Elon Musk invited Tesla engineers to review coding and other operations at Twitter.
Key Details
- Elon Musk has officially taken over Twitter after months of back and forth.
- Before the acquisition was finalized Musk sent engineers from his company Tesla to check out the social-media platform.
- Musk tweeted “the bird is freed” late on Thursday announcing his official ownership of Twitter.
Why it’s news
It has been months of twists and turns, but Elon Musk is officially the owner of Twitter.
Before his acquisition was finalized he sent Tesla engineers to meet with Twitter product leaders to ensure everything was in place for Musk’s takeover.
The meeting between Tesla engineers and Twitter product leaders happened early on Thursday at Twitter’s headquarters in San Francisco. The product leaders showed the engineers Twitter’s code so they could look it over and explain to Musk what needs to be changed.
As of noon on Thursday Twitter engineers could no longer do anything with the platform’s code. This was part of an effort to ensure that nothing about the product changes ahead of the deal closing, according to Bloomberg writers Kurt Wagner and Edward Ludlow
Musk Making Changes
Many people have been scared of the changes Musk will bring to Twitter—mainly advertisers.
Yesterday, before the acquisition was finalized he wrote a letter to investors assuring them that the changes he will make will only benefit the company—not hurt it.
“Twitter obviously cannot become a free-for-all hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences!” Musk stated in the tweet.
He went on to assure advertising investors that Twitter will remain a good place to advertise and all of the changes he plans to make will be for the good of the company.
Backing up a Bit
The full timeline between Elon Musk and Twitter is long.
It all started in April, Elon Musk announced that he held a 9.2% stake in Twitter, which made him the social-media company’s largest shareholder. Twitter’s stock price soared 25% after the announcement.
Later that month, the billionaire entrepreneur offered to buy all of Twitter at $54.20 per share—equaling about $44 billion. He said he originally invested in the platform because he believes it is failing in its potential to be the leading platform for free speech around the globe. In fact, he asked his 2 million followers if Twitter adhered to principles of free speech, and 70% said “no.”
In July, Musk decided to back out of the deal, claiming there were too many fake accounts on the platform. Twitter has since sued Musk in Delaware Court of Chancery to complete the deal and requested the trial to take place in September. Musk, on the other hand, wanted to delay the trial until February 2023, stating that a case of this size takes time to prepare. Twitter was granted its wish of an expedited trial, with Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick, the presiding judge, setting a five-day trial for October.
Musk then countersued Twitter, stating his reason for the termination was due to Twitter not being upfront about the number of fake accounts on the platform.
Then, Elon Musk and his legal team subpoenaed Twitter’s founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey, to get him to release documents that provide accurate information on bots and spam accounts on the social-media platform and now these documents have come out from Zatko and Musk and his lawyers have subpoenaed him as well.
Then, Musk’s text messages were revealed in court filings and it showed that Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey tried to facilitate Musk’s Twitter takeover, which led to Musk officially reverting back to his original deal to buy the social-media company.
