Musk Takes Twitter.
“After months of waffling, lawsuits, verbal mudslinging and the near miss of a full blown trial, Elon Musk now owns Twitter.
On Thursday night, Mr. Musk closed his $44 billion deal to buy the social media service, said three people with knowledge of the situation. He also began cleaning house, with at least four top Twitter executives — including the chief executive and chief financial officer — getting fired on Thursday. Mr. Musk had arrived at Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters on Wednesday and met with engineers and ad executives.
The closing of the deal, which followed months of drama and legal challenges as Mr. Musk changed his mind about buying the company, sets Twitter on an uncertain course. Mr. Musk, a self-described “free speech absolutist,” has said that he wants to make the social media platform a more freewheeling place for all types of commentary and that he would “reverse the permanent ban” of former President Donald J. Trump from the service.”
Elon Musk completed a 44 billion dollar takeover over of the wildly successful social media company. Heads of social media companies are increasingly viewed as gatekeepers of the market place of ideas who decide what views are heard or more importantly heard loudly. The influence of media platforms like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, on elections have been of keen interest to foreign governments that try and to exert influence to achieve the results they want. Elon Musk’s next moves will be highly scrutinized especially as the 2022 Midterms arrive.
