Nick Pickles, a Yorkshire-born former music photographer, has risen to turn out to be some of the outstanding executives at X, charged with combating Elon Musk’s rising variety of political battles over the social media platform whereas heading off international regulators.
X has promoted Pickles to vice-president of worldwide affairs, in accordance with an replace on his LinkedIn web page.
Insiders at X stated he has, in impact, turn out to be the right-hand man to chief govt Linda Yaccarino at a time when she is going through stress to show across the firm’s flagging enterprise.
A longtime staffer at Twitter earlier than Musk renamed the corporate following a $44bn takeover two years in the past, 40-year-old Pickles was elevated from his place of head of worldwide authorities affairs final month.
This got here after Yaccarino immediately fired X’s head of enterprise operations and communications Joe Benarroch. Pickles’ expanded function is much like that held by former UK deputy prime minister Nick Clegg at Meta.
In line with interviews with greater than 10 present and former staff in addition to folks near him, Pickles is now among the many most influential lieutenants from Twitter’s previous guard, main coverage work at X in addition to selecting up Benarroch’s communications duties.
That rise has led some who’ve labored with Pickles to invest that he might be X’s subsequent chief govt.
However his newfound prominence makes him a lightning rod for these annoyed by Musk’s possession.
X’s proprietor has ordered additional cost-cutting, leaving staff not sure over their jobs. There are additionally heightened tensions between the proprietor and Yaccarino over the corporate’s monetary well being, a number of folks stated. In the meantime, Musk has turn out to be extra outspoken politically, endorsing Donald Trump for US president.
To some, Pickles represents a gentle hand, unfazed by fixed disaster administration and professional at speaking coverage nuances.
Earlier this yr, Pickles ready Yaccarino for a US Senate listening to on little one security. Whereas Yaccarino, who had beforehand been criticised for poor public talking, emerged largely unscathed from the session, rival expertise bosses comparable to Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg confronted assaults from politicians.
“Linda deeply trusts Nick’s judgment,” stated one individual near him. “He could be a calming and moderating power . . . I feel she is aware of that and believes it’s a priceless useful resource.”
To others, his survival comes at a value: reneging on positions on on-line security and transparency he as soon as superior that run counter to Musk’s instincts.
“There is a component of it that may be a profound and hypocritical about-face for Nick particularly,” stated one former colleague. “He appears to be ethically versatile sufficient to signify the brand new views, as he did the previous ones.”
Pickles declined to remark. X didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Pickles began his profession as a music photographer, snapping bands together with Oasis and U2, earlier than his government-lite politics led him to privateness advocacy group Large Brother Watch.
“Our largest problem is making folks realise that their privateness is necessary — and to understand that the gradual trickle of authoritarian and intrusive legal guidelines can have penalties for his or her households,” he wrote in an article on the time.
Pickles shares Musk’s libertarian beliefs, folks near him stated. He ran to be a Conservative MP within the 2010 basic election, shedding to Yvette Cooper, who’s now house secretary.
Pickles joined Twitter in 2014 as a London-based senior public coverage supervisor. Nu Wexler, associate at 4 Corners Public Affairs who beforehand labored in coverage communications for Twitter and who interviewed Pickles for his first function, remembers that he had a “thick pores and skin” and “superb understanding of how British tabloids operated”.
Wexler described Pickles as a pragmatist who helped the corporate ease considerations about points together with on-line harassment and using social media by terror teams comparable to Isis.
In 2017, Pickles confronted a grilling from British MPs, together with Cooper, over Twitter’s failure to take down violent posts, together with threats towards London mayor Sadiq Khan and one stating Germany’s Angela Merkel “wants a bullet within the head”.
Twitter’s then-UK public coverage chief supplied a quick apology however insisted that its new moderation expertise represented “a step change in how we cope with abuse”.
In 2018, Pickles moved to San Francisco to tackle a worldwide public coverage function, inside two months showing in one other listening to earlier than US senators.
The place many Twitter coverage staffers baulked on the concept of a Musk takeover a number of years later, Pickles ready.
As Musk tried in 2022 to again out of shopping for the corporate, he took a vacation to recharge forward of what he noticed because the inevitable deal and ensuing chaos, in accordance with one individual conversant in the matter.
The break was well timed. In taking up X, Musk lower a whole bunch of jobs on the firm’s communications and coverage departments and upended the content material moderation insurance policies that Pickles had lengthy advocated for.
Beneath Musk, Pickles has as an alternative lobbied for X because the EU has investigated the corporate for alleged transparency and moderation points in breach of its Digital Providers Act.
In current months, when Turkey, Brazil, India and Australia issued X with calls for to “take down” content material, Pickles has helped X to call and disgrace the nations.
Pickles has revealed the requests by way of the corporate’s international affairs account on X, which he runs, and fought authorized battles on free speech grounds.
“I’m reassured that he’s nonetheless there,” stated former Twitter communications govt Brandon Borrman, who beforehand labored with Pickles. “I do know he cares and can advocate for the fitting issues.”
Critics argue that X has solely launched its challenges selectively in accordance with Musk’s whims, whereas Pickles has allowed transparency insurance policies he was instrumental in crafting to be rowed again in areas comparable to sharing data round disinformation campaigns.
Pickles earned a repute for being accessible within the pre-Musk period. However The Homosexual and Lesbian Alliance Towards Defamation, a non-governmental media-monitoring organisation, stated X has turn out to be an “unwelcome house” for various communities and that Pickles has been “silent to date” on how its coverage shifts had been impacting security.
Pickles continues to have aspirations at X and past. He has mentioned operating once more to be a British MP, one individual stated. For now, he battles on at X. Within the “About me” part of his LinkedIn web page, it reads: “By no means a boring second.”
Extra reporting by Javier Espinoza in Brussels