Elon Musk's Troubled Ownership of X: Financial Sink and Conspiracy Theories

One year after Elon Musk purchased Twitter and rebranded it as X, the platform is facing declining user engagement, hemorrhaging advertisers and revenue, and a noticeable rightward shift in content. The number of active tweeters has dropped by over 30%, and conservative influencers and media figures have seen their follower counts rise, while popular liberal and left-wing accounts have not experienced the same growth. Musk has led Twitter in a more explicitly political direction, endorsing Republican candidates and reinstating Donald Trump's account. Through product changes and policy shifts, Musk has elevated the voices of paying subscribers, many of whom are conservative influencers, while displacing mainstream media. However, these changes have also resulted in a proliferation of misinformation and confusion on the platform. Twitter's decline has given rise to rival platforms, but none have replaced its pivotal role in global debate.