New York — Elon Musk, the owner of social media platform X, revealed that they have plans to launch a news-distribution service called XWire.
The aim of this new service is to provide competition to platforms like Cision’s PR Newswire, according to a source familiar with the matter as reported by Bloomberg.
The meeting, held on October 26 to commemorate the first anniversary of Musk’s takeover of Twitter and subsequent renaming to X, also addressed the company’s future plans.
Executives expressed their view that platforms such as YouTube and LinkedIn would be future competitors, indicating X’s intentions to expand into video streaming and recruitment.
X has already begun working on the recruitment aspect, with the beta version of a service launched through the @XHiring account in July.
Verified organizations can utilize this service to highlight critical roles on their profile and reach millions of relevant candidates organically.
Musk, who identifies as a free-speech absolutist, has faced criticism regarding his stance on the topic since taking control of X. Some journalists have alleged that their X accounts were suspended due to their reporting.
Additionally, in September, Musk threatened to sue the Anti-Defamation League, claiming that their statements about hate speech on the platform were impacting advertising revenue.
Musk has made changes to the way news story links appear on X, removing the display of headlines in previews of third-party links. Only the domain and the main image from the destination page are now shown in tweets, resulting in a lack of context.
Musk stated in August that this change would improve aesthetics, and he confirmed this month that the platform’s algorithm prioritizes time spent on X, leading to less attention given to links.
Musk aims to transform X into an “open-source news” platform, where anything relevant in legacy media can be reposted.
He has also called for more citizen journalists to contribute to X and, in August, invited journalists to publish directly on the platform, offering the potential for higher incomes.
With the introduction of XWire and the expansion into video streaming and recruitment, X is poised to diversify its offerings and potentially create a significant impact in these domains. The company’s focus on open-source news and the involvement of citizen journalists could reshape the way news is consumed and shared on social media platforms.
