Particularly since the main subject of the coverage seems to be getting a lot of attention.
The self-proclaimed “free speech absolutist,” Musk has said he wants Twitter to be a public square where all ideas, no matter how unpopular, can express themselves. He also collaborated with Walter Isaacson, who wrote biographies of Steve Jobs, Leonardo da Vinci and Albert Einstein and is now working on a book about Musk. “He’s been very, very open,” Isaacson told The Times last year, “not just him and the people around him, but he’s been very good at allowing me access to people from his past.”
What we consider before using anonymous sources. Do the sources know the information? What is your motivation for telling us? Have they proven to be reliable in the past? Can we corroborate the information? Even with these questions satisfied, The Times uses anonymous sources as a last resort. The reporter and at least one editor know the identity of the source.
At the same time, Musk has publicly tangled with journalists who have apparently annoyed him. In December, Twitter suspended the accounts of eight journalists, including Ryan Mac, a technology reporter for The Times. Those suspensions came a day after Musk disconnected more than 25 accounts that tracked the planes of government agencies, billionaires and celebrities.
Some of the journalists banned by Twitter had reported on the accounts that tracked flight data or had chronicled in detail Musk’s tenure at the company. “You are not special for being a journalist; you’re a citizen, so there’s no special treatment,” Musk told reporters during an audio session on Twitter shortly after the accounts were deactivated. Following criticism from First Amendment advocates and threats of sanctions from European regulators, Twitter reinstated the journalists’ accounts.
One reporter, who spoke on condition of anonymity because his employer would not allow him to speak publicly about Musk, compared writing on Twitter to covering a White House where the person in charge is media-obsessed and chaotic, leading to debate. about whether her airing of grievances on the media is part of his genius or a manifestation of his childishness.
Mr. Musk has recruited communications consultants on occasion. But his history of whimsy and saying inflammatory things (often via tweet) has sometimes created challenges for hired advisers managing those impulses.
In 2018, Musk hurled an insult at one of his critics, calling him a “pedophile,” in a series of angry tweets. Amid major fallout, he turned to communications consultant Juliana Glover, whose clients have included John McCain and James Murdoch and who had advised Musk’s electric car company, Tesla. Musk eventually apologized for the tweets.
