Twitter’s Complete Code Rewrite, $15 Billion Valuation, and “What Is a Woman” Film Censorship Controversy

It has been a wild few days at Twitter, with persistent downward revisions in the global town square’s valuation amid widespread advertisement drought, and a fresh censorship controversy to complete the image of management upheaval.

Elon says he still believes that a ground up rewrite of the Twitter code will be needed.

The team are already cutting down and rewriting the codebase - for example, the code for the timeline mixer was 700,000 lines, now it’s 70,000, down by a factor of 10.

— T(w)itter Daily News  (@TitterDaily) June 1, 2023

Elon Musk appears to be leaning toward a complete rewrite of Twitter’s code from the ground up to extract efficiency gains. For instance, a rewrite of the platform's timeline mixer code has resulted in 10x efficiency gains, with 700,000 code lines now reduced to just around 70,000 lines.

True

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 1, 2023

In the same vein, Elon Musk appears to be angling to rebrand Twitter to X Platform. Bear in mind that the social media platform is already a subsidiary of Nevada-registered company, X Holdings Corp.

Twitter’s Valuation Has Plummeted From $44 Billion in October 2022 to Just $15 Billion in April 2023

On the 28^th of April, 2023, the Fidelity Blue Chip Growth Fund published its monthly holdings report. The fund has cut the value of its stake in X Holdings Corp. – the company that owns Twitter now – to just $6.55 million, equating to an overall valuation of $15 billion for the global town square. This is the fourth downward revision to the global town square's valuation that Fidelity has undertaken since October 2022, when Elon Musk officially took over the company.

These valuation downgrades are a direct result of the ongoing advertisement drought at Twitter. According to the estimation by Sensor Tower, the social media giant's top 10 advertisers spent 89 percent less in February and March of 2023 as compared to the ad spend levels in September and October of 2022, with this cohort’s total ad-related spending plummeting from $71 million to just around $7.6 million.

Moreover, the Twitter Blue initiative also appears to be floundering. The premium tier had 640,000 subscribers as of the end of April. However, out of the 150,000 early subscribers, only 68,157 have retained their subscriptions amid disappointment related to the supposed reach-enhancing benefits of the Blue subscription tier.

“What is a Woman” film Censorship

Our film has been posted for a couple of hours. You cannot retweet it. It will not appear in anyone’s feed. It has been flagged as hate speech. It has been blacklisted from the trends list. It still has nearly 900 thousand views.

— Matt Walsh (@MattWalshBlog) June 2, 2023

Elon Musk has positioned himself as the ultimate champion of free speech. However, these credentials were strained recently when Daily Wire’s “What is a Woman” film on gender identity was censored on Twitter.

Will be fixed tomorrow

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 2, 2023

Elon Musk later clarified that the issue would be fixed by Friday.

Head of Trust and Safety Ella G. Irwin has now resigned presumably over this film and @elonmusk’s directive to allow it on Twitter. Anyone who helped carry out this act of defiance against Elon to censor What Is A Woman by @MattWalshBlog should be fired ASAP! @realDailyWire

— Robby Starbuck (@robbystarbuck) June 2, 2023

In another step, the social media giant's Head of Trust and Safety, Ella G. Irwin, has resigned over the ensuing controversy. And, it appears additional heads might yet role.

Written by Rohail Saleem