the bbc has been speaking to twitter s owner, elon musk. the last minute, unexpected interview came about after the bbc objected to a new tag describing it as government funded media on its main twitter account. in the interview the billionaire agreed to change this to publicy funded. he also defended the site s policing of hate speech and the mass sackings of staff and described taking over the social media firm as painful. do you have any regrets about buying twitter? i think it was something that needed to be done. it s been quite difficult. i would say, the pain level of twitter has been extremely high. this hasn t been some sort of party, so, it s been really quite a stressful situation in the last several months, not an easy one. so it s been quite painful, but i think at the end of the day, it should have been done and were there are many mistakes made along the way, of course? live now to san francisco and our technology correspondent james clayton. this was a sur
hello and welcome. let s return to the last minute unexpected interview that elon musk the boss of twitter and ceo of tesla has been doing with the bbc s james clayton. this came about after the bbc objected to a new tag describing it as government funded media on its main twitter account. james began by asking him why he decided to do this interview. there is a lot going on, so i thought this might be a good opportunity to answer some questions and. you know, i guess maybe get some feedback, too. what should we be doing different? i know the bbc for example is not thrilled about being labelled state funded media. it has viciously objected to that term, do you want to respond to it? i wanted to be as truthful and accurate as possible. i think we are adjusting the label to be publicly funded, which i think is perhaps not too objectionable. we are trying to be accurate. too objectionable. we are trying to be accurate- too objectionable. we are trying to be accurate. publ
fraction of the original headcount. you mentioned outages they are, there have been several. we have actually spoken to an engineer who works at twitter and they said the plumbing is broken here and it s on fire and there could be problems at any minute. do you accept that? well, there have been a few outages, but not for very long. and it is currently working fine. 50 but not for very long. and it is currently working fine.- but not for very long. and it is currently working fine. so it does not keep you currently working fine. so it does not keep you up currently working fine. so it does not keep you up at currently working fine. so it does not keep you up at night - currently working fine. so it does not keep you up at night that - not keep you up at night that twitter might go off line again? that twitter might go off line again? git this point, i think we have a pretty good handle on what makes twitter work. and we are also doing it with two data centres instead of three, so
minutes per day, which is a lot of user minutes. so. yeah, so usage is up. growth is good. the site works, mostly. you know, a few glitches here and there but the site is working fairly well. we are doing it with a small fraction of the original headcount. you mentioned outa . es, original headcount. you mentioned outages. there original headcount. you mentioned outages, there have original headcount. you mentioned outages, there have been - original headcount. you mentioned outages, there have been several. | original headcount. you mentioned i outages, there have been several. we have spoken to an engineer who works at twitter and they said the plumbing is broking here and it s on fire and there could be problems at any minute. do you accept that? there have been a few outages but not for very long and it s currently working fine. 50 not for very long and it s currently working fine- not for very long and it s currently working fine. so it doesn t keep you u . working fine. so i