Twitter Removes CBC’s ‘Government-Funded’ Label–Possibly by Mistake [Update]

Yesterday, the CBC along with the ‘Global Task Force’, consisting of other national media broadcasters from other countries, demanded Twitter remove the “government-funded media” label and replace it with “publicly-funded media”.

The CBC deemed the “government-funded media” label as misleading, claiming it suggested the broadcaster’s editorial independence was influenced by the federal government.

Now, it seems the CBC may have been granted its wish, as the public broadcaster’s Twitter profile no longer has “government-funded media”. Actually, there’s nothing showing at all.

While it looks like Twitter removed the label after the CBC’s request, it seems like this may be a bug. That’s because all media outlets, even those from actual state-affiliated media accounts, don’t have their Twitter labels anymore either.

Media outlets such as RT, backed by the Russian government, and Al Jazeera, funded by the government of Qatar, also have had their “state-affiliated media” labels axed. It seems like yesterday’s removal of legacy checkmarks has seemingly removed media labels as well.

Check out the RT Twitter bio as of writing:

…and Al Jazeera’s:

Other Twitter bios from the BBC, PBS, NPR and more also have “funded” labels removed. These organizations also disagreed with their “funded” labels on Twitter.

For now, the CBC no longer has any labels whatsoever on its Twitter account. The public broadcaster quit Twitter after it disagreed with the “government-funded media” label. The CBC’s 2022 funding from Canadian taxpayers was $1.24 billion.

Update April 21, 12:12pm PDT:

It appears this is not a mistake after all. According to NPR reporter Bobby Allyn, he says Elon Musk confirmed to him that Twitter has dropped all media labels. “This was Walter Isaacson’s suggestion”, said Musk when asked why. Isaacson is writing Musk’s biography and previously write Steve Jobs’ biography as well.

NEW: Elon Musk tells me Twitter has now dropped all media labels. Asked why, Musk says: “This was Walter Isaacson’s suggestion.”

— Bobby Allyn (@BobbyAllyn) April 21, 2023