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Top platforms refuse paid ads for Alex Gibney's "Musk" documentary [1]

['Rob Beschizza']

Date: 2026-09-26  

Academy Award-winning documentarian Alex Gibney directed Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room and Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief. His latest, Musk, profiles the wealthiest man in the world. But you won't be seeing paid ads for it on YouTube, Facebook or TikTok, as all of them are refusing to run the trailer. The Hollywood Reporter covers a stark example of class solidarity.

[X's refusal] is perhaps understandable, given its owner. But the rejection by the other platforms has taken distributor Bleecker Street by surprise, and it is internally scrambling to understand why the ad has been rejected, according to a person familiar with the company's processes who is not authorized to talk about them publicly. The unwillingness of platforms to accept even paid advertising is sure to raise concerns about free speech and the dwindling number of companies that control many of the platforms in this country — and ironically provide a proof-text for the very point the film is coming to make. Gibney's doc is a four-hour look at a title character who attempts to control the conversation in various ways, including with alleged suppressions on X, which he bought in 2022.

The 3 hours and 52 minutes film opens in theaters on October 9 and is supposed to air thereafter on HBO/Max (which paid to produce it), but parent company Warner Bros' expeted sale to other Musk-adjacent billionaires has put that in question.

Musk has attacked the film as a "hit piece" and threatened to sue over it, but Gibney says he received no response when inquiring after the threat; it's been well-received by critics who have seen it

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[1] Url: https://boingboing.net/2026/09/26/top-platforms-refuse-paid-ads-for-alex-gibneys-musk-documentary.html

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