Apple Never Considered Removing Twitter From App Store, Says Elon Musk
On Wednesday Elon Musk tweeted that the disagreement over Twitter’s possible removal from the Apple App store was resolved following his meeting with the iPhone maker’s CEO Tim Cook.
“Tim was clear that Apple never considered that,” the Twitter and Tesla CEO said in a tweet.
Thank you @tim_cook for taking me to the beautiful Apple location pic.twitter.com/xjo4g306gR
– Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 30, 2022
On Monday, Musk accused Apple of threatening to block Twitter from its app store without saying why in a series of tweets that also said it had stopped advertising on the social media platform.
He later tagged Cook’s Twitter account in another tweet, asking “what’s going on here?”
The world’s largest company spent an estimated $131,600 (approx. Rs. 1,07,42,900) on Twitter ads between November 10 and November 16, down from $220,800 (approx. Rs. 1,80,23,385) in between October 16 and October 22, a week before Musk closed the Twitter deal, according to ad analytics firm Pathmatics.
In the first quarter of 2022, Apple was the leading advertiser on Twitter, spending $48 million (roughly Rs. 390 crore) and accounting for more than 4 percent of the total revenue for the period, reported the Washington Post, citing an internal Twitter document.
Twitter and Apple did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Musk’s latest tweet. Apple has not publicly responded to Musk’s previous tweets.
Among the grievances tweeted by Musk on Monday was the up to 30 percent fee Apple charges software developers for in-app purchases, with Musk posting a meme suggesting he was willing to “go to war” with Apple rather than pay a commission.
The self-described freedom of speech absolutist, whose company a few days ago returned many Twitter accounts, including that of former US President Donald Trump, accused activist groups of oppressing advertisers.
Ben Bajarin, head of consumer technology at research firm Creative Strategies, previously said Musk may have been learning too much from the regular process Apple goes through in-app reviews.
“App review from Apple isn’t perfect by any means and it’s a consistently frustrating process for developers but what I’m hearing is a two-way conversation,” he said.
“Tim was clear that Apple never considered that,” the Twitter and Tesla CEO said in a tweet.
On Monday, Musk accused Apple of threatening to block Twitter from its app store without saying why in a series of tweets that also said it had stopped advertising on the social media platform.
He later tagged Cook’s Twitter account in another tweet, asking “what’s going on here?”
Twitter and Apple did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Musk’s latest tweet. Apple has not publicly responded to Musk’s previous tweets.
Among the grievances tweeted by Musk on Monday was the up to 30 percent fee Apple charges software developers for in-app purchases, with Musk posting a meme suggesting he was willing to “go to war” with Apple rather than pay a commission.
© Thomson Reuters 2022
