The Twitterverse is becoming the Elonverse
Elon Musk is Twitter’s biggest shareholder and new board member. (Photo: BusinessInsider)
Last week, Elon Musk became Twitter’s biggest shareholder after he snapped up a 9.2% stake in the social media platform. The ironic thing is the tech billionaire—an avid tweeter—didn’t even post about his acquisition.
Could it be because his stake is a “passive investment” under US laws? Although, “passive” and Musk do not make sense.
Well, what do you know…the Tesla head honcho filed a new disclosure on his Twitter Inc. stake with the Securities and Exchange Commission, admitting that he invested in the company with the goal of effecting change and that his stock purchases began months ago—why are we not shocked?
That’s why the latest announcement, that Musk will join Twitter's board, comes as no surprise. "Through conversations with Elon in recent weeks, it became clear to us that he would bring great value to our Board," shared Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal. Even Twitter founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey welcomed Musk’s board involvement.
Or, could it be that Twitter avoided a potential hostile takeover by Musk by giving him a board seat, with the caveat that he doesn’t amass more than a 14.9% stake in the social media platform? He has a history of takeovers, just ask Martin Eberhard.
“Great value” also applied to Twitter shares. That the company’s value jumped by more than a quarter the day Musk revealed his stake shows that investors are hyped for some real change. A Twitter employee who was considering leaving the company because of its low stock price, said he may reconsider if the stock value holds.
With its rising stock value, tons of free publicity, and Musk behaving (so far), this looks like a win for Twitter, for now. We have no idea what Musk has in store for the company. But if he were going for a more laissez faire approach to content moderation, digital censorship, and the platform’s handling of free speech, the honeymoon period might be over soon.
We’re still not clear on Musk’s plan, but knowing the man, there’s no doubt the Twitterverse is going to change. One possible outcome is that Musk’s board seat makes him back away from shitposting—but hey, that’s the fun part.
Read the first part of this story here.
