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Saturday, July 27, 2024

Musk’s twitter: ‘Free Speech’ or a Business pawn to influence

Surfing off the previous long abrupt deal between the social media giant Twitter and the founder of SpaceX, Elon Musk, on Wednesday became the richest man with the end deal of the purchase after much hassle on ground legal issues. The deal costing around $44 billion finally received the shareholders’ nod. 

Twitter already sued Elon Musk for allegedly violating the agreement. After a tough, turbulent, months-long courting, Musk announced in July that he was canceling his USD 44 billion purchase of the company. Since then, Musk has been involved in a heated legal spat with Twitter. Musk allegedly came under fire in the shareholder complaint, which was filed in late July, for rushing the acquisition with flimsy justifications. The five-day trial in the second third week of October in Delaware court ended in his favor which has been substantiated by the claims of the richest man on earth. 

What made Elon Musk interested in buying Twitter

Elon musk being an influential personality and owner of several companies is also known to spend minimal on advertisements. His short but humorous tweets do the job of advertisement quite well. 

Experts acquainted with the matter state that the influential power of twitter greatly fascinated Elon in this extravagant deal. The current market value of Twitter is $32 billion, which is much lower than the $44 billion offer made by Musk. It’s quite evident that the deal is not a two party deal but an investment into the face value of Elon’s other companies too.

Extension of Acquisition

During the hearing, the judge issues a determination regarding Musk’s duty to acquire the company and found Twitter’s legal representatives to be at fault while giving him an extension to complete the financial acquisition of one of the most powerful expository tools since the boom of the Internet began. Internationally as well as in Asia’s largest democratic country, Indian journalists have all gained mastery in staying informed and self-opinionated in the shortest possible words. 

The agreement soured, however, because Musk claimed Twitter misled him about the volume of spam and bot accounts using the service.

In May, he stated that he no longer desired to buy the company, and then again

Whistleblower claims Twitter spent $33 million in three months on a Musk deal while deceiving the public.

And the instances of face off between the company and Elon alleged cheating about the real number of users on the platform seemed  to cancel the deal last month. According to the firm, less than 5% of the social media platform’s monetizable daily active users (those who may view adverts) are bots. Musk asserts that it might potentially be significantly higher.

Is the Bird really free?

After the abrupt deal, Musk tweeted “the bird is freed” signifying that the twitter would now be bias free. As twitter has been alleged to have been in the hands of left extremists. And a few serious allegations like biased elections projections and political favoritism  have been continuously alleged against twitter, which the politicians argue to be true citing the banning of Donald trump from the social media platform. 

Soon after Elon Musk’s Twitter acquisition, the European Union asked the social media platform to abide by EU’s laws, tweeting that “the bird will fly by our rules” in Europe. This comes in response to Elon Musk’s tweet “the bird is freed”, referring to his Twitter purchase.  

Despite being a “free speech” freak, Elon’s huge investment in China does not allow him to comment against the country and even cost him several embarrassing U-turns in the last few years. The business struggle between Tesla and Chinese government backed  EV manufacturers in China compels Elon to woo the Chinese government on an international stage to save him with Chinese market access and production capacity. 

This personal and business biases may result in containment of Twitter’s aim of “free speech”to save Elon’s other business in China. Experts argue that Twitter in future may not be open to China’s criticism or any other country where Elon musk is interested.

Future of Twitter, to turn into Super App?

No doubt Musk is an extremist trying to promote a free speech world, with the EU raising its concern while many have weighed their opinion on the return of banned accounts or the possible reversible set of the new policy with the acquisition. 

Twitter has consistently refuted Musk’s assertions that the company’s official statistic for spam and bot accounts is much too low. Musk has been outraged over the number of spam and bot accounts he alleges clutter the site. He could issue a mass cull, although that might not be the most popular course of action since it will likely have an impact on everyone’s crucial follower counts.

His claim that his new business will launch “X, the everything app” is possibly the most fascinating hint he has given thus far. He hasn’t clarified that, but many have hypothesized that he’s talking about the development of a “super app” similar to WeChat in China, which would serve as a one-stop shop for social media, texting, finances, and food orders—basically, daily life administration.

Mr. Musk has made no secret of his love for cryptocurrencies, and Binance, the biggest cryptocurrency exchange in the world, is a proud investor in his vision (according to the press release I received just after 05:00 BST).

Could Twitter be set up to allow companies to take payments in cryptocurrencies? That would be a hit with crypto enthusiasts and a nightmare for those who caution that crypto is still a risky choice because it is unregulated and, as a result, unprotected in the event of a catastrophe.

We do know a few things about Mr. Musk, including his visionary, erratic, ambitious, and creative qualities. Changes are coming, we can almost assure it, and some Twitter followers have already expressed concern that it will turn them off.

Conclusion 

Elon’s plans may not be clear but new privately owned Twitter may be a boon to freedom or none other than other online dictatorship due to absence of investor’s opinion and accountability. Twitter has historically been reluctant to follow rules of India, we hope not to see this tussle in the country again.


Written by Avolu Theluo and Edited by Suraj Maurya


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