Musk & Twitter: How did it all start and how could it end?

In recent months there has been more and more noise around Elon Musk related to his decisions to manage Twitter and many people are wondering why he suddenly needed this social network and how this story can turn out. The editors of Bright Uzbekistan decided to write about it in detail based on an objective analysis.

A $44 billion deal

After months of uncertainty, dramatic statements and lawsuits, the richest man on the planet finally bought Twitter for a whopping $44 billion. On October 26 this year, the company went from being a publicly traded company to a private one, with Elon Musk as its sole owner.

Twitter's "Chief."

The founder of SpaceX and Tesla announced the completion of the deal on his (now literal) Twitter.

"The bird is freed," he tweeted at first, and then he decided why be modest and signed himself "Chief Twitter''.

New boss, new rules.

The first thing Musk did after acquiring the company was to conduct a personnel purge and fire almost the entire management team. CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal and Director of Legal and Internal Policy Vijaya Gadde left the company.

"I did it for humanity." With this, Musk justified his reasons for buying TwitterThe businessman says he is not driven by material interests, but by humanistic ones: he wants to help humanity have a dialogue.


"Civilization should have a digital town square where a wide range of issues can be discussed in a healthy environment without the need to resort to violence," Musk writes, while acknowledging that this mission may also fail.

According to Musk, now there is a serious risk that social networks will divide into two closed camps - the extreme right and the extreme left, and this could lead to the growth of hatred and deepening of the rift in society. He argues that he wants to change the situation in which people are locked into their "information bubbles" and listen only to those who share their views.

Musk has spoken repeatedly in the past about how much he wants to deregulate Twitter and ease moderation so that more diverse opinions can be heard on the social network. (The social network has long been accused of its moderators favoring left-liberal beliefs, something the company has always denied.)
But now the entrepreneur clarifies that the platform should remain a "welcoming place" where laws are respected, rather than becoming "a hell of a gathering where everyone is welcome."

Free Speech for All!American journalist David Leavitt notes that in the last hours, shortly after the announcement of Musk's purchase of Twitter, there has been a sudden increase in radicalized users, which is noticeable if you type the words "holocaust" or racist slurs into a search engine.


Musk's Business Plan and "Super App X"

Over the summer, Musk hinted that he planned to make Twitter earn more than it spends by quadrupling its revenue to $26.4 billion by 2028.

Musk's most intriguing move to buy Twitter promises to be "X, an app for everything," a multifunctional smartphone app that promises to combine social networking, messenger, personal finance management, food ordering, and other features. In June, in a meeting with Twitter employees, Musk explained that the app should work similarly to China's WeChat. "In China, people practically live on WeChat. If we can replicate something like this in Twitter, we'll be a big success," Musk said at the time. In early October, he wrote on his Twitter account that buying the company would accelerate the development of the X app.

But some Western experts consider the idea of the new Twitter owner a failure.

"Musk has demonstrated a superficial understanding of the problems facing Twitter and social media in general. His self-proclaimed 'free speech maximalism' is destined to come into strong conflict with the social justice mission of many Twitter employees. And his plans to use Twitter as a 'universal app' are murky at best," says American journalist Brad Stone.

Massive layoffs

Either Stone was right about the controversy between the employees and their new manager, or Musk decided to cut costs at the company this way, in general, whatever the reason, the result was the dismissal of half of Twitter employees.

But a few hours later, the dismissed employees claimed, they received letters saying that if they agreed, the company was willing to cancel their layoffs. The company reached out to both engineers and designers to get them back.

Twitter bankruptcy: motivation from Musk or a real threat?

Musk said during his first official address to Twitter employees that the company could go bankrupt if it did not bring in more money.
The new "Twitter Chief" issued several stern warnings to the company's employees. In particular, employees need to prepare for an 80-hour work week and a reduction in office privileges, such as free food. Along with that, Elon Musk banned employees from working remotely.
According to Bloomberg sources, the billionaire has used the threat of financial collapse to motivate employees in the past.

Pay-it-forward: Twitter Blue, a $20-a-month tick, pay-it-forward Twitter

Meanwhile, Musk sees the company's salvation in his decision to make Twitter paid.

He plans to change the terms of Twitter Blue's paid subscription, which gives users of the microblogging network access to a number of premium features.
Specifically, the company plans to raise the monthly subscription price to $19.99 from the current $4.99, as well as exclude access to news articles from the package without viewing ads. People who are verified before the platform update will have 90 days to buy a subscription. Otherwise, they will have their "checkmark" taken away.

Also Elon Musk wants to make paid access to the social network. It is assumed that the social network will have a monthly limit for free use, after which it will be necessary to subscribe in order to continue browsing.

Will Trump return to Twitter?

The biggest question after Musk's acquisition of Twitter was the unlocking of former President Donald Trump's account. Many of his political opponents feared that once Musk became head of Twitter, Trump could easily gain access to his account back, which would be his main weapon in the Congressional Senate election. But that hasn't happened so far, and slyly avoiding an unequivocal answer to that question, Musk left this post on his Twitter page:

"If I got a dollar every time someone asked me if Trump would return to this platform, Twitter would mint money!" - the American billionaire wrote.

Kill Twitter or save it?

According to Canada's National Observer columnist Max Fossett: Musk is not going to fight the spread of misinformation or conspiracy theories on Twitter, as he loudly proclaims to the world.

"Musk is going to kill Twitter. Officials in countries where Twitter operates need to regulate social media platforms more aggressively and prevent them from serving as amplifiers of misinformation, fear and hatred. The proliferation of conspiracy theories around COVID-19 on these platforms and the damage to public health and safety should be all the proof that governments need to act," Fossett said.

Why Musk decided to buy Twitter knows only he himself, but what will be the result of it, will he kill it, as some predict, or will he save it by opening a new page in the history of this social network, we will not guess, because it is very difficult to predict the next steps of the man who offered Putin a duel for the fate of an entire country!

Khusniya ALIMOVA