Hi man.if Inflation makes everything more expensive, so why are stock prices falling? 401(k) required.
plain landscape
In the months since Elon Musk has been trying to take control of Twitter, his impulses seem to have made no sense. This is someone who focuses on using big science to solve big problems. He runs two huge, inspiring companies, Tesla and SpaceX, both of which face enormous challenges. He has another company that wants to solve brain problems, and another company that wants to dig tunnels under big cities. He has seven children…sorry, nine. He has to figure out how to get to Mars. Something, however, has made him so obsessed with running a 16-year-old business on the basis of fleeting self-expression that he has risked billions of dollars and endless distractions to do so, at least not before he did it. This was before I changed my mind.
The only explanation seems to lie in Musk’s own use of the platform — 18,600 tweets. Twitter can drive people crazy. It makes them do and say things they might not do. Few people fall for it like Elon Musk.
So it’s no coincidence that Twitter’s lawsuit demanding Musk complete the deal after Musk withdrew his takeover offer relies heavily on…his tweets. Just in the filing, the company’s lawyers intercepted them to build their case, starting with an irreverent pun that Musk made to suggest he was about to make a tender offer. (He cites Elvis’ tune “Love Me Tender” and cites F. Scott Fiztgerald’s 1934 novel tenderness is night.) The filing used Musk’s tweets to refute his claims that the deal was invalid because the company misled him about bot traffic on the platform. It also includes multiple instances in which Musk used Twitter to disparage Twitter, the company he ostensibly wanted to acquire. Perhaps most damning was Musk’s response to Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal’s post about the company’s efforts to curb bots: a tweet that consisted of a poop emoji. Quoting the briefing: “For Musk, Twitter, the interests of its shareholders, the deal Musk agreed to, and the court process to enforce it all appear to constitute a well-crafted joke.”
While I’m not a lawyer, this seems like a smart legal strategy. I know from the personal experience of a junior high school vice-principal that when you think the whole process is a joke, those in power don’t like it. Even the most impartial judges may be reluctant to accept Musk’s arguments while he scoffs at the venerable regulations that bring order to our financial system.
Is this behavior Twitter’s fault? I’m sure it’s not uncommon for top executives to talk trash in the privacy of a corner office. But Twitter can lure impulsive people to share these private thoughts with the world. Musk’s wealth must have made him feel invincible from the start, with 100 million followers rewarding his online activity with likes, retweets and supportive comments. Apparently it’s too easy to add trolling to the takeover — and it’s obviously fun.
