Last week, Elon Musk spent time begging Stephen King for money and bargaining with Garfield the Cat’s Twitter account. Musk found time to fire 90% of Twitter’s staff, and they’re already suing him. In the first hours and days of Musk’s Twitter acquisition, he fired all of the executives and the board too. There was a big meeting between Musk and Twitter’s biggest advertisers last week and long story short, instead of stopping the bleeding, Musk made it much worse, and most major advertisers are already pulling their ad money from Twitter. I spent the weekend watching Musk meltdown in real time, posting idiotic memes and bickering with AOC and Mark Ruffalo. It’s time everyone admits that Elon Musk is a moron and he has no idea what he’s doing.
Elon Musk “doesn’t know what he’s doing” with Twitter and is “making everyone alarmed”, a former executive has said, after major brands paused their advertising spend on the platform and the company laid off thousands of staff.
Bruce Daisley, Twitter’s vice-president for Europe, the Middle East and Africa from 2015 to 2020, said he was devastated by the undemocratic changes at Twitter and would leave the platform with “no hesitation” if there was a good alternative.
“I think Elon thought he was going to come in and solve everything and very quickly he’s going to work out that it’s far more complicated,” he told podcast The News Agents this weekend. “It’s pretty evident from every public action that he’s taken with this whole acquisition: he doesn’t know what he’s doing.”
Daisley, who was Twitter’s most senior executive in London, also criticised Musk’s plan to charge users $8 a month for a “blue tick” verification symbol. He told the Observer Musk was trading the “legitimacy of verified sources” for “pocket money”. “The fact that we have no recourse over that is undemocratic,” he said.
I agree. Elon Musk broke Twitter because he’s a rich idiot and he wanted to play with it. He thought people would fall over themselves to kiss his ass. He thought $44 billion would buy him legitimacy. Instead, he destroyed a social media platform just because he was too stupid to understand it. He also can’t take a joke – all weekend, people were impersonating him and he threatened to delete all of their accounts. One of my favorite moments was Valerie Bertinelli paying for verification… and changing her handle to “Elon Musk,” then tweeting out a bunch of pro-Democratic Party messages:
Guys, Valerie Bertinelli changed her verified name to elon musk and she's using it to retweet Dem candidates, and it shows up in feeds like this.
🤣🤣🤣🤣
Some people help rebuild my faith in humanity. pic.twitter.com/6ne9yUVM65— Roger ZenAF (@RogerZenAF) November 6, 2022
Jack Dorsey also said words this weekend:
I am grateful for, and love, everyone who has ever worked on Twitter. I don't expect that to be mutual in this moment…or ever…and I understand. 💙
— jack (@jack) November 5, 2022
Photos courtesy of Cover Images, Avalon Red, Backgrid.
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- Elon Musk attends The 2022 Met Gala Celebrating “In America: An Anthology of Fashion” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 02, 2022 in New York City,Image: 688277542, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Pictured: Elon Musk, Credit line: – / JPI Studios / Avalon
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- Elon Musk attends The 2022 Met Gala Celebrating “In America: An Anthology of Fashion” at The Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 02, 2022 in New York City,Image: 688277574, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: , Model Release: no, Pictured: Elon Musk, Credit line: – / JPI Studios / Avalon
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- New York, NY – Elon Musk attends the 2022 Met Gala in NYC. Pictured: Elon Musk BACKGRID USA 2 MAY 2022 USA: +1 310 798 9111 / usasales@backgrid.com UK: +44 208 344 2007 / uksales@backgrid.com *UK Clients – Pictures Containing Children Please Pixelate Face Prior To Publication*
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- Heidi Klum’s 21st Annual Halloween Party Presented By Now Screaming x Prime Video And Baileys Irish Cream Liqueur At Sake No Hana At Moxy Lower East Side Featuring: Elon Musk Where: New York, New York, United States When: 31 Oct 2022 Credit: ROGER WONG/INSTARimages.com/Cover Images
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- Heidi Klum’s 21st Annual Halloween Party Presented By Now Screaming x Prime Video And Baileys Irish Cream Liqueur At Sake No Hana At Moxy Lower East Side Featuring: Elon Musk Where: New York, New York, United States When: 31 Oct 2022 Credit: ROGER WONG/INSTARimages.com/Cover Images
What’s the point of Jack D saying that?
Trying to appear as if he wasn’t a giant douchenozzle that cared only about money, trying to make it look like he cared about the staff of Twitter when it truth it’s all just a cash grab for him.
And hiding the fact that he’s working with Musk to create yet another platform.
Exactly all this. Jack D doesn’t care at all about employees or he wouldn’t be doing all this crap. He is just as bad as Elon.
So, look. I’m no apologist for anyone involved and I’ve got zero skin in this game. Take or leave my comments as you will. But I live in SF now and I know a few people and I know a few things. I think Elon is a, well he’s not a sociopath exactly, but he’s a sorely deficient human being and I feel bad for him. He doesn’t experience joy the way most of us do. And Jack, well, Jack’s actually not a bad guy, he just went off the rails sometime in the last decade. In the Valley you see this shit all the time, young male nerds attain unimagined wealth/status/acclaim and they process it by 1) reimagining society in a way that makes them feel heroic rather than lucky and 2) trying to prolong their lives/legacy/success in whatever way they possibly can.
We’re watching that play out in real time. I personally think it’s destructive that we, humans, have created a stage to glorify and amplify the worst of our instincts. That stage is being manipulated by bad actors.
Jack is still invested in Twitter stock. He’s trying to save his own cash.
I wonder how much Trump has “donated” to make sure his boy Musk gets Twitter.
The timing is impeccable. Watch Trump use these platforms (plural, since Jack D. and Musk is creating yet another where it will appear to be more democratic but everyone will be fooled) during re-elections.
@LIONEL
100% what you’re saying.
Who made the valuation of 44 billion is what I want to know! I also read that Jack Dorsey chipped in to help Elon buy twitter Huh? How does that work?
So is this the most expensive company to buy in the world?
I think it’s that Dorsey didn’t cash out his shares of Twitter, but rolled them over into shares of the private company – almost $1 billion worth. But Dorsey also supported Musk from early on – he wanted Musk on the board, he said Musk was the best solution for the company, and he supported the buyout. It seems to me the company was in deep sh*t for a while and Dorsey didn’t know what to do about it.
Now Jack Dorsey is back peddling. He realizes how bad it has gotten. People were letting him have it in the comment section. Pretty much letting him know he’s not that important and he no longer owned Twitter when it was sold, so what was the point of his tweets?
@Lulu – if he rolled over his public shares for private shares, then he still owns part of the new company, doesn’t he?
Elon Musk is impulse controlled. He does not do any detailed planning before making any decisions.
Musk offered to pay 44 billion for Twitter even though Twitter clearly wasn’t worth that much at the time. Twitter said yes, and contracts were signed. That set the price for Twitter to 44 billion.
This is why no single person should hold so much wealth. money is meaningless, as is failure. He will never suffer the consequences of his ineptitude.
Imagine having this much money and using it on a social media platform instead of actual humans who are starving, homeless and poor in this world.
I’m convinced we’re all dead and Earth is hell. Nice to burn with you, people!
It came out that Diddy also chipped in. He claims to be there to be look out for the culture or something…. That part is obviously not going well.
@Eurydice – He rolled over 18 million shares and a 2.4% stake in the company which is very small.
@Lulu – that’s what I said – his 18 million shares came out to be about $1 billion. 2.4% ownership seems small, but why bother to retain some ownership at all if he isn’t still connected to Musk in some way? He’s busy apologizing for whatever, but he’s not out of it.
“Who made the valuation of 44 billion”
I believe Elon himself did when he offered to buy it at a specific price per share
It’s what Elmo, himself, offered as a magnanimous flourish. It was valued $25-28B. What an impulsive narcissist.
I don’t mind what he claims is his vision but it seems like he doesn’t know what to do. These things need to be well planned an people can easily jump to another platform. I don’t think it would be tiktok reddit, or fb though, those have had their time shining and are now in the stage of being criticized. Maybe Instagram will get more popular for less “pretty” and more serious posts. Instagram has been good with responses to criticism and is less hated than other platforms
That’s pretty much his M.O. he doesn’t know what to do always. He is the text book example of failing upwards. The only reason why SpaceX and Tesla are still standing is a testament to the people who make it happen despite his screwups. And he screws up ALOT. I have seen SpaceX employees scramble real time to fix his idiocy. The problem is Elon fired the executives who could have saved him. He has no one left at Twitter to do this.
And now wants to hire back some he had fired. I’d tell him to go to h e double hockey sticks
.
@ goofpuff +1 to this right here. Elon outed himself as a clown when he claimed to have a submarine that would rescue the Thai soccer team when they were trapped in the cave. ALL of the rescue divers – who have been doing this for multiple decades – told him to sit down because his purported “solution” was preposterous and he argued with them.
He lost me from there – I will never buy a Tesla or any other Musk product or service. I hope he loses everything over this Twitter debacle so he goes away.
“and he argued with them.”
and he didn’t just argue with them, his “argument” was to call them ped0s. like, WTF? you try to butt your nose into something you have NO knowledge of, and when you’re told that you don’t know what you’re talking about you resort to vicious slander?!
@WHAT Yes, you are right. I have a family member who knows that dive community and he was like, these people know EXACTLY what they are talking about and everyone including Musk should sit down and STFU to ensure these kids get out alive.
For Musk to then resort to horrific name-calling of highly respected experts was him revealing EXACTLY who he is.
I’ve signed up to mastodon on the artisan.chat server. I can follow people that do the politics etc.. but also look at amazing crafts that people are making. It is already making my heart happier. People seem really engaged with providing positive feedback. Before you join it is definitely worth seeing the server rules and what they block. My server automatically blocks some of the crazy “free speech” servers that are actually people just wanting to shout at people. So far it has been super positive and heart healing.
Thank you that site sounds lovely
A humiliated white man is the most dangerous creature on earth. The worst is yet to come with Musk.
This. Some of them just don’t have the pain tolerance for accountability.
He will go scorched earth and salt it in his wake. Entitled, apartheid-endorsing, “slave”-labor utilizing, union-busting enacting, “master-race” proposing, over-populated-Earth populating, Penguin-villain impersonating, Hair-Plugs-for-Men utilizing, cool-sculpting deforming, of average-intelligence denying, born-on-home-base-thinks-he-hit-a-homer living, incelitic, MAGA-taint-kissing, troglodytic mediocre white colonizing cowardly over-privileged average undateable beast.
Damn. Ok. Lol. 🤣
ThatsNotOkay, your post is a thing of beauty and a joy forever.
@ThatsNotOkay A+++++++++++ comment. I have a list of people I’d like you to do next, please and thank you!
think this comment is a liittle too nice /s
well tell us how you really think.😅🤣😂🤣😅
I’m…. In love with you after this comment 👌😂😂
Laughing at Musk is reminding me, dangerously, of how people laughed at Trump before he won in 2016.
Musk has enough money and enough powerful friends (especially the Saudis, the Chinese, and Peter Thiel) and enough resentment to destroy Twitter as a source of any legitimate information. That’s what he’s doing, It looks ridiculous but it’s actually intentional and irreversible.
Musk is BOTH a thin-skinned egomaniac and a far-right sympathizer. We should not underestimate him.
I have no proof but think some of the far right superpacs and/or far right mega rich folks like the Kochs helped him complete the sale. After he tried to back out of it he was running to court to get out of the contract which was apparently iron clad and then boom. Purchase done.
100% agree about not underestimating him… I’m not a fan of his or Twitter, but he has proven more than once that he knows when to turn over the reins to other people so his companies can grow. He’s probably just shaking things up for kicks right now. But eventually he’ll get interested in something else and hire experienced turn-around specialists who will bring Twitter back from the brink. Let’s just hope that it doesn’t cause lasting harm to our democracy in the process.
Yep he just Tweeted to vote GOP to throw a few elections while he’s at it…
His fanbois would naturally vote RWNJ as a default pov.
Jack’s “apology” is meh. Sorry I grew the company? That’s what leadership and management teams are for. When I worked with them at a former employer, Twitter were always trying to blame us for their poor growth. Had nothing to do with them hiring people who loved social media (so, “good culture fit”) and maybe weren’t so hot at being a functional expert. I once had to create user profiles for a couple of their business products… not my job at all, but they couldn’t provide any guidance that would have helped our vendors.
The amount of times I would go on a call and for my Twitter stakeholder fail to show up…. aaargh! I am sick of popcorn;)
The Valerie Bertinelli page is no longer there. I wonder why??
Absolutely love this. She’s unexpectedly become my favorite celebrity.
Valerie is still there. She changed back to her own name and her address has always been wolfiesmom. She was absolutely brilliant and hilarious yesterday. And she changed back just in time. Musk tossed Kathy Griffin for doing the same.
Her account is still there, she reverted back to her name
Musk announced a 0 tolerance w/no warning for changing your name to be an imposter unless you label it as a parody account so they have shut accounts down over the weekend. Worse, it looks like Imani Perry’s account was hacked right after she dropped an article entitled “Can Twitter’s Failings Spur a Better Social Media?” and her entire feed was replaced with tech bro BS (not just new posts but some of the tweets that show up pre-date the hack which is super shady). It took about 2 days of people reporting the account as being hacked before she regained control of it. I will not be surprised if more of that happens, especially to WOC who are critical of Musk, under Musk’s watch
Lol, so what are they going to do with all stan accounts?
So many people have celebrity pictures as their PFPs while mentioning their names in their account names.
They’re clearly just fans without an intention to impersonate, but where does it end?
A local journalist’s account was mysteriously put on restriction when he @’d Musk “twitter has reached it’s highest potential in the ability to watch the owner cope, in real time, with having made a $44 billion mistake in the same tone I would take if I drunkenly bought a jet ski.” 😂 (@cd_hooks)
Point being, there’s no one too big or small for a thin skinned ego maniac to lash out at. Grimes’ ex boyfriend is not playing 4D chess, although I do wonder if he’s distracting from something else purposely. Also, Dorsey wanting to be seen as the enlightened sage is certainly a choice he can’t pull off.
I’m not verified and I’m a nobody shitposter with 250 followers. I changed my handle to TheRealElonMusk three days ago. Anyone with two brain cells to rub together could tell it was a joke.
My account was suspended this morning.
There literally is no one too small for this dictator diaper baby.
Rumor has it he was on a bender when he purchased it. Which, we’ve all made mistakes when drunk or high, but… I’m still getting tons of schadenfreude from this.
Lol, a friend of mine would stay up all night getting high and ordering all sorts of crap online. Boxes and boxes of random stuff would arrive to his office – shiatsu massagers and Nespresso machines, one of those black cat wall clocks with the eyes that go back and forth, a ceiling fan…
Cat clock is a solid purchase, though. Lol.
The upside: Twitter was a cesspool of hate already and too little was done about it.
Now with him at the helm, more people are already migrating to other sites Like Counter Social or starting their own sites/apps.
I miss the 2000s in that sense: people with an interest were often on interest-specific forums with much stronger moderation.
You didn’t get confronted by hateful trolls or missinformation posts nearly as much.
Elon is being exposed in real time for the fraud that he is. Tesla has never had a traditional marketing department–instead it relied on Elon’s cult of personality (largely driven by his Twitter antics) for attention. He thought Twitter would work the same way, but he never understood the product.
Facebook is set to do a lot of layoffs, too. There are reasons for that (Apple privacy rules, TikTok, new regulations, the ill-conceived investment in the “metaverse”), but I find it curious that 2 massive social media companies are struggling financially in the months following international sanctions on Russian assets.
Wow, Lizzie, I did not think of that!
Exactly that @Lizzie Bathory! I was thinking it is definitely interesting to see which companies are struggling after the Russian assets freeze. Not surprising its the ones who follow the fascist playbook.
@LIZZIE BATHORY This is a really good point re: coincidence of the financial flailing of these two major social media companies and the various recent barriers for the operation of Russian troll factories.
Possibly but lots of companies are laying off right now, Amazon has a hiring freeze, Microsoft is laying off, Zillow, Opendoor are laying off, big pharma is laying off.
The Fed has been very clear that it thinks low unemployment is driving up inflation and more layoffs is the plan to fight it.
Yes, and inflation has hit all digital advertising, which is the main source of revenue for social media.
BOOOOOOOOOM !!!
^^ This 100%
No money no honey !
This is kind of like Donald Trump becoming elected president all over again. Smart people (like me lol) knew it would be a disaster from start to finish while the other idiots stayed in denial and loudly claimed to “give him a chance.” Someone (Jack Dorsey? Parag Agrawal? Twitter exec board?) decided having Elon Musk buy Twitter would be a great idea but Elon digging in his heels for months and refusing to pay the $44 billion acquisition (who even came up with that valuation???) should have been a sign of the chaos to come. This all could have been avoided but the Twitter execs were all a bunch of idiots with their determination to sell to Elon. I feel bad for the regular Twitter employees because they are in a mess not of their own making but the exec board (who all got fired and I think that’s hilarious) can all shove it.
I have zero time for Jack Dorsey or Elin Musk, but isn’t it the case that regardless of how they personally felt about it, because of the insanely high offer, as a publicly listed company, the Twitter board had a fiduciary obligation to its shareholders to accept? It could have been sued by shareholders if it did not accept. Corporations law isn’t my area, so maybe someone with more knowledge can comment!
My favorite thing about this acquisition is that he used his shares in Tesla as collateral. Then some of the earliest advertisers to pull their ads from Twitter were car companies aka Tesla’s competitors who were given a chance to tank Twitter’s share price. If the share price goes below a certain threshold, it might result in a call on Musk’s Tesla shares, which may potentially result in him losing control at Tesla, Turns out when you employ nothing but obsequious flatterers and aren’t competent yourself about the ins and outs of such complex matters, you’re gonna get got.
“Turns out when you employ nothing but obsequious flatterers and aren’t competent yourself about the ins and outs of such complex matters, you’re gonna get got.”
^^ And I love this for him.
Hahahaha I didn’t even think about that. The shark gets eaten by the bigger sharks and the cycle of life continues. Too bad Elon never listens to anyone who might warn him about doing stupid things. I also love this for him. 👏👏👏👏
The way I giggled reading your comment. Totally brightened my afternoon.
Plus, his acquisition of Twitter was basically a bear hug so he overvalued the company. Hahahahahahahah.
Elon also blocked (on Twitter) an advertising exec who met with him and is pushing back on the “liberals are pressuring advertisers” BS Elon’s been spewing. one of them responded and explicitly explained that it’s the lack of moderation (and that he fired the entire mod team) that is prompting them to pull ads.
Elon then blocked him. that man-baby is THE BIGGEST SNOWFLAKE EVER.
From what I’ve read, Elon purchased Twitter with money loaned from the Saudi government. It’s being speculated all of this is by design. Elon may be planning to strip down Twitter and sell the parts. Think about the amount of personal information that Twitter holds on All of it’s users.
but that was part of the issue 80% of it is bots and worthless. And if they want my fake yahoo email to mine my information. Have at it.
People should have let him go, the first time he failed to aquired Twitter was a sign and omen. If things keep going the way they are Twitter will end up becoming a has been like Blockbuster.
Yes. Apparently there is a big event where the platforms do a song and dance about their plans for the new year and advertisers pre- buy a chunk of ads for the next year. This helps the apps cash flow and locks ad pricing in for the ad agencies and their clients. Typically companies purchase 20-25% of their annual ad buy at this event.
The advertisers knew about the potential Musk purchase and were hoping for some sign that he would understand what they need from the platform – stability and no Nazis or racist garbage next to their ads. Must did nothing to appease them and they bought – nothing.
So Twitter is not heading into 2023 with shaky ad prospects, it is at least 20% in the hole. And it has a billion dollars in debt financing to pay off every year. Twitter’s ad revenues have been running about a billion dollars a year. These will be interesting times.
I think he woefully miscalculated if he thought he could turn this into a subscription service. To offset loss of ad revenue. While many use it as a marketing tool. The majority of users are just passive readers. And could not give a flying fig about blue checkmarks and being able to edit a typo here and there.
And all of tech is going to through a layoff now. With the coming recession. Since the thought the pandemic would bring more growth to the industry. And companies over hired. And it hasn’t. Elon just didn’t have to be such a dick about it.
One person’s take on the motivations/end goals of Musk/Dorsey:
https://davetroy.medium.com/no-elon-and-jack-are-not-competitors-theyre-collaborating-3e88cde5267d
@Vizia Thank you for sharing the link to this article. Also, j*sus, that is depressing and the middle aged male population has so much to answer for. We desperately need women in management in STEM and tech spaces.
That article is terrifying. The thought that “who cares about planet earth because we’ll just spread out around the universe” is insane, and the main reason pointed at when people are asked why they don’t care about this planet.
These people make me sick, and are more than welcome to go to mars and never come back here. But of course they want to drag us all through the mud with them.
Elon knew what he was doing, wreaking havoc. His problem is that it didn’t turn out the way he hoped.
Ditto.
In April, Elon tweeted that Twitter should be politically neutral.
An hour ago Elon tweeted his recommendation that everyone vote for a Republican Congress, as a curb to the executive branch’s power.
Twitter does not have the usual 600 to 900 million (guaranteed income) for the beginning of the year as a result of selling chunks of adverts at the yearly “new fronts” event.
It was unable to answer the basic questions regarding Brand Safety and Community Standards posed by media buyers.
After buying Twitter he promptly fired 75% of the staff especially moderators creating an antagonizing environment
He kept his commitment to roll back brand safety and community standards to have a safe space for bigots to antagonize users who do not share their opinions.
He failed to understand that ownership does not mean that you were responsible for a company’s success.
That some skills and knowledge are not successfully transferable to a different industry.
Digital media is different.
Buying ownership is not being a ‘founder’.
No arguments here, he’s been tanking Twitter’s worth (and his own) from the day he took over. Tesla stocks went from $334 to $204 since he started his Twitter quest. He took Twitter private (no longer on stock exchange) so that we won’t see Twitter shares decline to a garbage stock. An incredible number of advertisers left, citing (hello?) Brand Safety and Accountability concerns since he fired most of the moderators. [As Well Wisher points out] He fired the guys who took care of the advertisers, how dumb was that? Advertisers moved their money while still on the damn conference call Elon had on Friday! Say hello to misinformation and hate speech, great, it’ll feel like reading the bathroom wall. This will be taught in business schools, how one guy lost tens of billions in a single week. Don’t Start A Dumpster Fire At A New Acquisition 101.
Elon is not an engineer, he’s an on-the-spectrum, over-privileged, conceited, over-leveraged white Republican investor who broke the shiny toy he chased.
It’s been amazing watching this clown meltdown and throw literal tantrums when many of the official accounts began making fun of him. He’s such a petty, thin skinned, egotistical moron, and he’s showing us all this in real time!
I have around 700 followers and have had my account for 8 years now. I used to argue with trolls and call out BS but last year, I grew tired of it and just locked down my account and have no interest in any drama outside my own followers.
It’s interesting to see how a lot of people are testing out new sites. Most of us expected Twitter to die out eventually, much like MySpace, Tribe, FB, and so many other social media sites have done over the past 20 years. Sadly, Twit is my fav and it’s sad to see this privileged megalomaniac try to ruin it.
Me too! I used to jump into crap like that all the time. After a while, I started asking myself if this was a conversation I wanted to have in five minutes, one hour, one day.. because if there’s one thing Twitter users know how to do, it’s draw out an argument.
Agreed, Valerie. One just kind of grows up eventually and stops spending time conversing with idiots.
Glad it’s not just me 😃
I don’t work in the business world, so I guess I am still struggling to understand this — why did the board force Musk to honor their deal and not let him out of it when it was clear he was just messing around and had no idea what he was doing? Letting him off seems like it would’ve been much better for the company.
I am speculating Twitter does not make a lot of money, it was trending downhill, the board saw an opportunity to jump ship and did.
44billion? Elon is an idiot.
His ego to be seen as some saviour of free speech is insane.
There was no guaranteed income after the clown show leading to the actual purchase.
Twitter ensured that he did not get to devalue the company and walk away.
He has to pay $1B per year to service the debt.
Spin will further devalue it to maybe it being sold for 10% of this purchasing price.
Is he using other people’smoney or his own? It is $18B in d debt..
This would be examined in business class in the near future.
An exercise of hubris and stupidity.
Better for the company and consumers, but his offer was basically $20 billion more than the company was worth, so it was the absolute best deal for the shareholders. And getting top dollar for the shareholders took precedence over everything else.
To piggyback @NCWoman’s comments: the law requires the board to maximize shareholder value. Musk’s offer was far more than the company was worth, so they had a legal obligation to close it in order to maximize value for the shareholders. Otherwise, the shareholders would have sued the company.
And, let us not forget, the board and the C-suite made out like bandits. Many of them are nice people and they do care, up to a point, but tens of millions of dollars would entice most of us jump ship too.
I remember when people used to pretend that Elon Musk was the inspiration for RDJ’s Iron Man. Suuuuuuure.
I never used to follow /care about him, but I’ve known exactly what he is since he tweeted that that rescue diver was a pedo for in response to him shooting down his (quite frankly ridiculous) cave submarine.
Damn right. That was the first time I ever heard of him, and WTF? And then he GOT AWAY WITH IT AND WON THE LAWSUIT? The FUCK?!?!
Hated him since.
I would not trust this dude to send anyone to Mars. Right now, the only thing they would land on Mars is the human version of raspberry jam, but even if they could figure out how to land on Mars, I wouldn’ty want to have my life depend on Musk’s whims. He could decide to forgo resupplies of key resources because an astronaut hurt his fee-fees.
If humans go to Mars, NASA will take them there, sometime in the 2040s at the soonest.
I WANT to support space exploration! But Elon is so fucking stupid I’m legitimately afraid some astronauts are going to get blown up again.
So does this make Twitter the small child at the end of The Emperor’s New Clothes who points out he’s naked?
Jack D crocodile tears -don’t cry about employees yet stay in orbit of you know who. Jack D could care less, in that wealthy libertarian mindset.
What this comes down to is that arguably, the most powerful social media tool will fall into disarray. The new owner should tread lightly, it may run out of gas before it destroys democracy…Big advertisers cringe at being associated with, let alone supporting the “hellscape”….
He’s a dangerous, ridiculous clown. Today he’s endorsing the GOP and sending pictures of Nazis. I notice my usual feeds and people I follow are missing from my timeline and more trolls showing up. As soon as there’s a viable alternative I’m out of there.
Hey crybabies – you can survive without Twitter. I have for 49 yrs.
If you don’t like it, don’t use it and kindly stfu already.
I definitely don’t need it and don’t have it… Reading a book is much nicer…
Twitter has actually, unfortunately, become extremely important for journalism. Also for writers and small businesses to promote themselves. Also for worldwide news and things like supporting Ukraine.
If you don’t like people complaining about something very important to them, maybe you’re the one who should kindly stfu and go do something else with your infinitely valuable time?
(Btw, I’m not on Twitter. I hate that place. That doesn’t mean I can’t care about other people.)
I have some thoughts about the seeming reliance of contemporary journalism on Twitter. I don’t particularly like going to the NYT or the WaPo and reading an article that’s based on an embedded tweet. It just seems, I don’t know, lazy? I DO get the importance of social media in people’s professional lives. It’s invaluable for networking, which is what I use it for myself although I’m not on Twitter. JC is obviously an unneeded troll in this space, but iMO it is worth taking some time to think about why and how we use it, and whether it’s necessary.
Elon and Jack… smart but loathsome. Ever since I read an article about Dorsey only eating one meal a day so he can work more, I picture him as a variation of Elizabeth Holmes and her black turtleneck. Sure, Jack. Your disordered eating is making the world better place.
He knows very well what he is doing.
1. By firing the staff responsible for content management, he opened up the Twitter for: false information, election lies – all ahead of US midterms. Hoping to influence the election results.
2. Adding blue checkmark for 8 dollars, he opened up the space for RUSSIAN TROLL FARMS & bots to get verified, some already are. Not only this might influence the US election, but reduces credibility of Ukrainians & allies – which may affect the course of war.
3. Not to mention he has access to personal messages – which will joy to China, ruSSia and the Saudi’s.
4. All mentioned above will also influence the content – getting rid of unwanted opinions. To be honest, the US administration should have stopped the transaction. And I am baffled why they did not
It’s a disaster.