After an investigation, the EU ultimately determined that X/Twitter does not meet the criteria for a gatekeeper role, citing the company's lack of emphasis on the platform.

The EU's Digital Markets Act (DMA) has now been implemented, placing several major tech companies and their products under stringent regulation as designated gatekeepers, including Microsoft, Google, Apple, Amazon, Meta, and ByteDance.

From the perspective of user scale, the social networking platform X/Twitter, owned by Elon Musk, also met the threshold criteria for gatekeeper status, leading the European Commission to designate it as such.

However, X subsequently filed an appeal arguing that the platform should not be designated as a gatekeeper and subjected to the strict regulations of the DMA. Following the appeal, the EU launched an in-depth investigation on May 13.

Today, the EU released the final results of the investigation: after conducting a thorough market survey and evaluating the opinions of relevant stakeholders, the EU concluded that X indeed does not qualify as a gatekeeper for online social networking services.

One might wonder why the EU would exempt X, given its significant user base in the EU and globally. The reason may be related to Musk's approach: after acquiring X, Musk made a series of adjustments to the platform's policies and content restrictions, leading to a mass exodus of advertisers from X.

The EU's investigation revealed that businesses do not consider X as their preferred platform to reach users. For most businesses, X might be considered dispensable, whereas Meta's Facebook, Instagram, and ByteDance's TikTok are clearly preferred platforms.

Based on these findings, the EU concluded that X does not hold a monopolistic position warranting strict regulation under the DMA. However, should X's appeal increase in the future, the EU may reassess its status.

This outcome is bittersweet for X: while it is relieved from adhering to the stringent regulations of the DMA, being deemed by an official agency as not a primary platform for business promotion is concerning. As advertising revenue is crucial for social networking sites, the lack of business interest in the platform naturally leads to reduced ad revenue.

The departure of advertisers from X over the past two years has been particularly bad news for the platform, leading to a sharp decline in revenue. From this perspective, being designated as a gatekeeper might not have been entirely negative, as it would indicate that businesses still value the platform significantly.