On Tuesday, Elon Musk announced that his X Corporation had filed a lawsuit against little-known advertising consortium GARM, short for Global Alliance for Responsible Media. X claimed that GARM conspired to cut off its advertising revenues, thereby depriving it of “billions of dollars.” About 48 hours later, the besieged advertising organization appears to be ceasing operations and dissolving.
The New York Times is reporting that GARM is planning to “shut down,” after an internal email from the group said it didn’t have the funds to continue operating while fighting X’s lawsuit. Business Insider first reported on the email, in which the group said it was “ceasing” operations.
GARM is an initiative created by the Global Federation of Advertisers in 2019 in the wake of the Christchurch shooting. The group professes its goal to address “the issue of illegal or harmful content on digital media platforms and its monetization through advertising.” Functionally, this is meant to advise companies on sites that may be problematic from a brand safety perspective. An investigation by the conservative-led House of Representatives Judiciary Committee alleges that the group violated antitrust laws in its efforts to “demonet objectionable content in the name of brand safety,” specifically targeting conservative organizations.
Last year, Musk told advertisers who disliked him or his website to “fuck off,” and said he wanted companies that didn’t support his way of doing business to stop advertising on X. Apparently he didn’t mean it, and now Musk’s company is suing some of the advertisers who decided to do just that. X’s lawsuit alleges that after Musk bought Twitter (later renamed it X), GARM sparked a “massive advertiser boycott,” depriving the company of “billions of dollars in advertising revenue.” Internally, the lawsuit says, “GARM celebrated and took responsibility for the massive economic damage that the boycott caused to Twitter.”
While the organizations may be shut down, GARM and WEF deny that they violated antitrust laws. Gizmodo has reached out to both organizations for comment.
On Thursday, X CEO Linda Yaccarino posted about GARM’s breakup: “No small group should have a monopoly on what gets monetized. This is an important recognition and a necessary step in the right direction. We hope it means ecosystem-wide reform is on the way.”
Musk has yet to comment directly on this development. The tech billionaire has made a habit of high-profile lawsuits in recent years. In addition to X’s legal attack on GARM, Musk and X are currently suing OpenAI, which Musk helped found, the left-leaning nonprofit watchdog group Media Matters, and another nonprofit, the Center for Countering Digital Hate. Of course, the full list of legal disputes involving Musk and his companies is long.
