Elon Musk Slams Mark Zuckerberg's Meta for Engaging in 'Super Greedy' Advertising Practices

By Jace Dela Cruz

May 13, 2024 03:57 AM EDT

Elon Musk, who owns the social media platform X, has criticized Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, for being "super greedy" in taking credit for advertisers running campaigns on its platform. This has added fuel to his ongoing rivalry with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg.

COMBO-US-TECHNOLOGY-META-TWITTER — (COMBO/FILES) This combination of file photographs created on June 22, 2023 shows SpaceX, Twitter and electric car maker Tesla CEO Elon Musk during his visit at the Vivatech technology startups and innovation fair at the Porte de Versailles exhibition center in Paris on June 16, 2023 (R) and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg testifying before the House Financial Services Committee in the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, DC on October 23, 2019.
(Photo : MANDEL NGAN,ALAIN JOCARD/AFP via Getty Images)

Elon Musk: 'Meta Is Super Greedy at Claiming Credit'

Elon Musk addressed the issue on Sunday after one of his followers highlighted an alleged discrepancy in how conversions were attributed between X and Meta advertising campaigns.

The X user noted that several of his advertisers noticed that "while running campaigns on both X and Meta, nearly all conversions are attributed to Meta, with X reporting almost no conversions."

"Interestingly, when X Ads are turned off, total conversions significantly drop, including those reported on Meta. No research is needed to understand what's going on here," he added.

In response, Musk acknowledged that X is "terrible at claiming credit" while "Meta is super greedy at claiming credit." The X owner added that "there is a major class action lawsuit against Meta for their false claims."

The Musk follower then noted that "eventually, Meta will need to revise their attribution model, revealing the truth to advertisers who are already noticing a decline in results."

He added that "for X, refining the attribution model to align more closely with reality is relatively straightforward. This will show even better outcomes for advertisers."

Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg's Rivalry

This incident further underscores the longstanding rivalry between the two wealthiest men in the world. The rivalry between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg is well-known.

Beyond their financial standings, Musk and Zuckerberg have been engaged in a public spat for years. Their rivalry dates back to 2016 when a SpaceX mishap destroyed a Facebook satellite.

It further intensified when Meta launched Threads, a social media platform that became a rival to Musk's X. The two arch-rival billionaires even traded barbs last year about a potential cage fight.