Now the US entrepreneur Elon Musk also wants to buy the short message service Twitter. For a good 41 billion dollars, in order to then take it off the stock exchange. This is the only way to guarantee freedom of expression on the platform, Musk writes to the US supervisory authorities. SRF digital editor Guido Berger says it’s still hard to tell whether Musk is concerned about money or concerns about democracy.
SRF News: Is Elon Musk really about freedom of expression or does he just want to make money on the stock market?
Guido Berger: With Elon Musk, you never know exactly what his real motives are when he starts another campaign – often directly on Twitter himself. It could just be about money in a very profane way. Musk has been buying Twitter shares almost every day since the beginning of the year. At the same time, he tends to speak badly of the company in public and thus tended to depress the price of the shares.
When his stake became public and now with his takeover bid, the price is going up steeply. If he were to sell his Twitter shares now, it would be a good profit. However, he may actually be concerned about the future of the platform and its democratic-political significance.
Assuming Musk actually cares about Twitter. Why would Musk be interested in this platform?
In his offer, Musk emphasizes the importance of Twitter for the expression of public opinion. He thinks that the company isn’t doing the right thing here and – self-confident as he is – obviously believes that he could do better.
Legend:
Tesla and SpaceX boss Elon Musk is currently the richest person in the world. On March 22, 2022, he opened the Tesla factory in Berlin Brandenburg in Grünheide.
key stone
Musk has barely hinted at what he would do differently. He recently asked users on Twitter whether they would like an “edit button” to edit tweets. So he hasn’t shown any big strategic throws here yet. So it would be completely open what would happen if Musk had full control of Twitter.
Twitter has long tried to combat radicalism and misinformation on the platform without overly restricting freedom of expression. How well does that work?
That’s one of Twitter’s two big problems. In other words, to resolve this contradiction, to make as many opinions visible as possible and then not to allow them all. And then to control this without being arbitrary all the time.
At the same time, the platform has a major impact. Politicians like to use it for unfiltered statements. But it’s unclear how Twitter is supposed to make money from it. In this area, too, the company Twitter has not yet proven that it has good ideas. Musk now wants to do better, although both of these issues arguably require a lot of attention from the company. I’m a little unsure whether Musk has the necessary patience for this.
The conversation was conducted by Simone Hulliger.