From: allin
Elon Musk views Twitter as a crucial platform that serves as a “public digital town square” [00:07:34]. His interest in acquiring Twitter stems from a belief that such a forum is necessary for open debate on all kinds of issues, including substantive ones [00:07:34].
Vision for a Digital Town Square
Musk believes a true digital town square must be:
- Broadly Inclusive It needs to have as many people on the platform as possible [00:07:49].
- Politically Balanced The platform should feel balanced from a political standpoint and not be biased [00:07:59].
- Transparent The system needs to be transparent, with its algorithm publicly available on GitHub for critique and improvement [00:08:05]. Any manual changes, such as shadow banning or altering tweet prominence, should be noted [00:08:15]. This transparency would clarify why certain tweets perform well or why accounts are banned, as currently, there’s no clear explanation or recourse [00:08:34].
Musk asserts that Twitter currently exhibits a “very far-left bias” [00:08:54]. Despite historically voting overwhelmingly for Democrats, and possibly never for a Republican, he identifies himself as a moderate [00:08:58]. His intention with the platform is not a “right-wing takeover,” but rather a “moderate wing takeover” to ensure people of all political beliefs feel welcome and can express themselves without fear of bans or shadow bans [00:09:30].
Importance of Free Speech
For Musk, free speech is paramount for a healthy democracy [00:10:20]. He emphasizes that “free speech only matters… when it’s someone you don’t like saying something you don’t like” [00:10:31]. He cites his own experience of being constantly “trashed by the media” as an example of free speech in action, indicating that even with significant resources, he cannot stop media criticism, which he views as a positive sign [00:10:57].
Combatting Bots and Spam
A significant concern for Musk regarding Twitter is the prevalence of bots and scam accounts [00:00:58]. He questions Twitter’s claim that over 95% of daily active users are real unique humans [00:02:28]. He believes the percentage of bots is likely at least 20%, citing analysis by outside firms [00:03:16]. He argues that spam, scams, and fake accounts, especially those operating “huge bot armies,” unduly influence public opinion and must be removed [00:09:57].
Musk highlights that the most-liked tweet of any living human (his tweet about buying Coca-Cola to put cocaine back in) had less than 5 million likes, which is only about 2% of Twitter’s stated 217 million daily monetizable active users [00:04:00], [00:05:08]. He contrasts this with YouTube, where the most popular videos have billions of views compared to a user base of one to two billion, a ratio that “makes a lot more sense” [00:06:04].
He notes that Twitter’s revenue relies primarily on brand advertising [00:06:55], which requires real humans seeing ads [00:07:09]. If a large portion of the users are bots, it significantly impairs revenue [01:05:05].
Acquisition Implications
The number of bots is a “material public state threshold issue” [01:02:00] for Musk’s potential acquisition of Twitter. He states that if Twitter’s public filings, which claim less than 5% fake or spam accounts, are inaccurate (e.g., if the number is four, five, or even ten times higher), it’s a “big deal” [00:07:02]. He compares it to buying a house with “less than five percent termites” that turns out to be “90 percent termites” [00:07:09]. Such a discrepancy would mean the acquisition price cannot be the same [00:07:11].
Musk finds Twitter’s refusal to provide a logical explanation for the bot numbers problematic [00:07:13]. He speculates that Twitter either “don’t want to look too closely” at the issue or “didn’t realize they were mistaken” and “weren’t paying enough attention” [00:07:18]. He believes that addressing bots and spam “should be a lot easier” than splitting the atom or going to the moon, citing obvious examples like Bitcoin giveaway scams [00:07:27].
Future of Twitter as a “Super App”
Musk envisions Twitter potentially transforming into a “super app” akin to WeChat in China [00:28:47]. This app would combine features like social media (Twitter), payments (like PayPal), and other functionalities into one platform with a great interface [00:28:56]. He suggests that a “spam-free thing” with high trust could enable payments, whether crypto or fiat [00:29:16]. This would be a “maximally trusted and inclusive” digital town square where important ideas are debated [00:29:53].
He believes such an app needs to exist, whether by converting Twitter or by starting a new platform from scratch [00:30:12]. While his default inclination is to “start things from scratch” [00:30:53], the Twitter acquisition is contingent on resolving the bot issue and ensuring the platform is fixable without revenue collapse [00:31:07].