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- Canadian broadcaster CBC's Twitter label has been changed to "69% Government-funded Media."
- Musk said the change occurred because the CBC said it's "less than 70% government-funded."
- The CBC disputed the idea that it's influenced by the government, and said it's quitting Twitter for now.
Elon Musk has switched the Canadian Broadcasting Corp's Twitter tag to "69% Government-funded Media," claiming that the media company said less than 70% of its funds come from the Canadian government.
"Canadian Broadcasting Corp said they're 'less than 70% government-funded,' so we corrected the label," Musk tweeted on Monday evening.
The change was reflected on the CBC's Twitter account as of press time, but not on its accounts for its news and radio divisions.
—Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 18, 2023
It's unclear when the CBC might have told Musk that it was "less than 70% government-funded." The public broadcaster did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment sent outside regular business hours.
Its Twitter label has been changed several times over the last two days.
Before the "69%" change on Monday, it was initially labeled just as "government-funded Media" by Twitter on Sunday.
Several other news organizations, such as National Public Radio and Public Broadcasting Service, have in recent weeks been tagged with the same label. Twitter's policy defines government-funded media as outlets that receive money from governments and "may have varying degrees of government involvement over editorial content."
Disputing the label on Sunday, the CBC said that while it receives public funds, its journalism is independent from government control.
"Our journalism is impartial and independent. To suggest otherwise is untrue," the broadcaster wrote in a tweet, saying that it was pausing its use of Twitter.
Musk, however, wasn't done. On Monday, he spotted a Twitter thread highlighting the CBC's fiscal reports.
It said the reports show the CBC receives 70% of its funding from the federal government. The thread also resurfaced a 2017 tweet from the CBC discussing its sources of revenue.
—T(w)itter Daily News (@TitterDaily) April 17, 2023
Musk responded to the thread, pondering if the CBC should be labeled as "70% govt funded." "Just trying to be accurate," the billionaire wrote.
The CBC's Twitter label was changed that evening to show "70% Government-funded Media," but then was altered again to show "69%," Reuters reported.
Musk habitually posts memes and tweets about the numbers "69," sometimes used to allude to a sex position, and "420," colloquially associated with the consumption of cannabis.
Like the CBC, some outlets that have been labeled as "Government-funded" have quit Twitter in protest, saying the characterization inaccurately compares them to state-controlled media organizations in other countries.