Elon Musk's X Accused Of Slowing Traffic to Sites Criticized By Him, Including New York Times, Instagram

X, formerly Twitter, was reportedly accused of limiting traffic to sites that Elon Musk, its owner, criticized. Users observed slower speeds when accessing links from several websites, such as The New York Times, Meta Platforms Inc's META Instagram, Facebook & Threads, Bluesky, Reuters, and Substack. 

However, this lag seemed to be rectified by Tuesday afternoon. Musk has previously expressed his disapproval of these sites. 

Links to them on X experienced a loading delay of five seconds. Users on the Hacker News forum first highlighted this issue and later reported by The Washington Post.

This intentional slowdown could lead to reduced traffic and advertising revenue for the affected websites. Minor delays can have significant consequences on web traffic since users tend to navigate away if the content doesn't load quickly.

Interestingly, other prominent websites and news outlets like YouTube and Fox News were unaffected. The targeted delays appeared to be exclusive to websites Musk had previously criticized.

Twitter's ex-head of trust and safety commented on the situation on Bluesky, suggesting that even a mere second's delay can divert users, leading to decreased engagement. 

Moreover, Meta's CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, reacted with a "thinking face emoji" to a post discussing the issue on Threads. 

Musk's personal biases have influenced X's operations before. He's blocked links to competitors like Substack and Threads and revoked The New York Times' verification check mark after labeling it "propaganda."