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Comment by typeofhuman | Hacker News Reader

So many HNers thought the deal wouldn't go through.

If you thought Elon was a genius, you figured he was just trolling the world and would weasel his way out of what seemed like a stupid deal.

If you thought he was a troll first and genius second, and paid attention to the analysts who read the fine print on the offer, you probably expected he was going to be hoisted by his own petard.

The odds of the deal going ahead were always pretty good, because getting out of it would have been difficult. The key here is the unique way in which the Chancery Court operates. They may have very well forced Musk to buy the company.

Because his 44billion dollar investment is worth 12 billion when the ink dries

>worth 12 billion

Why do you say this?

Well, look at what he's been advocating for:

1) Edit Button - already in production

2) "Absolute" free speech - not legally possible, and his tweet (https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1585619322239561728) indicated that he knows it's not palatable to advertisers either

3) Get rid of the bots - Either a) it's not that big of a problem or b) it's a big problem, but will greatly reduce the number of users and impressions used to drive advertising revenue

Plus, there's no clear growth plan as it's not an attractive platform for youth or young adults.

Of course, it's possible Elon moves mountains and turns it into a thriving business, but it's not clear at this point in time how that happens.

Smart guy though, he walked it back just in time. I'm sure he'll point to that tweet, and it's timing, whenever his legal counsel eventually tells him that, yes, very much so they need to ban certain folks. And like most of the time when playing to (that particular crowd), it won't matter when his hypocrisy (or pandering) is exposed.

And so many thought it would.

Predicting the future is an imperfect science, as it turns out.

4D chess on how to lose $30B…

I remember those threads, the confidence with which people were claiming 'Musk is just lying and will never ever go for it". Just tells you most people are susceptible to emotions even if they are otherwise rational. In this case, visceral contempt for Musk being against censorship.

> contempt for Musk being against censorship.

Speaking of emotion, this is a far cry from a good faith read on this.

Yep, even here on HN.

I hope Musk turns Twitter around and makes it a great platform.

> Just tells you most people are susceptible to emotions

This is not insightful and an obvious aspect of being human.

> In this case, visceral contempt for Musk being against censorship.

This is an emotional opinion without the support of facts. Are you sure you are being rational?

Very nice glass house you have there.

That's not how I recall it. In my experience, the general opinion here was that Musk indeed wanted to get out of the deal but that he was legally going to have to go with it. Which is what has happened.

Elon did try very hard to stop it.

or was this all just theater?

To what end? He signed the deal as was proposed, no?

A month ago an article appeared detailing how several prominent investors made a huge amount of money by buying the dip on twitter as the lawsuit business unfolded. I personally suspect collusion. The legal drama cost him relatively very little and was basically a favor to his friends.

To achieve what? Crater a public perception of the company he’s buying?

"no publicity is bad publicity"?

I believe that Elon plans multiple routes to account for possibilities when he does business. I believe he colluded with other parties to depress Twitter's share price through legal drama, firstly so they could profit by knowing the moves in advance, and secondly so he could try and force the valuation lower to save his own money money. I believe he has tried several strategies to get the US government to intervene and cancel the deal.

Maybe all that is wildly out of band, but we've seen him operate for years now. He routinely lies; that is, creates a message he wants a certain market to hear to achieve a certain effect, and in a couple of moments, despite his massive wealth, has demonstrated that he has a keen interest in acquiring more wealth.

I'm honestly not sure I'm more shocked it went through or more shocked he thought he could get out of that contract.

Exactly. Hence why so many HNers are extremely annoyed and angry that it happened and that they will still use Twitter regardless. I guarantee you that they won't move or close their accounts down due to this and will continue to peek or use links from Twitter.

I don't care what happens since I'm laughing at the whole mess and chaos.

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