The twitter buy isn't about money its about power. Money is only a proxy for power. Controlling the largest distribution source of worldwide news is a pure power play.
That's not really true is it? My understanding is that it's actually the smallest of its immediate peers in social media. And perhaps the same in the field of the broader definition of media.
As a separate issue, my personal sentiment on social media, like a number of others I know, is that it has all become a steaming pile of toxic garbage, not unlike the pile of junk mail I dutifully retrieve from my physical mailbox once a month (and even then only so that the mail person has room to add more). My concern on a deal like this is that if that sentiment takes off in the mainstream a property like Twitter could experience a MySpace style collapse overnight.
Twitter is a great way for Musk to get into social media without having to get users and build the infrastructure. He can compete at a worldwide level with Facebook on day one.
1. News such as an HN post which is a ... twitter link
2. News in an article or on TV that reverences a ... twitter link
3. Social media referencing a ... twitter link
There's a lot more than appears at first, even if you aren't consuming news on Twitter or Tik Tok a lot of it is being broken there.
Weido and Wechat may have more users, but they aren't newsmakers. Just like there's more people at a Def Leppard concert than in the White House, but the White House makes news.
[0] https://www.npr.org/2021/06/04/1003284948/trump-suspended-fr...
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31110766
Please learn how comment threads work.
Nobody cares about Facebook, even though it's hugely used it's a dead letter.