"I hope that even my toughest detractors remain on Twitter, since that is what free expression means," the world's wealthiest man posted just before Twitter accepted Elon Musk's $44 takeover proposal.
A fellow tech millionaire, rocket enthusiast, and media magnate is putting his devotion to the test. "Interesting topic," said Jeff Bezos, quoting a New York Times reporter's tweet pointing out that Tesla's commercial connections in China might give the government control over Twitter via its new owner. Is it possible that the Chinese government has gained some control over the town square?"
Elon Musk's purchase of Twitter has elicited a slew of questions, remarks, and critiques, and Bezos is far from alone (Twitter employees are likely near the front of the line). He does, however, own the Washington Post and has a net worth of $177.5 billion, which is about equal to Elon Musk's ($264.6 billion).
According to reports, Elon's purchase should go through without too much regulatory wrangling, but bringing up the possibility of undue influence from a foreign government is one way to clog the works... if you had a few billion dollars and some spare time. Of course, "Twitter is fun," as Elon once told me, and perhaps this is how millionaires joke, like poking one other on Facebook or something. Or perhaps Jeff is concerned, as are many of us, about who will hold his unencrypted DMs in a few months.
Interesting question. Did the Chinese government just gain a bit of leverage over the town square? https://t.co/jTiEnabP6T
— Jeff Bezos (@JeffBezos) April 25, 2022
Or maybe things got a little out of hand — Bezos responded with two more tweets about 90 minutes later, stating the answer is "probably not" and that "Musk is incredibly skilled at handling this type of complexity."
But we’ll see. Musk is extremely good at navigating this kind of complexity.
— Jeff Bezos (@JeffBezos) April 26, 2022