Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter has been finalized, there’s a new sheriff in town, and the tech press is up in arms.

Musk in control of Twitter, ousts top executives, the AP screamed.

And what company doesn’t replace senior executives after an acquisition?

The Washington Post reported that Musk had been telling prospective investors that he planned to lay-off “75 percent of Twitter’s 7,500 workers” once he takes over, which he is now assuring them will not be the case, or at least not in those exact numbers. Although, according MSN via The New York Times, Elon Musk Is Said to Have Ordered Job Cuts Across Twitter.

Is this a newsflash? We reported back in April that Musk’s Twitter Pitch Featured Job Cuts.  What to speak of the fact that there are usually staff cuts/ replacements following an acquisition, and that tech, in general, is experiencing huge layoffs.

 

Are layoffs unwarranted? WATCH THIS ‘DAY IN THE LIFE’ VLOG OF A TWITTER EMPLOYEE (who made the video herself, mind you) AND YOU WON’T FEEL BAD ELON IS FIRING 75% OF THEM. The video went viral but was removed before Musk took over…In case you’re wondering why Musk’s inner circle worked through weekend to cement Twitter layoff plans, targeting the first 25%.

 

“Twitter users expressed concern over a surge of hate speech being reported on the platform since Mr. Musk took control. The National Basketball Association star LeBron James pointed to a report by the Network Contagion Research Institute, a private group that studies the spread of ideological content online, which said that the use of a racial slur on Twitter had increased by nearly 500 percent in the 12 hours after Mr. Musk’s deal was finalized,” said the MSN piece.

Finalized, mind you Had Musk even arrived at the office yet? Or was it that the Twitter employees decide to open the floodgates in response to the deal…

 

We will remind you that it was also back in April that we reported Musk wanted to own a media company, period, not unlike other tech billionaires. Yet the tech press was up in arms about it, including MSN (backed by billionaire Bill Gates), in a Bloomberg opinion piece (owned by billionaire Michael Bloomberg) published in the Washington Post (owned by billionaire Jeff Bezos).

 

But unlike owning a mere publication, Twitter is a town square through which one can wield a different kind of power and influence – and where both sides of an issue can potentially be aired. Yet look at the complexion of the people who had been deplatformed or shadowbanned under what we will call the Jack Dorsey Era (we know Parag Agrawal succeeded Dorsey just under a year ago, so who’s Twitter was it really?): people whose opinions were not in lockstep with the generally accepted talking points. In fact, Twitter Bans Conservative Author For Tweet Against Deplatforming, and if you believe Twitter isn’t a powerful platform, just ask Ye, nee Kanye West, who lost $2B in endorsements in a single day over a tweet. Or remember Arab Spring?

 

Musk contends that he purchased Twitter to once again open up the conversation/restore dialog.

“The reason I acquired Twitter is because it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner, without resorting to violence. There is currently great danger that social media will splinter into far right wing and far left wing echo chambers that generate more hate and divide our society.

“I didn’t do it to make more money,” Musk says. “I did it try to help humanity, whom I love . . . That said, Twitter cannot become a free-for-all hellscape where anything can be said with no consequences!”

 

Benjamin Franklin said, “Freedom of speech is a principal pillar of a free government; when this support is taken away, the constitution of a free society is dissolved, and tyranny is erected on its ruins,” and in case you missed it, Biden ordered social media to censor views conflicting his COVID-19 messaging – including those of respected doctors. This was not widely reported in the media, although what was widely reported was celebrities who were threatening to abandon Twitter with the Musk takeover and hey, there’s a cause for concern, considering Hollywood’s enormous contributions to the body of science, knowledge and wisdom.

 

But is it really over?

This just in from @elonmusk: Wachtell & Twitter board deliberately hid this evidence from the court. Stay tuned, more to come …

He’s Elon Musk and speaking of birds, the fox is now in the hen house. Feathers will fly…

 

Love him or hate him, Twitter is now very much in the hands of Elon Musk.  Hollywood et al may decide to stomp out of the room, and that’s certainly their prerogative, although there were celebrities who threatened to give up their US citizenship after the outcome of a certain national election a few years back. They didn’t. Musk is Musk and does and says what he pleases, and we doubt that the current eruption of histrionics from the media and various camps are going to sway him.

The beauty of the town square is that it is a forum where all voices and viewpoints have an opportunity to be heard, within the limits of the law, and that it’s not a soapbox for a singular point of view. If that’s the Twitter that you prefer – the one we’ve been witnessing for the past several years, truth be told, with Musk at the helm, it looks like that bird has flown. Onward and forward.