Twitter banning political ads globally from Nov 22, says CEO Jack Dorsey

Dorsey said the company would share the final policy by November 15, and will start enforcing it from November 22 to provide current advertisers a notice period before the change goes into effect

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey on Thursday said that the microblogging platform would stop all political advertising globally, becoming the first mainstream social media company to do so.

In a series of tweets, Dorsey explained the reasons for the decision. Saying that internet advertising was “incredibly powerful” and effective for commercial advertisers, it posed “significant risks to politics, where it can be used to influence votes to affect the lives of millions”. Political ads on social media platforms have been a growing cause for concern globally, especially since reports of foreign interference in the 2016 US Presidential elections surfaced.

“These challenges will affect ALL internet communication, not just political ads. Best to focus our efforts on the root problems, without the additional burden and complexity taking money brings. Trying to fix both means fixing neither well, and harms our credibility,” said Dorsey. Dorsey said the company would share the final policy by November 15, and will start enforcing it from November 22 to provide current advertisers a notice period before the change goes into effect.

Among the biggest platforms for political ad spending, companies like Facebook, Twitter and Google have made efforts to bring transparency to the process by releasing political ad spending data globally, including in India’s general elections this year…

Twitter plans to cut about 300 more jobs, say reports

Twitter Inc may cut eight per cent of its workforce or about 300 people, Bloomberg reported on Monday, citing people it said were familiar with the matter.

The job cuts could be announced before the company reports third-quarter earnings on Thursday, and the number of jobs affected could change, Bloomberg said.

A company spokeswoman declined to comment.

Last year, Twitter announced plans to lay off up to 336 employees, or about eight per cent of its workforce, a week after Jack Dorsey, its co-founder who had been serving as interim chief executive, took over as permanent CEO.

Twitter, which last month hired bankers to field acquisition offers, faces an uncertain future after Salesforce.com Inc, the last of the companies believed to be interested in buying the company, said it would not make a bid.

With a market cap of about $12.76 billion and losses running at about $400 million a year, Twitter was likely judged too expensive by prospective buyers.

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