Elon Musk Is Now the Owner of Twitter, and He Wants You to Let That Sink In
Published Oct. 28 2022, 11:37 a.m. ET
Above all else, Elon Musk is a creature of the internet; he traffics in memes, he clearly loves posting, and he is not above a little light punning either. Now that he's officially become the owner of Twitter, Elon is promising that changes are going to come to the platform. To commemorate his new ownership, he posted a video of himself carrying a sink into Twitter headquarters, which has understandably baffled plenty of people.
Why did Elon Musk bring a sink to Twitter?
On Oct. 26, Elon walked into Twitter headquarters with a sink in his hands. He hadn't officially become the company's owner yet, but everyone knew that the exchange of power was imminent.
The sink was apparently an attempt at some light meming, as he posted a video to his Twitter page along with the caption “Entering Twitter HQ – let that sink in!” It seems a little elaborate, but Elon probably isn't looking for my input on his Twitter posts.
The sink didn't serve any additional purpose, but it did help to mark Elon's trip to Twitter HQ as unusual. In the days since that visit, he's officially taken over as Twitter's top dog. Anxiety levels were high inside the company because of news that Elon would be taking over, and it seems at least some of those anxieties were warranted.
Elon fired four top executives after taking over.
To officially begin his own era as Twitter's owner, Elon fired four of the top executives that were previously in charge of the company, including its CEO and CFO.
In addition, Elon also posted a message aimed at Twitter's advertisers on Oct. 27 in which he attempted to reassure them that he wasn't going to make Twitter unusable for them.
“The reason I acquired Twitter is because it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner, without resorting to violence,” he explained in the note. “There is currently great danger that social media will splinter into far-right wing and far left-wing echo chambers that generate more hate and divide our society.”
The Musk era of Twitter has led to some rebellion among users.
Although large swaths of the American population are not on Twitter, those who are seem to be concerned about what Elon's version of the platform might look like. He has yet to announce any definitive changes that he's hoping to make, although he has said that he wants the platform to be more open to a wide range of ideas and viewpoints. What that actually looks like remains to be seen.
Free speech is an important ideal to strive toward. When free speech starts to emotionally damage those who receive it, though, a decision ultimately has to be made about whose rights are more important: The person being harassed, or the harasser. Elon has certainly done his share of harassing, so it's unclear where he'll fall on that question.