509
Elon Musk tells advertisers: ‘Go fuck yourself’ - The Verge
(www.theverge.com)
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 30 Nov 2023
509 points (93.1% liked)
World News
39167 readers
1126 users here now
A community for discussing events around the World
Rules:
-
Rule 1: posts have the following requirements:
- Post news articles only
- Video links are NOT articles and will be removed.
- Title must match the article headline
- Not United States Internal News
- Recent (Past 30 Days)
- Screenshots/links to other social media sites (Twitter/X/Facebook/Youtube/reddit, etc.) are explicitly forbidden, as are link shorteners.
-
Rule 2: Do not copy the entire article into your post. The key points in 1-2 paragraphs is allowed (even encouraged!), but large segments of articles posted in the body will result in the post being removed. If you have to stop and think "Is this fair use?", it probably isn't. Archive links, especially the ones created on link submission, are absolutely allowed but those that avoid paywalls are not.
-
Rule 3: Opinions articles, or Articles based on misinformation/propaganda may be removed. Sources that have a Low or Very Low factual reporting rating or MBFC Credibility Rating may be removed.
-
Rule 4: Posts or comments that are homophobic, transphobic, racist, sexist, anti-religious, or ableist will be removed. “Ironic” prejudice is just prejudiced.
-
Posts and comments must abide by the lemmy.world terms of service UPDATED AS OF 10/19
-
Rule 5: Keep it civil. It's OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It's NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
-
Rule 6: Memes, spam, other low effort posting, reposts, misinformation, advocating violence, off-topic, trolling, offensive, regarding the moderators or meta in content may be removed at any time.
-
Rule 7: We didn't USED to need a rule about how many posts one could make in a day, then someone posted NINETEEN articles in a single day. Not comments, FULL ARTICLES. If you're posting more than say, 10 or so, consider going outside and touching grass. We reserve the right to limit over-posting so a single user does not dominate the front page.
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
Lemmy World Partners
News !news@lemmy.world
Politics !politics@lemmy.world
World Politics !globalpolitics@lemmy.world
Recommendations
For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/
- Consider including the article’s mediabiasfactcheck.com/ link
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
He's not the only shareholder though.
First off, they didn't pay $44bn, that number includes a $13bn loan that Twitter took out to buy itself on behalf of the new owners. Musk paid ~$27 including fees, $20bn of this was Tesla stock (which since shortly after has been underperforming), then $5bn was other investors, including that Saudi Prince.
Edit: there was also Musk's existing shares, which iirc was around $2bn, but I think that's included in the $27bn - so his payment was something like $25bn, made up of $20bn in stock and $5bn in cash. /e
Musk is the majority owner, owning roughly around 26/31 of the value. However he isn't the only shareholder.
In any case the leveraged buyout has been structured with the intent of killing the business. There was never any sincere hope of paying off the $13bn debt, and the intent was all but proven when they almost immediately stopped paying rent on their offices. This might not have been the goal along, but since Musk was forced to make the purchase that's what it turned into.
What do you think is the endgame here? Im so lost with regard to this whole storyline
It's an interesting question.
Musk was forced to buy Twitter after accidentally promising to do so in legally binding terms. So, to a very great extent, there is no endgame, just the endless flailing of a rich kid who can't comprehend just how much luck (rather than genius) got him where he is.
But, his supporters are primarily far right authoritarians, and his partners in Twitter include some extremely authoritarian regimes which have an interest in being able to suppress speech (and have had more help to do so with X compared to old Twitter). And his idea of free speech is being able to say whatever he likes without criticism, which means silencing any ideas that could possibly be construed as criticism, whether directed at him or not. The standard far right nonsense. If you point out the existence of racism you're attacking white people. If you point out the existence of sexism you're attacking men. If you choose not to advertise on a website promoting far right ideas, you're attacking him personally.
Is he trying to turn Twitter into a more successful version of Gab or Truth Social, or is that just a by-product of his peculiar psyche? Is it with the intention of influencing elections, or is it just that his particular type of narcissism happens to be very useful to authoritarians? Are the ideas of the far right anything other than extreme narcissism anyway?
He's not an evil genius but evil clowns can do a lot of damage too.
There is no endgame plan. He is a fucking idiot that got rich on accident.
He got super-wealthy accidentally. He got rich because his father is rich.
Endgame now is to kill off Twitter (and grassroots public forums in general) then replace them with right wing alternatives. Musk's old friend Peter Thiel failed with Parler, with Twitter out the way they have a much stronger chance.
Meanwhile, as Twitter crashes and burns, they can experiment with ludicrous ideas. Most of them will fail, but anything they get away with becomes a template for whatever comes next.
Like I say, that wasn't the plan all along - most likely he just wanted to manipulate the stock price and make a bit of profit - but that's what this has turned into.
You think he's aware of Lemmy? What do you think he thinks about us if so?
No idea really, but I think he generally dismisses the platform as a non-threat. Which is good, I don't want him anywhere near it.
[excellent]
i don't know that this is certain. Withholding rent is not an uncommon tactic to force a landlord to renegotiate a lease (in fact, that was the stated reason for withholding rent, for whatever Elon's statements are worth). Certainly a very dirty one, and one that could blow up in his face if the landlord called his bluff and evicted him (last i heard they were handed an eviction notice in June, but I assume that's either currently being litigated or already settled). It may have been HIS intent, but that doesn't mean his shareholders weren't intent on being repayed.
Regardless, I think 'shareholder' is a bit misleading (even if completely accurate and justified), because people (possibly the original commenter) think of CEO's having fiduciary obligation to shareholders for publicly traded companies, and that's not the case here.
There are other contractual obligations he would have to his co-investors and lenders (more serious ones I think) if he's found guilty of intentionally tanking the company. I think that's probably why he's being so vocal here about it being the fault of the advertisers; if he tanks the company, whether he's held to those contracts or if he's allowed to declare bankruptcy depends on whether the plaintiff's can prove he tanked it intentionally. If he did (as I think is pretty clear to most people at this point) and he's found guilty of that, he'd be held liable for the total repayment of those loans plus whatever damages determined.
While he himself didn't pay $44b for twitter, he could end up personally paying that much if all of the above comes to fruition, and that's worst-case for him. Considering his net worth is mostly tied up in his other companies, he could stand to loose most of his net worth. If he gets tied up in a fraud trial, chances are high that his other companies' stock values would plunge, too (TSLA has a beta value of 2.3, which means it's more than twice as volatile as the rest of the market).
TLDR: Elon has every reason to be completely loosing his shit
I'm just picturing Elon slinging shit like arrows from a bow. LOOSE!
I'm leaving it, is a much better description of his current mental state.
Ah, I didn't realise that, thanks for the explanation.