Author: Xiao Yang
After the world's richest man, Tesla CEO and SpaceX founder, Elon Musk may add a new title: Twitter boss.
On April 25, local time, Twitter's board of directors accepted Musk's acquisition proposal. Under the deal, Musk will buy Twitter for $54.20 per share. The deal, which is worth a total of about $44 billion, is scheduled to close in 2022. If all goes well, Twitter will become a privately held company.
Such large commercial acquisitions are usually carried out in secret, and the bargain is repeatedly tug-of-war until the transaction is successful. Microsoft's acquisition of Activision Blizzard in early 2022 is in this category, spanning 26 years from the first acquisition to the negotiated price.
In contrast, this Twitter deal is a pre-publicized acquisition, with a strong Musk style, making it unclear whether history has made a joke or whether the joke has become real history.
Musk attended TED2022 to talk about Twitter's reform plan. /Visual China
The world's richest man is acquiring at the same speed as a rocket
At the end of March 2022, Musk launched an online poll on Twitter with the participation of more than 2 million netizens, tentatively asking whether netizens felt that Twitter did not strictly adhere to the principle of free speech. Seeing that more than 70% of netizens replied "no", he asked whether to establish a new social platform.
"Do you think Twitter strictly adheres to the principle of 'free speech'? Results are important, carefully chosen. ”
Is Musk going to set up another portal? Amid the confusion, Musk announced on April 4 that he had bought 9.2% of Twitter's shares, promoting him to Twitter's largest individual shareholder.
When fans were expecting Musk to enter the Twitter board to point out the country, the world's richest man flatly refused. However, it does not prevent him from continuing to teach Twitter product managers with more than 83 million followers.
Musk asked whether to add an "edit" function after the content was published on Twitter, and once again launched an online vote. In order to resonate with netizens, known for his spelling cleanliness, he also deliberately misspelled yes and no in the options.
"Are you going to edit the button?"
After one "broken idea", Musk gathered the melon-eating crowd in the global technology community and then threw out his own acquisition plan: wholly-owned and privatized.
In the face of Musk's step by step, Twitter's board of directors tried to resist with the "poison pill plan". Musk ran to the TED conference to talk about the vision of reforming Twitter, shouting at the board: "If you don't buy it, I can buy out their shares, I don't like to fail." ”
The implication is that either Twitter will be sold to him, or he will release the stock he has on hand, causing the company's stock price to plummet. Twitter's board has and only option to accept Musk's purchase price.
From disclosing the intent to make the acquisition to reaching an agreement, it took less than a month. Musk bought Twitter at the same rate as a rocket.
Musk is known to be a superuser on the Twitter platform.
His verified account @elonmusk registered in June 2009 and has posted more than 17,000 tweets and gained more than 83 million followers. The number of followers on his account is the same order of magnitude as before former US President Trump was banned.
Musk's Twitter page.
Is it like the domineering president in the novel, because he loves to push, he bought the company?
"Free speech is the foundation of democracy, and Twitter is a digital town square where people discuss issues that are vital to the future of humanity, and Twitter has great potential." Musk wrote in the acquisition announcement. Later, he stressed that he didn't care much about the economic benefits of the deal.
Twitter is an English version of "Weibo", or a social platform that was benchmarked when "Weibo" was first launched. After 16 years of development, Twitter has 217 million users (mDAU) worldwide. Its user base ranks among the best in the world, but the growth in the number of users in recent years has shown weakness.
The social platform's revenue capacity is also not outstanding. In 2021, Google and Meta (formerly Facebook) had full-year revenue of $257 billion and $117 billion, respectively, while Twitter was only $5 billion. The business models of the three American companies are similar, and they are mainly free to use and earn advertising fees.
While Twitter isn't the largest or most lucrative social media, its world impact matters.
Politicians, celebrities, business tycoons and celebrities have formed the most eye-catching group of Twitter users, and they are willing to send their influence to the world day and night. Once upon a time, Trump's highest record was to post a message on Twitter on average every 7 minutes and 12 seconds, and his tireless gesture achieved the spectacle of "talking".
In addition to the gathering of opinion leaders, the influence of Twitter's main users is also higher. Twitter users are younger, earnier, and have a higher percentage of higher education than the overall demographics of the United States. To some extent, Twitter influences young and middle-class Americans, and even influences the election of the US election.
Aside from the former U.S. president who was expelled from Twitter, there may not be another Earthling who knows twitter's potential better than Musk.
You're sending characters Musk is sending prophecy
The tweet in Musk's hand is like the magic wand in the hands of wizards in the World of Harry Potter.
Tesla's stock price rose and fell, all thanks to a Tweet from Musk. On April Fool's Day 2018, he tweeted that "Tesla is bankrupt" and accompanied by photos of himself sleeping on the streets in papier-mâché. Tesla shares plunged 7% on the day.
In August of the same year, Musk tweeted that he "wants to take Tesla private," and Tesla's stock rose 13% the next day. Later, it was found that privatization could not be achieved, and Tesla's stock price turned downward.
In this regard, Tesla shareholders who have a bad heart have asked to review musk's tweets about Tesla. Musk's wayward remarks about playing social media even caught the attention of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), fining him $20 million.
In November 2021, Musk asked netizens online if he would approve of him selling 10% of the Tesla stock he held.
After Musk acquired Twitter, Tesla's stock price plummeted, and the market value evaporated by 800 billion yuan in one day. People are even beginning to worry about whether Musk's previous acquisition funds pledged with Tesla shares will be enough to pay.
Dogecoin has gone from a joke in the circle of engineers to the world's fourth-largest cryptocurrency, and it is inseparable from Musk's push on Twitter.
In February 2021, Musk sent a number of tweets in a row to support Dogecoin. When the price of Dogecoin fell repeatedly, Musk actively "rescued the market" on Twitter. Not only did he announce that his rocket company, SpaceX, would send Dogecoin to the moon in 2022, but he also said that dogecoin could be used to buy Tesla peripherals, pay for SpaceX services, and so on.
In the coin circle , " to the moon " means a soaring price.
Looking ahead to the future of Twitter, Musk has also proposed allowing Dogecoin to be used to buy Twitter's paid services. In this way, the price of Dogecoin soared by more than 20% after the Negotiation of the Twitter acquisition.
Musk's tweets are one after another, making it impossible to distinguish which one is the joke that rich people think of when they are squatting on the toilet, and which one is a prophecy that involves tens of billions of capital. What is clear to ordinary people is that Musk made many people rich overnight, and devoured many people's family property overnight.
In the recent Twitter acquisition, Musk once again showed how good he is at using Twitter to create viral marketing and add an accelerator to his business ambitions.
According to the Pew Research Center in the United States, 25% of super users publish 97% of the content on the Twitter platform, and the remaining 75% of users are almost diving, and even likes and retweets are very small. Twitter users who come and go don't have time to type, but it's okay to pick a "yes" or "no."
Pew's research shows that divers are more likely than active users to see multiple perspectives on Twitter.
When paving the way for the acquisition of Twitter, Musk used a series of guided questions to decide the direction of the public opinion tide.
In the 140-word tweet, Musk did not bother to discuss the boundaries and connotations of "free speech", only asking "Is the Twitter platform sufficient to uphold the principles of free speech?" Then, he took the Twitter big V mold that speaks once a year and asked, "Is Twitter dead?" ”
Musk listed the inactive head accounts on Twitter and asked everyone, "Is it dying here?" ”
From adding an "edit" button to a new platform or not, Musk puts his desired results into the minds of ordinary people.
For this practice, people who have watched the classic British drama "Yes, Minister" are estimated to be very familiar. There is a scene in the play where the secretary Humphrey sets up different guided questions to come up with the opposite public opinion result. Musk is nothing more than appropriating an old political ploy into tech deals.
The coin circle has turned upside down, NFTs have risen, and Internet people are looking forward to the arrival of "decentralized" Web 3.0. Looking left and right, people see a supercenter called "Musk", rising strongly on the Twitter map representing Web 2.0.
Whether it's building electric cars, building Mars bases or engaging in brain-computer interfaces, the things Musk loves to do are all mythological. Before Tesla, not many businessmen would believe that electric vehicles were the future of human transportation, let alone spend money on production lines.
Some media reporters questioned the theoretical breakthrough of the brain-computer interface, and Musk replied: "The idea of landing on the moon is easy to get, and the action of landing on the moon is difficult to achieve." ”
Musk believes that academia emphasizes theory over practice.
After more than 10,000 tweets, the louder the social media, the more likely Musk is to turn jokes in the eyes of others into reality.
The freedom of expression you think is not what you think it is
Musk has long described himself as an "absolutist of free speech."
In an interview with TED, he further revealed that he wanted to turn Twitter into an "inclusive, free-talking stage" where "people you don't like can express what you don't like."
After the acquisition was successful, Musk tweeted again to confirm: "Even the worst criticism of me, I hope to stay on Twitter." ”
Musk thinks it's okay for the worst criticism to stay on Twitter.
At first glance, Musk seems to be the embodiment of the reality that "if criticism is not free, praise is meaningless." Social media executives, however, could not praise it.
Twitter founder Jason Goldman angrily criticized: "Musk has taken a very naïve and unserious approach to content censorship. ”
About 10 years ago, the then CEO of Twitter promised that the social network "could bring anything users posted to the world."
Unfortunately, issues such as disinformation, racial violence and gender discrimination have deeply hurt the Wings of Freedom. To combat fake news, Twitter formed a fact-checking coalition and reintroduced traditional media coverage.
In 2021, Twitter "permanently banned" Trump's account, alarming the European top level: If a private company can make the president "shut down" at any time, is it difficult to guarantee the expression rights of ordinary people?
Trump's Twitter account was frozen.
In the face of many doubts, Musk did not say clearly which aspect of freedom of speech he wanted to let go. He responded with only one tweet: "Free expression within the limits permitted by law, but not beyond the law." ”
In addition to the censorship scale of social platforms, many people have also cast distrustful eyes on Musk himself.
Last year, Musk tweeted that dogcoin's English name (Doge) was pronounced "Egod" backwards. One user praised Musk as his god in the comments section, along with a hand-drawn portrait of Musk.com.
Kwamask is a god, and also pay attention to the use of diagrams.
That night, perfectionist Musk sent a private message to the user, asking him to delete that and stop holding a pencil in the future. "Free hand-drawn" does not exist, and as for "free expression", just listen to it.
Musk said he was "just trying to tweet funny things." But for some, his tweets often hovered on the edge of embarrassment and madness.
When 12 teenagers in Thailand were trapped in a cave in 2018, British diver Vernon Unsworth played an important role in the rescue operation. Musk proposed a mini submarine on Twitter to rescue him, but the British diver publicly vetoed Ma's proposal, believing it was a PR stunt and didn't work.
Musk hit back with a series of "tweets," calling the other side a "Pedo guy." The word originally meant pedophilia, but Musk's defense attorneys said it was just a lame joke.
I believe that many people have been shouted some ugly flower names when they were young. If you are shouted out by the "child king" in the class, this flower name will probably follow until graduation. In the age of social media, the power of verbal violence is likely to grow exponentially in the face of opinion leaders with tens of millions of followers.
Could the next "digital Kane" appear?
In addition to emphasizing "freedom of expression," Musk also wants to open up Twitter's algorithms so that users understand what mechanism determines their flow of information.
In recent years, Internet users have discussed the evil of algorithms. Under the influence of the algorithm, accurate recommendation ads induce more consumption, and users accidentally fall into the trap of "nipple music". Some media pointed out that flawed algorithm design may cause the "echo chamber effect" and aggravate the appearance anxiety and depression of adolescents.
Former Twitter executives talk about algorithms. /Surveillance Capitalism
In order to improve the transparency of the algorithm, Musk proposed to put the code of the Twitter algorithm on the technology forum Github and let people suggest changes, just like updating the Linux code.
I am afraid that this is yet another "speaking of a momentary, execution of the crematorium" proposal. Under the volume of the Twitter platform, the number of tweets posted per day is calculated in the billions. Even engineers within the company cannot explain the specific recommendation logic of the algorithm.
Michael Ekstrand, an expert in the field of algorithms in the United States, said that people outside the company who want to read algorithms must not only see the "mysterious" code, but also need to "master the data used to train the algorithm", such as likes, retweets and comments , but he stressed that this may involve personal privacy issues.
In fact, how complex the algorithm is, is it not clear to the Tesla boss who developed autopilot? As some experts suggest, if you want to improve the transparency of the platform, consider letting each user define the flow of information, which is simple and straightforward.
Still, Musk's long-awaited "Edit" button is already in beta, though Twitter's technical team says the feature has long been in demand for products, and it's a coincidence that there are similarities. As for other changes such as promoting paid use and encouraging Dogecoin trading, they have not yet been implemented.
Musk's lovely move to take Twitter privately may seem pompous, but it is by no means uncommon among the top billionaires, such as the 19th-century newspaper tycoon Hearst, whose movie "Citizen Kane" is based on the tycoon's entrepreneurial journey.
By the 21st century, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos bought The Washington Post, followed by Silicon Valley software giant Salesforce founder Mark Benioff bought Time magazine. From newspapers to magazines to social media, the trajectory of the richest man's acquisitions has rippled through the media.
Stills from Citizen Kane.
With the development of social media, we have entered the "post-truth era". The term "post-truth" first appeared in the US "National" magazine in 1992 to describe a kind of public opinion ecology, that is, "the influence of emotion on public opinion exceeds the facts themselves."
After successfully winning the tweet this time, the fans' admiration for Musk reached a new climax. Musk tweeted that "next I'm going to buy Coca-Cola and add cocaine back," and then said, "I'm going to buy McDonald's and fix all the ice cream machines."
These marginal acquisition ideas have aroused heated discussion among netizens, and the media has followed up to analyze the possibility of privatizing Coca-Cola. In the face of those expectant little eyes, Musk hastened to send a message clarifying that "I can't create miracles."
Jokes are too much, and everyone thinks it's true.
In the past, we have seen many waves of public opinion that Musk has set off on Twitter, and now we want to see what kind of changes he will bring to Twitter. After all, Elon Man's Iron Man Topic Maker Musk is probably more unpredictable than algorithms.
Resources
[1] Musk, the world's richest man, bought Twitter for $44 billion! 丨China News Service
[2] Twitter "Barbarian at the Door" – What does Musk want? 丨 Zhao Ying
[3] What would happen to the world if Musk bought Twitter? 丨 The New York Times
[4] Elon Musk calls British diver in Thai cave rescue 'pedo' in baseless attack丨The Guardian
[5] Elon Musk bought Twitter. Here's what he says he'll do next丨NPR
[6] Elon Musk wants Twitter’s algorithm to be public. It is not that simple 丨Day to News
[7] What would Musk do if he bought Twitter? 丨Titanium Media
[8] Twitter's 15th anniversary丨 All-media faction
[9] Musk called Dogecoin a "scam" and rushed to "rescue the market" after the big fall