some of the biggest criticisms I hear is that smaller accounts don’t get discovered as easily as the larger accounts do. This should help I hope.”
Someone else said: “Thank you for consistently addressing issues, here.
“Running this account on X has been an absolute blast - and largely because of the replies from smaller accounts.”
Time will tell if Musk’s latest decision works well in practice as well as theory, however.