Elon Musk and Twitter

Published 9:22 am Thursday, April 28, 2022

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Twitter has been around since 2006 but I have yet to “tweet.” The closest I have gotten to a tweet is watching a Warner Brothers Looney Tune with a yellow canary character by the name of Tweety. “I tought I taw a puddy tat.”

Twitter is in the news this week because it was bought by a gazillionaire by the name of Elon Musk. There are rich people in this world and, then, there is Elon Musk, said to be worth about $270 billion dollars, give or take a billion.

Of course, Musk is now worth about $44 billion less since that is the price he paid for Twitter. It reminds me of the quote attributed to American entrepreneur Malcolm Forbes. “The difference between men and boys is the price of their toys.” Musk just might have bought himself another toy with which to play.

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Not that he needed another one. Talk about having a full plate! The South African-born Musk, before his purchase of Twitter, had seven current jobs. I won’t name them all because I’m not smart enough to understand some of them, but the two most recognizable are his job as CEO of the world’s largest electric car manufacturer, Tesla, and CEO and Chief Technology Officer of SpaceX.

Now, he has bought what many call one of the world’s most popular communications site. Since I am like the late Auburn University head football coach, Pat Dye, and “don’t do ‘Twitta,’” I can’t say too much about his new venture.

What will he do with it? That’s the big question. Musk said he didn’t buy the company to make money, but if you believe that, I’m sure he would sell you some ocean front property in Arizona. He has said that he wants to make sure the company lives up to its potential and wants to return the site to one that emphasizes free speech.

There are almost 400 million twitter accounts, which is not all that many when you consider the world’s population of about eight billion. It’s mostly used by the younger set of folks and, to be honest, I know very few people who use it.

Probably the most famous of the former Twitter users was former President Donald Trump. He was said to have 88 million followers and used it very effectively during his campaign for the presidency in 2016 and all during his administration. Many have said he used it too much. If I heard, “I like Trump, but wish he wouldn’t tweet so much” one time, I heard it a thousand times.

I said that he was a former Twitter user because he has been suspended for life from using it. A most interesting question for Elon Musk is will he reinstate the former president? If Musk wants the business to emphasize America’s 1st Amendment of free speech, I think he will make Trump an offer to return. It would be good for the business.

But, it doesn’t matter to most of us. Elon Musk buying Twitter is a conversation that might last for one day and there will be plenty of people who will never know that he bought it. I may know one or two people who have an account, but for everyone who has an account, I know hundreds or thousands who don’t.

Here’s a few things I do know. It’s a beautiful day outside. Sweet corn is just a few weeks away from being harvested and there will be hundreds of thousands of pounds of peanut seed put in the ground in the next few weeks. That means in 100 days, it will be boiled peanut time.

And I don’t have to be on Twitter to know that!