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Musk's interview with Trump marred by technical glitches

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Musk's interview with Trump marred by technical glitches
News

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Musk's interview with Trump marred by technical glitches

2024-08-13 09:56 Last Updated At:10:00

Elon Musk's much-awaited interview with former President Donald Trump was marred by technical glitches on Monday, with people unable to join the audio conversation on X's Spaces platform.

Eighteen minutes into a conversation that was supposed to start at 8 p.m. EDT., Musk posted on X that the platform was experiencing a “massive” denial-of-service attack (DDOS), which is a federal criminal act that involves flooding a site with data to overwhelm it and knock it offline.

Outage tracker Downdetector reported a spike in reports of X being inaccessible to users starting before the interview but it could not be immediately verified whether this was due to a malicious attack. The rest of X appeared to be operating normally, and X users questioned whether there was a DDOS attack or if the Spaces event was just overwhelmed with people trying to listen in.

Musk had been promoting the event earlier in the day, calling it a conversation rather than an interview. He said X “tested the system with 8 million concurrent listeners earlier today.”

At 8:42 p.m., the interview finally began. By around 9:40 p.m., some 1.3 million people were listening in. Trump congratulated Musk “on breaking every record in the book tonight” with the number of people trying to get in to listen.

X has suffered a host of technical issues since Musk took over the company. He has fired, laid off or driven out most of its staff — including engineers tasked with keeping the site running.

Trump had previously mocked Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis when his primary campaign launched with a May 2023 interview on X that was marred by glitches.

“Wow! The DeSantis TWITTER launch is a DISASTER!” Trump wrote on May, 2023, on his Truth Social network. “His whole campaign will be a disaster. WATCH!”

The DeSantis event started with technical problems that Musk said were due to straining servers because so many people were trying to listen in. More than 20 minutes passed beyond the scheduled start time with users getting kicked off, hearing microphone feedback and hold music and dealing with other technical problems. The number of listeners listed topped out at around 420,000.

DeSantis dropped out of the race after a disappointing finish in Iowa’s kickoff caucuses.

Trump, who has been posting on his own social media site, Truth Social, returned to the X Monday morning, where he posted for the first time since he was banned in 2021. The posts promoted his interview with Musk and featured campaign ads.

FILE - Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk talks with President Donald Trump, May 30, 2020, in Cape Canaveral, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

FILE - Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk talks with President Donald Trump, May 30, 2020, in Cape Canaveral, Fla. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon, File)

Elon Musk's Trump interview marred by technical glitches, Musk says its a malicious attack

Elon Musk's Trump interview marred by technical glitches, Musk says its a malicious attack

This combination of photos shows former President Donald Trump during rally in Minden, Nev., Oct. 8, 2022, left, and Elon Musk in Wilmington, Del., July 12, 2021. (AP Photo)

This combination of photos shows former President Donald Trump during rally in Minden, Nev., Oct. 8, 2022, left, and Elon Musk in Wilmington, Del., July 12, 2021. (AP Photo)

Elon Musk's Trump interview marred by technical glitches, Musk says its a malicious attack

Elon Musk's Trump interview marred by technical glitches, Musk says its a malicious attack

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Japan's exports hit record high, but trade deficit continues

2025-01-23 13:16 Last Updated At:13:21

TOKYO (AP) — Japan saw record-high exports last year, as its annual trade deficit declined 44% from the previous year, the Finance Ministry reported Thursday.

The trade deficit, which measures the value of exports minus imports, totaled 5.3 trillion yen ($34 billion), according to government data, as imports ballooned on the back of rising energy costs and growing inflation around the world.

Exports from the world’s third-largest economy totaled 107.9 trillion yen ($691 billion), surpassing the 100 trillion yen mark for the second-straight year, and the biggest value on record for comparable data, which dates back to 1979, the ministry said.

Some companies may have sped up their exports in anticipation of potential tariffs by U.S. President Donald Trump.

Trump has said he expects to put 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico starting Feb. 1. During his campaign, he threatened to impose tariffs on imports from China, although details on that remain unclear.

For the month of December, exports gained a greater-than-expected 2.8% on-year, while imports rose 1.8%. Exports grew to Asian and European nations, while dipping slightly to the U.S.

Imports grew most from India, Hong Kong and Iran.

Demand was especially strong for Japan's vehicles, semiconductors and other machinery.

The weakening yen, another recent trend, has the effect of inflating the value of imports. The U.S. dollar has been hovering at 150-yen levels, sometimes surpassing 160 yen, over the past year, while a year ago it was often at 140-yen levels.

Japan has recorded a trade deficit for four straight years, but last year's deficit was considerably smaller than the 9.5 trillion yen deficit for 2023.

FILE - Cars for export are parked at a port in Yokohama, near Tokyo, on July 6, 2020. (AP Photo/Koji Sasahara, File)

FILE - Cars for export are parked at a port in Yokohama, near Tokyo, on July 6, 2020. (AP Photo/Koji Sasahara, File)

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