There are a lot of things I like about being my own boss on this blog. One of them is that I can write about whatever I choose to. Well almost. Frustration number one is that there never seems to be enough time and space to cover everything I would like to. Frustration number two is that often I am writing about people I don’t want to. The prime example is Donald Trump however, today it is Elon Musk.
This is another article that needs a timestamp which in this case is Monday morning. (Another benefit of being my own boss on this site is that I can write ahead a bit to save time for other things; in this case election results analysis.)
A few days ago Elon Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion, $13 billion of which he borrowed. This deal just doesn’t make financial sense and a lot of bankers are going to rue the day they approved those loans. Twitter doesn’t turn a profit and was already saddled with massive debt even before Musk added $13 billion.
One of the most hilarious things that happened in the Musk takeover was that within hours he declared himself to be the “Chief Twit”. I howled when I read that thinking of how it played in the UK.
Shortly after taking over Musk fired approximately half of the workforce. I remember back in the day studying the Japanese management philosophy of Kiazen. One of its major principles was that most organizations were overstaffed so if you acquired a business the first thing you did was cut 10% (not 50%) of the workforce and after assessing the results continued to cut in 10% increments until you achieved maximum efficiency. Over time this proved to be as foolish as it sounds. Musk took Kiazen and turned it into Hari Kari.
The majority of cuts were in the areas responsible for policing the site’s content. It is well established that foreign countries, primarily Russia, have used Twitter to spread disinformation in an attempt to subvert American democracy. Twitter is now ablaze with domestic disinformation along with racism and anti-Semitism. (Fascists have always demonized the ‘other’.) Musk is running a fire department without fire engines or a sufficient number of firefighters. Musk has effectively defunded the police – the truth police on his site that is.
I have never been on Twitter and have no intention of ever being on it. (With Musk’s pending policy of selling supposedly verified accounts my name may appear in the future.) If you are on it, I advise you to quickly exit. If you advertise on it, I strongly suggest you reconsider the wisdom of doing so (unless you are part of the right wing media that is.) Just when I thought Twitter couldn’t get any worse and harmful Elon Musk bought it.
Musk entered 2022 as the world’s richest man. He exits it proving he certainly isn’t it’s smartest! I just couldn’t help myself and had to weight in.
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