The ABC is shutting down almost all of its official accounts on Twitter – now known as X under Elon Musk’s ownership – citing “toxic interactions”, cost and better interaction with ABC content on other social media platforms.
There will only be four remaining official accounts for Australia’s public broadcaster: @abcnews, @abcsport, @abcchinese and the master @abcaustralia account. ABC Chinese reaches Chinese-speaking audiences on X.
“Starting from today, other ABC accounts will be discontinued,” the ABC managing director, David Anderson, has told staff. Musk responded to the move by accusing the ABC of embracing censorship.
Well of course they prefer censorship-friendly social media.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 9, 2023
The Australian public does not.
Anderson said the closure of the Insiders, News Breakfast and ABC Politics accounts earlier this year limited the amount of toxic interactions, which had grown more prevalent under Musk and made engagement with the shows more positive.
Several high-profile ABC journalists left Twitter after being subjected to abuse, including News Breakfast host Lisa Millar and Australian Story host Leigh Sales.
“We also found that closing individual program accounts helps limit the exposure of team members to the toxic interactions that unfortunately are becoming more prevalent on X,” Anderson said.
“Concerningly, X has reduced its trust and safety teams. Additionally, it is introducing charges which make the platform increasingly costly to use.”
The ABC has closed its @abcemergency X account and directed people to their local radio station and ABC website for emergency information.
The @Q+A account has also been archived, bringing to an end a long relationship between the talk show and the platform.
This account is now archived. To stay in touch:
— QandA (@QandA) August 9, 2023
Watch Q+A on ABC TV or ABC iview: https://t.co/fC34LuXafO
Follow us on Facebook: https://t.co/7HXXRZfht5
And follow ABC News on Twitter: @abcnews
The ABC Media Watch account will stay on X because the program is independent and can’t post on the ABC news account.
The announcement comes after the ABC recently shifted resources towards making content for other social media platforms including TikTok and Instagram.
Anderson said the vast majority of the ABC’s social media audience was located on official sites on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok.
“We want to focus our effort and resources on where our audiences are,” he said.
The ABC is the third big public service broadcaster to remove itself from Twitter, following NPR and PBS in April. They left Twitter after Musk branded them “state media”.
In April the ABC and SBS were also labelled “government-funded media”.
At that time a spokesperson said the ABC was not planning to follow NPR and PBS by quitting Twitter.
“The ABC doesn’t currently have any plans to shut down all its Twitter accounts. We’re liaising with Twitter regarding changes to account verification and labels,” they said.
The withdrawal marks the end of the ABC’s rosy relationship with Twitter, which former ABC managing director Mark Scott once called a “joy” to use for breaking news and conversation.
Scott was an evangelist of the value of social media in journalism, encouraged journalists to join the platform and promoted the ABC’s use of Twitter for disseminating ABC content.
“Twitter reminds me of sitting in the newsroom, watching the feeds come in from the world’s great media organisations: Reuters, Dow Jones and Associated Press, the New York Times, The Guardian, AFP,” he said in 2010.
“Now anyone, simply by following their Twitter feeds, can have these great media organisations delivering a stream of updates to them no matter where they are.
