Footage has surfaced of recently-appointed Twitter CEO
Linda Yaccarinospeaking with Elon Musk, arguing that advertisers should have more "influence" over aspects of the platform such as product development and even content moderation. Her comments were met with pushback from Musk, who remained steadfast in his belief that freedom of speech took presedence over advertising dollars.
officially named
Yaccarinoas the new CEO on Friday, a decision that has been met mixed reactions. In the hours since, her background has been scrutinized by both the right and the left, with the latter pointing out that she follows accounts such as the Babylon Bee and Catturd, and the former drawing attention to her ties with the World Economic Forum.
During the interview with Musk in April, Yaccarino suggested that advertisers should work to turn Twitter into a place where they will be "excited about investing more money."
"Product development, ad safe, content moderation," she said. "That's what the influence is."
Musk cautioned against letting advertisers take over certain aspects of the platform.
"It's totally cool to say that you want to have your advertising appear in certain places in Twitter and not in other places," he said, "but it is not cool to try to say what Twitter will do."
Musk stated that "freedom of speech is paramount," and that, "if that means losing advertiser dollars, we lose it."
Yaccarino called on Musk to reinstate the infamous "Influence Council" under a new name, giving advertisers access to the company's execs.
"I would be wary of that creating a backlash among the public," Musk replied, "because if the public thinks that their views are being determined by a small number of CMOs in America, they will be upset about that."
He did note, however, that feedback for those spending money on the platform was "appropriate."
Yaccarino served as NBC Universal's head of advertising for years, and has decades of experience in the field.