Tech Roundup: Elon Musk makes peace with Tim Cook, and Apple sees more issues from China
Win McNamee


Investors came back from the long Thanksgiving weekend to be greeted by a sizable number of earnings reports, and a few surprises from some tech-sector notables as November turned into December this past week.
Ah, but it was the inimitable Elon Musk who made some of week's most-interesting headlines by kicking off a dustup with the world's most-valuable company, Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL).

At issue was Apple's (AAPL) level of advertising on Twitter (TWTR). Musk kicked the week off with multiple tweets in which he called out Apple (AAPL) for what he claimed was the company pulling nearly all of its advertising off of Twitter (TWTR) without any explanation. Musk even tweeted directly to Apple (AAPL) Chief Executive Tim Cook and asked him, "What is going on here?"
But, Musk wasn't done there.
As he continued tweeting, Twitter's (TWTR) owner said Apple (AAPL) had threatened to pull the Twitter (TWTR) app from its App Store, said Apple (AAPL) put "a secret 30% tax on everything you buy through the App Store, and then ran a poll in which he asked his 119M followers if they thought that "Apple should publish all censorship actions it has taken that affect its customers." After 24 hours and more than 2M votes were cast, 85% of respondents agreed with Musk.
Never one to pass up a chance to claim a victory, Musk on Tuesday tweeted, "The people have spoken".
So, it seemed like Musk and Cook wouldn't likely sending each other any holiday-season cards this year. Which is what made Musk's next big round of tweeting all the more surprising.
On Wednesday, Musk tweeted out his thanks to Cook for taking him on a tour of Apple's (AAPL) Cupertino, California headquarters. Musk even posted some video of his tour, and said that he and Cook "resolved the misunderstanding" about Apple (AAPL) removing Twitter (TWTR) from the App Store.
Along with all of that, Apple (AAPL) reportedly has cranked up work on a mixed-reality headset, and has even given the name xrOS to its mixed-reality operating system.
Apple (AAPL) found itself in the middle of the ongoing Covid situation in China, as UBS cut its iPhone build numbers due to ongoing disruptions with its Chinese manufacturing partners like Foxconn.
And for its part, Foxconn was reportedly going to maintain a closed-loop environment amid speculation about Beijing possibly easing up on its "Zero-Covid" policies.
Disney (NYSE:DIS) also dealt with issues related to China's Covid policies, and shut down Shanghai Disneyland, on at least a temporary basis, just days after re-opening the park.
Disney (DIS) also gave some insight into its business situation, and plans now that Bob Iger has come back as company CEO with its annual report. In a nutshell, get ready for more restructuring at the home of Mickey Mouse.
Earnings rolled in from the likes of Marvell Technology (MRVL), Asana (ASAN), Okta (OKTA) and Salesforce (NYSE:CRM).
And Salesforce (CRM) really brought a surprise to the earnings party as the company's co-CEO, Bret Taylor, said he will step down from his job at the end of January. Taylor had been with Salesforce (CRM) for six years, but had been sharing the company's CEO job with founder Marc Benioff only since November 2021.
Meanwhile, at Amazon (AMZN), Jeff Blackburn, the executive credited with building the company's Prime Video streaming service, said he is calling it a day after 25 years at the company and will retire in January.