humancode.us

Funding Secured

July 9, 2022

elon

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/07/09/twitter-elon-musk-deal/

As Musk moves to abandon deal, Twitter faces ‘worst case scenario’

Analysts and employees warned Musk set the stage for a turbulent period, which could carry financial risks and leave workers more frustrated.

Any opinion piece on Elon’s now-botched attempt to buy Twitter needs to present the very plausible idea that Elon was never serious about buying Twitter in the first place, and that he just got bored of the deal; and that his complaints about bots are just an excuse for his petulance.

Remember when Elon tweeted about taking Tesla private (“funding secured”!), and it turned out to be just another spontaneous, narcissistic prank? Yeah, this is like that.

I’m no legal expert, but I think Elon is going to just end up paying the $1B breakup fee (0.5% of his wealth, so no big whoop) and just walk away, leaving a wake of chaos behind him for someone else to clean up.

I suspect he never had any interest in running Twitter. He just wanted to be the center of attention on the platform for a while, and flex the fact that he was so rich that he could—if he actually wanted to—control the medium.

Remember that the next time he threatens to buy yet another company on a whim.

Funding secured.