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African Musk: Not a Fragrance
I see that the shit-eating Trump Monkey Elon Musk has finalized his purchase of 'Twitter' at four times its value. He has done it, wait for this: 'for humanity', a claim that would be preposterous were it not in common with his other grandiloquent statements, such as his justification for spending billions of dollars on getting people to inhabit Planet Mars: if humans are to survive, they must become a multi-planet species. (not a direct quote, I haven't checked).
What absolute tosh. Not so much Total Recall as Total Bunk. Humans are based on Planet Earth for a simple reason: life here is possible. You can breathe the air, drink the water, grow food. In the tv series on Musk one of his employees or former employees at Tesla claims a series of nuclear blasts on Mars will release the riches of the planet sub-surface, which along with the claim a million -or is it a billion people (white people, presumably)- will live there is beyond lunacy. Would it even be legal?
Brian Cox, an English physicist/cosmologist produced a programme that imagined what it would be like to be on the range rover on Mars, yet both he and Musk need only head down to the Atacama Desert in Chile if they want to know what life on Mars will be like, only they can at least breathe the air. Why won't they do it?
House people on Mars, but not the homeless of Los Angeles. What a waste of money!
I don't know what will happen to Twitter, and I don't much care, only that it be liable for prosecution- or is Twitter to be above the law? 'Absolute free speech' we are told, is what Musk wants, and there are plenty of Twitter accounts that glorify the Nazi's and the Holocaust -all of which is illegal in Germany and successfully erased from social media platforms, according to the BBC news today. Does Musk think Nazi's should be free to air their views? Maybe he wants to give Putin 'a chance' to 'set the record straight', much as some would like his Dad Errol to be more transparent about the family wealth which Elon claims he had no access to. Just as even more want to know how much tax-payer's money subsidized the 'self-made' Billionaire.
Spray it on, if you like the smell. To me, it stinks.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Twitter - concerns yes of course but the rest of your piece ffs get a grip.... watch this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rPZOIFbtbig
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
So what's the premise here - mankind won't be able to manage a shift away from fossil fuels to keep this planet habitable but we will be able to manage a mass migration to Mars and work out how to survive there?
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
rodinuk
Ok it was a bit over the top, but I enjoyed writing it. When a man walks into the billion-dollar company he has just bought carrying a sink, it's because he thinks he is both funny and clever, and he is neither. It makes him look like a fool who has been parted from his money, but as someone pointed out in The Guardian today, when a man reaches the level of wealth Musk has, but is not lauded as the Greatest Genius in the World, he must do what he can to shape the public view of him -that he is indispensable to mankind, a visionary, above all, important.
An engineer once told me that once you master the basics, space travel is impressive, but not as impressive as the Mardi Gras Pipeline network in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico. It is perhaps ironic that the issues of survivability in space are also met in the deep ocean, on a planet we live on, which contains multiple inputs to the ocean ecology and more general environment that makes life here possible, desirable and welcome.
It is of no interest to Musk because I don't think he is that interested in the Planet he lives on, but I accept he likes things. And things that make money. And that is about it, really. And who is going to give up life on Earth for a distant planet from which they can never return? Some weirdos, mostly white people -does Musk really think the goat and camel herders from the Sahel to the Empty Quarter, or the illiterate peasants of Central America are going to go and live on Mars? Come on, let us for once have a sane debate about what matters, because of space exploration we can say, Nice to have, not need to have.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
I suspect you're part of the British pysche that likes to knock people down whereas I'm part of those who prefer to build them up.
What is it you want? Would you prefer it if Musk had never lived at all? Do you not want people who have at least some vision in trying to find solutions for the future? It's not about what's impressive it's that he can deliver - reusable rocketry saving billions for example.
I would think he would have no trouble finding people to live on Mars especially if life deteriotates here. Tell me why there couldn't be an Earthbound space transport back to Earth? They're not marooned there afaik. Are engineers and scientists, adventurers, pioneers just weirdos to you?
I hate to break it to you but Musk probably isn't considering camel herders and illiterate peasants as townsfolk on Mars.
If you want a sane debate try keeping it real.... that's what matters
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
You make a fair point, as someone I used to know complained I always saw the negatives in things. To which I would say my hostility is based on what I perceive as a lack of honesty on Musk's part, and a misplaced perception of what matters most. I do understand the vision thing, the role that pioneers have played across a wide range of activities in science, medicine, the arts and often the pain and loss it caused, and I do understand the fascination with Space and how much we have learned about the Universe over the centuries. I probably feel cool or hostile to people who make themselves the focus of what they are doing.
Whatever Musk has achieved he did not achieve alone, certainly not in financial terms, and his stunts, like the sink, to me suggest a man with an ego that one either finds fun, or just plain silly- I take the latter view. I am not sure too what it is that he has created -even in the case of the more admirable Bill Gates, he did not make Microsoft on his own, but did start it from nothing, and it has had a more transformative impact on our lives than anything Musk has done, so far. And then I guess some will argue Microsoft got big by swallowing or destroying the opposition, but that's business. So to me, Musk in business is more like Trump than Gates and suffers because of it.
The engineering is indeed impressive, but as I argued above, it is not as impressive as the Mardi Gras Pipeline network. And in the long term we know we don't need rockets, except to carry weapons of human destruction, and to put satellites into orbit, and in time, we won't need deep water pipelines.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Fitzcarraldo
Will his content moderation policy be applied to his own tweets?
https://www.theguardian.com/technolo...il-free-speech
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
rodinuk
I would think he would have no trouble finding people to live on Mars especially if life deteriotates here. Tell me why there couldn't be an Earthbound space transport back to Earth? They're not marooned there afaik. Are engineers and scientists, adventurers, pioneers just weirdos to you?
It still seems disingenuous to me. Elon Musk made his fortune selling EVs to people who cared enough about the planet to spend $$ on reducing carbon emissions. Without that, none of his other projects woud have been possible.
Now he supports a political movement that denies there is any problem and claims that we can't move away from fossil fuels because it will be too costly and disruptive. But never mind, he says, if the earth becomes uninhabitable I can sell you a ticket to another planet for even bigger $$.
Even if the technological challenges can be overcome, it's sure to be a very expensive option that will be feasible for only wealthy people. Moreover, it makes no sense from a societal viewpoint because shifting away from fossil fuels would be far less costly and disruptive than moving to another planet.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
He bought twitter because he wanted to promote the idea of "free speech" on a privately owned platform. The problem is that the platform is subject to market pressures and companies don't want to be associated with the kinds of ideas he thinks were unjustly deprived of dissemination. The following are groups of people who feel disenfranchised. It will be interesting to see whether he can actually invite all of them back without having all of twitter's sponsors leave or be subject to boycotts:
-anti-vaxxers. Musk himself said in early 2020 that he thought "coronavirus panic is dumb". Here we are millions of deaths later.
-People who promote dangerous views that get people killed (like injecting bleach) or ineffective treatments. They were booted bc they're nuts and have no place in a civilized conversation. He thinks the best ideas will win out if only you let cranks and nazis in on the conversation? The problem is that these people are more prolific than scientists and historians and more convincing to people who know nothing.
For people who believe there's no such thing as truth, popularity determines right and wrong. Some people think if you see someone inject himself with bleach and die bc he thinks it treats covid, that's good evidence it's a dumb idea and dangerous to disseminate.
-Nazis and racists. The people his biggest fans think he'll bring back to twitter include literal nazis and racists.
-People spreading misinformation to discourage others from voting. The people championing him feel disenfranchised bc they're not able to tell demographics they don't like (they often target black people and latinos) that the election is on the wrong day. Anyone can fall for their lies but given they're Republicans they're fairly certain most minorities don't want to vote for their asses.
-spreading election fraud theories intended to get people to literally wage war against their elected leaders because they believe the type of stuff that fascists promote and stupid people believe.
Is it a shock that this guy was spreading lies about a politician's husband who is 82 and was beaten with a hammer? It really isn't. This is the kind of stuff he is trying to normalize. The idea that Elon Musk is very intelligent is in a losing battle against the reality of Musk expressing himself.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
To be clear, I'm not suggesting anyone should pass a law to stop this project or that nobody should be spending money on space travel. I just don't think we should be celebrating him as some great contributor to humanity.
It may be possible to separate a person's achievements from their politics when the two are unrelated, but I don't see how it is possible then they are clearly at odds; ie someone claiming to be a man of science supporting a political party that is anti-science.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
I don't know the answer to the question, there might not be one, but what makes the best CEO of a large corporation?
Some time ago there was some report or analysis that suggested Psychopathic tendencies make for the best bosses, but I am not sure. If it is about making ruthless decisions for the good of the firm, then maybe.
On the other hand, I would suggest the CEO who is prepared to delegate decision making to more junior staff, who is Collegiate in the way he or she operates, who doesn't spend more time in the Media than the office, is a more effective leader.
In this context, I am not sure how Collegiate Musk is. Watching the tv programmes on him on the BBC, I get the impression he sacks people who disagree with him, or don't meet his targets, even if they are not realistic. One former executive involved in bringing forth one of the EV's was moved to tears when recounting how the workers exhausted themselves to get the latest model into the showroom, but I wondered why if the vehicle would have made it a week later and that mattered, though it mattered to Musk. Again, compare Sir Philip Green with some other CEO's in the UK, and it is not hard to see how and why he profited handsomely while the firm he ran collapsed.
Looked at historically, not many firms survive 100 years. Can Twitter survive? I don't know. But I recall around 20 years ago people were talking of the 'MySpace Generation' when it was all the rage -until it disappeared. Facebook -or Meta- dominates, but will it still be around in its present form in 10 or 100 years time? And who is the best or the worst -Zuckerberg or Musk?
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
filghy2
It still seems disingenuous to me. Elon Musk made his fortune selling EVs to people who cared enough about the planet to spend $$ on reducing carbon emissions. Without that, none of his other projects woud have been possible.
Now he supports a political movement that denies there is any problem and claims that we can't move away from fossil fuels because it will be too costly and disruptive. But never mind, he says, if the earth becomes uninhabitable I can sell you a ticket to another planet for even bigger $$.
Even if the technological challenges can be overcome, it's sure to be a very expensive option that will be feasible for only wealthy people. Moreover, it makes no sense from a societal viewpoint because shifting away from fossil fuels would be far less costly and disruptive than moving to another planet.
He made his fortune before that, via PayPal.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Fitzcarraldo
He made his fortune before that, via PayPal.
Zip2 before Paypal, and note the comments people made on Musk as a businessman -
"In 1995, Musk, his brother Kimbal, and Greg Kouri founded Zip2.[41][42] Errol Musk provided them with $28,000 in funding.[43] The company developed an Internet city guide with maps, directions, and yellow pages, and marketed it to newspapers.[44] They worked at a small rented office in Palo Alto,[45] Musk coding the website every night.[45] Eventually, Zip2 obtained contracts with The New York Times and the Chicago Tribune.[46][unreliable source?] The brothers persuaded the board of directors to abandon a merger with CitySearch;[47] however, Musk's attempts to become CEO were thwarted.[48] Compaq acquired Zip2 for $307 million in cash in February 1999,[49][50] and Musk received $22 million for his 7-percent share.[51]
X.com and PayPal
Main articles: X.com, PayPal, and PayPal Mafia
Later in 1999, Musk co-founded X.com, an online financial services and e-mail payment company.[52] X.com was one of the first federally insured online banks and over 200,000 customers joined after its initial months of operation.[53] Even though Musk founded the company, investors regarded him as inexperienced and replaced him with Intuit CEO Bill Harris by the end of the year.[54]
In 2000, X.com merged with online bank Confinity to avoid competition,[45][54][55] as Confinity's money-transfer service PayPal was more popular than X.com's service.[56] Musk then returned as CEO of the merged company. His preference for Microsoft over Unix-based software caused a rift among the company's employees, and led Peter Thiel, Confinity's founder, to resign.[57] With the company suffering from compounding technological issues and the lack of a cohesive business model, the board ousted Musk and replaced him with Thiel in September 2000.[58][b] Under Thiel, the company focused on the money-transfer service and was renamed PayPal in 2001.[60][61]
In 2002, PayPal was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion in stock, of which Musk—the largest shareholder with 11.72% of shares—received $175.8 million.[62][63] In 2017, more than one and a half decades later, Musk purchased the X.com domain from PayPal for its sentimental value.[64][65] In 2022, Musk discussed a goal of creating "X, the everything app".[66]".
Elon Musk - Wikipedia
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
He sold his interest in Zip2 for $22 million, and then Paypal for $176 million, which gave him the start to buy into other things. However, most of his net worth - recently estimated at $210 billion - comes from his interest in Tesla. That interest is currently worth around $120 billion, but it was much higher a year ago.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...Os-riches.html
https://www.forbes.com/sites/rachels...h=615aea303ea4
I see he has described himself as Chief Twit, so he does get some things right.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Stavros
I don't know the answer to the question, there might not be one, but what makes the best CEO of a large corporation?
Some time ago there was some report or analysis that suggested Psychopathic tendencies make for the best bosses, but I am not sure. If it is about making ruthless decisions for the good of the firm, then maybe.
A major study a few years ago found four key behaviours associated with successful CEOs.
1. Making decisions quickly and decisively.
2. Engaging with stakeholders to get buy-in.
3. Adapting proactively to a changing environment.
4. Being reliable and predictable.
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2018/...eding-as-a-ceo
Elon Musk appears to have shortcomings on at least two of these.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
How secure is Twitter's business strategy? It seems to me that it cannot raise enough revenue from subscriptions to be profitable, which makes it dependent on advertising, a business model that has worked for Facebook/Meta with the additional 'services' that Meta/Facebook has been able to monetize. A recession is never good for advertising, which I think makes Twitter vulnerable, on top of which Musk must pay compensation which will run into the millions on top of the interest payments incurred with the price he paid. It might survive in the long term, but if users desert Twitter and the advertising doesn't come through, I guess Twitter will fold. And if a less moderated platform becomes the vehicle of choice for the extremists, who will want to be part of it other than the fringes?
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Stavros
How secure is Twitter's business strategy?
Obviously Musk is going to apply his own strategy. He eliminated the board and is having massive layoffs of staff. His plans are unclear. I think this is a case of the dog catching the car.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Fitzcarraldo
Obviously Musk is going to apply his own strategy. He eliminated the board and is having massive layoffs of staff. His plans are unclear. I think this is a case of the dog catching the car.
He did try to get out of the deal, so I guess he figured out it wasn't likely to be a winner. It doesn't say much for his business acumen that he didn't do better due diligence before making his bid.
Apart from cost-cutting, it looks like his strategy will include charging users for various things (possibly including adult video content). Good luck that. Most of the TS videos I've seen on Twitter are just teasers for their subscription sites on Only Fans, etc.
https://www.vox.com/recode/23440075/...k-verification
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
The link Fitzcarraldo gave to Musk's partners in twitter, suggests a group of people who have become rich by taking early mover advantage in the Social Media sector that emerged after the dot.com boom ended. To them, Social Media appears to be a money-making scheme made in some Computer Geek's heaven -create a Platform 'everyone' wants to be on -or, for example, 'every young person' (this seems to be Tik-Tol at the moment), and the advertisers will flock to it with wads of cash, the partnership is sealed, and the process 'from concept to cash' is perfected. And if the Platform doesn't evolve, like MySpace, then something else will come along to replace it.
What these guys also have in common is not so much a healthy disrespect for Government, as no respect all. Deluded from their own success that they don't need Government, and with minimal attitudes to regulation of content, it is no wonder what political support they give is to people who don't believe in the legacy of 1776, and for these reasons may be part of the trend in the US which could see the Union become so fractured and dysfunctional as to have no meaning, paving the way for an end to traditional politics, and rule by 'entrepreneurs' and ultimately, a Tyrrell-style Corporation to dominate over all, but not Musk.
And you thought Blade Runner was a movie?
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
filghy2
Apart from cost-cutting, it looks like his strategy will include charging users for various things (possibly including adult video content).
Protecting free speech ... for $8/month.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
I don't see how it can work. He wrote a tweet today saying he's laying people off because twitter is losing 4 million a day (I don't know how he comes to that figure). Then he said advertisers are cutting ties with twitter and it's because the media has vilified him. He's behaving like a clown and it will be interesting to see how much of the 44 billion he invested gets flushed down the toilet.
I read that it will cost about 1 billion dollars per year to meet borrowing costs for his acquisition. Operating income in 2021 was 220 million. Cash flow a bit better than that but this will be fun to watch.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
broncofan
I don't see how it can work. He wrote a tweet today saying he's laying people off because twitter is losing 4 million a day (I don't know how he comes to that figure). Then he said advertisers are cutting ties with twitter and it's because the media has vilified him. He's behaving like a clown and it will be interesting to see how much of the 44 billion he invested gets flushed down the toilet.
I read that it will cost about 1 billion dollars per year to meet borrowing costs for his acquisition. Operating income in 2021 was 220 million. Cash flow a bit better than that but this will be fun to watch.
It's pretty hilarious until you think of all the Twitter employees who have lost and will lose their jobs.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Fitzcarraldo
It's pretty hilarious until you think of all the Twitter employees who have lost and will lose their jobs.
At first I thought he was firing these people was out of spite because they had in some way undermined his vision of pure free speech. Now I see that it's part of his business strategy but I don't think it will work.
Twitter brings in a lot of ad revenue every year. You look at their operating costs every year and they are pretty significant. He figured he could keep the revenue and that all of these people he's firing are really superfluous. I think he's going to find out that's not true.
The other thing is that he is realizing he can't possibly keep his promise about free speech and he's already reneged on it. Advertisers and lots of users with a high profile will leave if he allows the type of speech he claimed he would. People are already mocking him by making obnoxious false claims about him and others as satire and it's clear if this vision of his were actually realized you'd have complete babble.
If he wants to keep his advertisers, he can't allow high profile users to disseminate false information or engage in racist incitement. The article I linked talked about how only a fraction of blue checks have to pay to keep their check mark for it to add another revenue stream. The problem is I think few people will go for it and if you take away the blue checks of people who are already verified they will leave bc you're allowing people to impersonate them.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
broncofan
If he wants to keep his advertisers, he can't allow high profile users to disseminate false information or engage in racist incitement.
The problem is that only some advertisers will not want to be associated with Twitter under its new boss if he relaxes moderation. And more than this, are the Billionaires who support Trump and his lies and don't need Twitter anyway.
Take Peter Thiel -
"Peter Thiel, the billionaire tech financier who is among those leading the charge, once wrote, “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible.”
Thiel is using his fortune to squelch democracy. He donated $15m to the successful Republican Ohio senatorial primary campaign of JD Vance, who alleges that the 2020 election was stolen and that Biden’s immigration policy has meant “more Democrat voters pouring into this country.” ".
America’s billionaire class is funding anti-democratic forces | Robert Reich | The Guardian
Or Doug Logan-
"“The Deep Rig” repeatedly quotes Doug Logan, the C.E.O. of Cyber Ninjas, a Florida-based company that consults with clients on software security. In a voice-over, Logan warns, “If we don’t fix our election integrity now, we may no longer have a democracy.” He also suggests, without evidence, that members of the “deep state,” such as C.I.A. agents, have intentionally spread disinformation about the election."
The Big Money Behind the Big Lie | The New Yorker
And then the Claremont Institute-
"The donations flowing into Claremont illustrate that although the group’s full-throated support for Trump and fixation on election crimes may be extreme, they’re not fringe views when they have the backing of influential conservative funders. “Were it not for the patronage of billionaire conservatives and their family foundations, the Claremont Institute would likely be relegated to screaming about its anti-government agenda on the street corner,” says Kyle Herrig, president of government watchdog group Accountable.US."
Conservative Donors Bankrolled Pro-Trump Think Tank Behind Jan. 6 Lies – Rolling Stone
Having billions is not enough, they want absolute power as well. What are they afraid of? Democrats taxing them to death? Seriously?
Who cares if Twitter goes? Something else will replace it, and someone else will make billions.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Stavros
The problem is that only some advertisers will not want to be associated with Twitter under its new boss if he relaxes moderation.
His problem is that he can't afford to lose any of the existing revenue base. It looks like he made an impulsive decision to bid for Twitter because he wanted to pose as a free speech hero, without thinking it through.
I think IT investors are a lot like gamblers who bet on different ventures in the hope that at least one of them will be hugely profitable. Most of these investors fail, but we only hear about the ones who succeed. These people are over-confident types in the first place, and when they succeed they become convinced of their own genius, as do many other people.
Once you make a fortune the dice are heavily loaded in your favour, especially in the US. You can mostly avoid income tax, and money buys political influence and connections with other wealthy people. You can afford to have some failures, and still remain a rich and powerful celebrity. In the worst scenario for Musk he will still be filthy rich and gets to pose as a martyr to woke elites who hate free speech.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
I don't understand why anyone (let alone Musk himself) thought it was a good idea for Elon Musk to buy Twitter. He tried to back out of it. They should have let him. He was sued, and the government forced him to go through with it. We really need to refresh (and enforce) our antitrust regulations. The richest man in the world shouldn't control a large portion of our access to space, an auto manufacturer, and one of the biggest social media outlets.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
https://twitter.com/PhilJamesson/sta...iACuR6igkViXYQ
So I thought this was well done. But Musk is making a fool of himself. You have to actually look at his tweets to see how dim he really is. He says he wants twitter to be the most accurate source of information. Then he falls for and responds to a fake Voltaire quote that was written by a Neo-Nazi.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Fitzcarraldo
I don't understand why anyone (let alone Musk himself) thought it was a good idea for Elon Musk to buy Twitter. He tried to back out of it. They should have let him. He was sued, and the government forced him to go through with it.
I don't think it was the government. The Twitter board took Musk to court to force him to go through with the previously agreed deal. The board is legally obligated to act in the financial interests of the existing shareholders, so if someone offers way more than the market vaue of shares it's hard for them to refuse.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/...8AFKtDGQcCJxmA
he can't be serious here. this is not a coherent idea of what truth is. He wants lies that gain traction.
filghy, i didn't follow the negotiations which were somewhat publicized. but what's kind of funny about it is that i think the board initially wasn't crazy about him buying. But they have fiduciary duties, he had the money or could raise it, and once he was legally bound they really had an obligation to enforce the purchase agreement.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
filghy2
I don't think it was the government. The Twitter board took Musk to court to force him to go through with the previously agreed deal. The board is legally obligated to act in the financial interests of the existing shareholders, so if someone offers way more than the market vaue of shares it's hard for them to refuse.
He had to buy it to avoid a trial:
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/10/06/musk...nal-terms.html
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
There is a rumour Musk is thinking of buying Liverpool -I assume the Football Club, not the City....
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
The pretence of political neutrality has been discarded completely now.
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/1...moves-00071758
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/1...files-00072015
I wonder if he has figured out that making his Twitter takeover a financial success is a lost cause: having trashed his own reputation as a technocratic business genius the only future is to become a right-wing cultural hero.
His creditors must be nervous now. I assume the loan is secured on his Tesla shares, but the price of those has fallen by half since the start of this year.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Useful article analysing the Twitter Files and the efforts of Musk and his collaborators to use them to promote disinformation about a non-existent conspiracy.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022...en-laptop.html
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
Quote:
Originally Posted by
filghy2
His creditors must be nervous now. I assume the loan is secured on his Tesla shares, but the price of those has fallen by half since the start of this year.
Tesla is now trading at $122.15, which gives it a market cap of 382 billion dollars. That's more than 60% off its high at around a trillion. The stock currently has a p/e ratio of around 37. That implies net income last year was something like 10 or 11 billion dollars.
Twitter will likely not have positive cash flow and may require cash infusions to run in the long term and pay its debt (as you say some of musk's tesla shares are pledged as collateral). Tesla does actually make money but while a pe ratio of 37 is not stratospheric, it prices in some growth. Nobody wants a yield of 3% for a risky equity investment.
There's no law that says tesla's net income can't shrink. While the market for electric cars will grow a lot, other companies will be offering their models and I'm sure plenty of people won't want to buy teslas because Musk is a shrill conspiracy theorist. He's definitely not a genius, but unless he's unusually dumb he should still have tens of billions of dollars when he's done damaging tesla's brand and sinking money into twitter.
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Re: African Musk: Not a Fragrance
There has definitely been a tendency in the technology area for first movers to not retain their market dominance. That seems to be happening with EVs as they become more mainstream. https://www.vox.com/recode/2022/12/2...ones-ira-biden
I guess Musk can keep Twitter going as a loss-maker for some time, possibly with help from like-minded billionaires or foreign interests who find him a useful idiot. It serves his purposes as a narcissist and right-wing troll, and it's hard to see him getting as much attention if he wasn't running Twitter.