How did Elon Musk ruin Twitter? Authors will explain at Vancouver Writers Fest event

New York Times' Kate Conger and Ryan Mac look at Trump supporter/advisor Elon Musk in Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter

Published Jan 08, 2025  •  2 minute read

Ryan Mac along with co-author Kate Conger will be in Vancouver on Jan. 17 for a Vancouver Writers Fest event where they will discuss all things Elon Musk including their book Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter. Photo by JJ Geiger /Courtesy of Penguin Random House

A day, heck, a minute doesn’t go by where we don’t hear about billionaire disrupter and Donald Trump’s biggest supporter Elon Musk.

Article content

Article content

An omnipresent friend and funder of Trump — he spent more than a quarter of a billion U.S. dollars to back the President-elect and other Republican candidates in the U.S. election — Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion and turned it into X, a free-for-all of disinformation and a MAGA megaphone.

Article content

With that overwhelming support, Musk has bought himself into the very, very inner circle of Trumpland and is poised to be given power within the U.S. government. As well, he is working on making moves internationally with his unabashed boosterism on X for Germany’s far-right, anti-immigrant AfD (Alternative for Germany) party.

How did all this happen?

How did Twitter become such a dark place?

New York Times reporters Ryan Mac and Kate Conger, the authors of Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter, will attempt to explain at a Vancouver Writers Fest Books & Ideas event on Jan. 17  at 7:30 p.m. at the Revue Stage on Granville Island.

With sources from within and around the company, Conger and Mac tell the story behind Musk’s takeover of Twitter.

“Given the results of the November election, and Elon Musk’s influence over the President-elect and the social network that helped to get him elected, I wanted to give space to the journalists who have devoted so much time, research and space to his meteoric and deeply worrying rise to power,” Leslie Hurtig the artistic director for the Vancouver Writers Fest said.

Article content

“Ryan Mac and Kate Conger have each spent over a decade reporting on the tech industry and the wealth and overwhelming power of Silicon Valley. Together, they expertly navigated the behind-the scenes story of Musk’s takeover of Twitter and his fragile, malicious nature that now makes his influence over the President-elect entirely alarming.”

New York Times reporter Kate Conger is the co-author of the book Character Limit: How Elon Musk Destroyed Twitter. Photo by JJ Geiger /Courtesy of Penguin Random House

Mac and Conger will be in conversation with CBC journalist Kathryn Gretsinger for the Vancouver event.
[email protected]

Recommended from Editorial

1. 

   Vancouver Writers Fest: Discussion on how to find joy amid turmoil kicks off powerhouse event

2. 

   Vancouver Writers Fest hosts Big Little Lies author Liane Moriarty

3. 

   10 titles to add to your Vancouver Writers Fest reading list

4. 

   Dana Gee: Just when I thought I was out, the Oscars pull me back in

Article content