Musk responds to LeBron James Twitter concerns

New Twitter owner Elon Musk has addressed concerns from NBA icon LeBron James about the reported rise of the ‘N-word’ on the social media platform.

Musk, who is said to be worth around $220 billion, purchased Twitter for $44 billion on October 27. Shortly afterwards, use of the of the ‘N-word’ used to insult African-Americans and black people skyrocketed by 500%, a report shared by The Washington Post claimed.  

LA Lakers star James said that the development was “scary AF [as f**k].” 

“I don’t know Elon Musk and, [to be honest], I could care less who owns Twitter,” James tweeted.

“But I will say that if this is true, I hope he and his people take this very seriously because this is scary AF [as f**ck]. So many damn unfit people saying hate speech is free speech.” 

Though Musk didn’t reply to James with his own words, he shared a post from Twitter’s head of safety and integrity Yoel Roth.

“Over the last 48 hours, we’ve seen a small number of accounts post a ton of Tweets that include slurs and other derogatory terms,” Roth tweeted at the weekend.

“To give you a sense of scale: More than 50,000 Tweets repeatedly using a particular slur came from just 300 accounts.”

“Nearly all of these accounts are inauthentic. We’ve taken action to ban the users involved in this trolling campaign – and are going to continue working to address this in the days to come to make Twitter safe and welcoming for everyone,” Roth added.

READ MORE: Elon Musk fires entire Twitter board

Musk confirmed on Friday that Twitter hasn’t changed its moderation policies yet and revealed that he will form a panel to handle big decisions, such as whether banned accounts from figures such as ex-US President Donald Trump should return to the platform, and moderate content. 

“Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints,” Musk wrote. 

“No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.”