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And how does the price Musk paid for Twitter look now? Sure, maybe it was really a dumb move and he just got lucky. But he's been lucky a hell of a lot.

by lmm 6mo ago

WatchDog 6mo ago
He bailed out his Twitter investors by having xAi purchase Twitter, then he bailed out his xAi investors by having SpaceX purchase xAi, and how he is trying to bail out SpaceX by having the index funds be forced to purchase SpaceX. Twitter valuation aside, there must be some intangible benefits to the purchase. Lots of influential people use Twitter, he has amplified his reach, and the purchase seems to have moved the overton window in favor of his agenda.
- zarzavat 6mo ago
  > the index funds be forced to purchase SpaceX SpaceX is a fantastic company full of the smartest engineers that has brought fast internet to the most remote regions on Earth. Even if it wasn't for index funds, investors would buy the shit out of it. xAI has built an almost-frontier model. It's not Anthropic or OpenAI but it's also not valued like Anthropic or OpenAI either. Twitter is doing OK, despite predictions. It found a niche with obnoxious right-wing assholes instead of obnoxious left-wing assholes. Twitter does seem to be less excited about getting people fired for wrongthink than before which is a societal improvement. It did succeed in buying Musk influence at the highest levels, but he threw it away. Mixed success. I know Musk gets a lot of hatred on here for his behavior and beliefs, including from myself, but that doesn't imply that his businesses are all scams. Hugo Boss was a Nazi too and his business is doing fine.
  - WatchDog 6mo ago
    Elon has made multiple comments in the past about how much keeping SpaceX private, makes it easier to run, and achieve it's goals of colonising Mars. He has given up on that, he has abandoned the Mars goal, and he is sacrificing the company to the whims of the public markets, just so he can have a payday. xAi raised $45 billion and Grok loses benchmarks to Chinese(GPU sanctioned) open weight models. I'm overall positive about the Twitter acquisition, I mean it was terrible financially, and Elon has made a lot of unforced errors in it's management, but yes, it does feel like the idpol witch hunts have died down a bit since.
    - fluoridation 6mo ago
      >yes, it does feel like the idpol witch hunts have died down a bit since. You don't seriously believe that was because of the Twitter purchase and not due to a coinciding social shift, do you?
      - WatchDog 6mo ago
        I think the causation is multivariate, but at least partially because of it, yes.
      - zarzavat 6mo ago
        After the Musk acquisition, the identity politics ultras quickly moved to mastodon and bluesky. Regular people were slower to move if at all because of switching friction. Social media is an amplifier: most of the users are passive consumers or retweeters, and only a smaller minority drive the conversation. Traditional media also loves to get stories from social media in order to "get the pulse" of society and because journalists are lazy and desperate for narratives. A relatively small social movement can therefore use social media to catapult its message onto traditional media and thus onto society at large. By isolating themselves from the amplifier, the identity politics ultras were no longer able to push their political message (and witch hunts) to such a large audience, the message stayed confined in spaces that were basically invisible to the average person, and the message faded away. Yes it wasn't just because of the Musk purchase, but it was definitely a factor.
tw04 6mo ago
Absolutely horrible? He absolutely lost his ass on the purchase and is one election away from fraud charges. I guess congrats you bought Twitter and then spent half a billion dollars just so you could temporarily dismantle the regulators who were preventing you from committing open fraud? Or, you know, if you did manage to permanently dismantle the regulators it means you’ve destroyed your primary source of revenue.
- tdeck 6mo ago
  > is one election away from fraud charges. Nothing in my lifetime of experience in the US so far, or in the demeanor of the "opposition" party suggests he'll face real consequences for this.
  - actionfromafar 6mo ago
    "One election away from more fraud". Not fraud charges.
margalabargala 6mo ago
Terrible. Twitter is just now back to the valuation he bought it for, four years and lots of inflation later. If the best you can do with $44B is break even after 4 years that is a piss poor investment.
- schnebbau 6mo ago
  Do you think Elon bought Twitter as an investment?
  - margalabargala 6mo ago
    No. I'm just replying to someone else who is arguing that Elon buying Twitter was a good investment.
    - lmm 6mo ago
      I'm saying I think he got his money's worth overall, not that it worked great when considered solely as a financial investment.
ejoso 6mo ago
How to say you play 4D chess…

And how does the price Musk paid for Twitter look now? Sure, maybe it was really a dumb move and he just got lucky. But he's been lucky a hell of a lot.

by lmm 6mo ago

And how does the price Musk paid for Twitter look now? Sure, maybe it was really a dumb move and he just got lucky. But he's been lucky a hell of a lot.

WatchDog 6mo ago

He bailed out his Twitter investors by having xAi purchase Twitter, then he bailed out his xAi investors by having SpaceX purchase xAi, and how he is trying to bail out SpaceX by having the index funds be forced to purchase SpaceX. Twitter valuation aside, there must be some intangible benefits to the purchase. Lots of influential people use Twitter, he has amplified his reach, and the purchase seems to have moved the overton window in favor of his agenda.

zarzavat 6mo ago
> the index funds be forced to purchase SpaceX SpaceX is a fantastic company full of the smartest engineers that has brought fast internet to the most remote regions on Earth. Even if it wasn't for index funds, investors would buy the shit out of it. xAI has built an almost-frontier model. It's not Anthropic or OpenAI but it's also not valued like Anthropic or OpenAI either. Twitter is doing OK, despite predictions. It found a niche with obnoxious right-wing assholes instead of obnoxious left-wing assholes. Twitter does seem to be less excited about getting people fired for wrongthink than before which is a societal improvement. It did succeed in buying Musk influence at the highest levels, but he threw it away. Mixed success. I know Musk gets a lot of hatred on here for his behavior and beliefs, including from myself, but that doesn't imply that his businesses are all scams. Hugo Boss was a Nazi too and his business is doing fine.
- WatchDog 6mo ago
  Elon has made multiple comments in the past about how much keeping SpaceX private, makes it easier to run, and achieve it's goals of colonising Mars. He has given up on that, he has abandoned the Mars goal, and he is sacrificing the company to the whims of the public markets, just so he can have a payday. xAi raised $45 billion and Grok loses benchmarks to Chinese(GPU sanctioned) open weight models. I'm overall positive about the Twitter acquisition, I mean it was terrible financially, and Elon has made a lot of unforced errors in it's management, but yes, it does feel like the idpol witch hunts have died down a bit since.
  - fluoridation 6mo ago
    >yes, it does feel like the idpol witch hunts have died down a bit since. You don't seriously believe that was because of the Twitter purchase and not due to a coinciding social shift, do you?
    - WatchDog 6mo ago
      I think the causation is multivariate, but at least partially because of it, yes.
    - zarzavat 6mo ago
      After the Musk acquisition, the identity politics ultras quickly moved to mastodon and bluesky. Regular people were slower to move if at all because of switching friction. Social media is an amplifier: most of the users are passive consumers or retweeters, and only a smaller minority drive the conversation. Traditional media also loves to get stories from social media in order to "get the pulse" of society and because journalists are lazy and desperate for narratives. A relatively small social movement can therefore use social media to catapult its message onto traditional media and thus onto society at large. By isolating themselves from the amplifier, the identity politics ultras were no longer able to push their political message (and witch hunts) to such a large audience, the message stayed confined in spaces that were basically invisible to the average person, and the message faded away. Yes it wasn't just because of the Musk purchase, but it was definitely a factor.

tw04 6mo ago

Absolutely horrible? He absolutely lost his ass on the purchase and is one election away from fraud charges. I guess congrats you bought Twitter and then spent half a billion dollars just so you could temporarily dismantle the regulators who were preventing you from committing open fraud? Or, you know, if you did manage to permanently dismantle the regulators it means you’ve destroyed your primary source of revenue.

tdeck 6mo ago
> is one election away from fraud charges. Nothing in my lifetime of experience in the US so far, or in the demeanor of the "opposition" party suggests he'll face real consequences for this.
- actionfromafar 6mo ago
  "One election away from more fraud". Not fraud charges.

margalabargala 6mo ago

Terrible. Twitter is just now back to the valuation he bought it for, four years and lots of inflation later. If the best you can do with $44B is break even after 4 years that is a piss poor investment.

schnebbau 6mo ago
Do you think Elon bought Twitter as an investment?
- margalabargala 6mo ago
  No. I'm just replying to someone else who is arguing that Elon buying Twitter was a good investment.
  - lmm 6mo ago
    I'm saying I think he got his money's worth overall, not that it worked great when considered solely as a financial investment.

ejoso 6mo ago

How to say you play 4D chess…