‘Living the plot of Succession is f**king exhausting’: Twitter employees melt down online and in private chatrooms after finding out Elon Musk may buy the company after all
- Elon Musk on Tuesday offered to complete the buyout of Twitter at his original offer price of $44 billion – having pulled out in July
- Musk was being sued for reneging on the deal, but on Tuesday he surprised many within tech by reviving his bid
- Twitter’s staff were unamused, saying the rollercoaster ride was exhausting and posting a series of memes about the news
- Now, Musk is expected to own the company within a matter of weeks, if not days, and refocus the company on protecting freedom of speech
Twitter staff on Tuesday were posting exasperated and worried memes after it emerged Elon Musk was renewing his bid to buy their company.
Musk pulled out of his planned purchase of the company in July, and was facing legal action over backing out.
On Tuesday, he shocked Silicon Valley by offering to complete the buyout at his original offer price of $44 billion.
Employees were taken aback.
‘Living the plot of succession is f***ing exhausting,’ said Rumman Chowdhury, the director of the META (ML Ethics, Transparency and Accountability) team at Twitter.
Elon Musk on Tuesday shocked Twitter employees by reviving his $44 billion bid for the company, meaning he could take over within weeks
She added: ‘I am sitting on 2023 company wide strategy readouts and I guess we are going to collectively ignore what’s going on.’
Parker Lyons, a senior financial analyst at Twitter, tweeted a series of memes, including a young girl crying captioned: ‘writing my little emails today’.
He also tweeted a cartoon of someone attempting ‘2023 planning’ and being told: ‘This is worthless.’
One image featured a mock up of Mark Zuckerberg as a priest welcoming newcomers to his flock, captioned: ‘Meta recruiters for the next 48 hours’.
Another staffer, EJ Samson, tweeted a clip of a Balenciaga model angrily marching through a catwalk covered in mud.
‘I encourage every Twitter employee to go outside and take a walk,’ he wrote.
Some workers were venting their frustrations on the chat forum Blind, CNN reported.
‘Cue the layoffs,’ one anonymous staffer reportedly wrote.
Musk on Tuesday confirmed the deal, tweeting: ‘Buying Twitter is an accelerant to creating X, the everything app.’
Musk had been battling for months to back out of the deal, and legal and financial analysts widely believe that he acquiesced due to fears that he could be forced to complete the transaction after a highly public, potentially embarrassing trial.
Twitter had sued Musk in order to force him to complete the agreed-on merger, and the case was due to go to trial in Delaware court on October 17, until Musk backed down and agreed to carry out the deal.
‘Musk saw the writing on the wall and knew his chances of a victory in Delaware were slim to none with the best path accepting the current deal and move forward,’ wrote Wedbush analyst Dan Ives in a note obtained by DailyMail.com.
‘Being forced to do the deal after a long and ugly court battle in Delaware was not an ideal scenario and instead accepting this path and moving forward with the deal will save a massive legal headache,’ he wrote.
The billionaire did not elaborate on his plans for an ‘everything app’ or explain what such a product would offer.
However, he has previously indicated that he could build an alternate social media platform called X.com if his Twitter buyout failed. PayPal, which Musk co-founded, was originally known as X.com, and SpaceX is one of his major ventures.
The private Musk-controlled company that will acquire Twitter in the buyout is officially known as X Holdings.
Elon Musk has acknowledged his abrupt reversal and agreement to buy Twitter in a tweet suggesting that he is now eager to complete the transaction
Musk had been battling for months to back out of the deal, and legal and financial analysts widely believe that he acquiesced due to fears he would lose a court battle
Earlier in the day, Twitter accepted Musk’s proposal to buy the company for $44billion, with a deal expected to close within weeks.
A spokesman for the company told DailyMail.com on Tuesday afternoon: ‘We received the letter from the Musk parties which they have filed with the SEC.
‘The intention of the Company is to close the transaction at $54.20 per share.’
Regulatory filings on Tuesday revealed that Musk’s attorneys sent Twitter a letter confirming that he planned to buy the company at the original price he proposed – $44billion.
It was a surprising U-turn from the bombastic billionaire, but was prompted by his fear that he’d end up being ordered to buy the company anyway in court.
Musk had been trying to back out of the Twitter deal, claiming the company was hiding how many spam accounts were active on the site. Twitter took him to court to try to force the takeover through.
The judge, Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick, recently rejected Musk’s request to delay proceedings. Sources cited by Bloomberg on Tuesday said he feared she would end up siding with Twitter in the matter and force him to buy the company after a highly public, potentially embarrassing trial.
Musk’s new offer to complete the deal is contingent on Twitter halting its lawsuit to force the transaction. Now, with a deal nearing a close, Twitter’s share price is soaring.
Trading was halted at 12.10pm on Tuesday after the shares jumped 13 percent to $47.93, and the stock closed at $52, an increase of 22 percent on the day.
Trading was halted at 12.10pm on Tuesday after the shares jumped 13 percent to $47.93, and the stock closed at $52, an increase of 22 percent on the day
Texts between Musk and his famous friends about the deal were already made public in the court docket.
Musk had been scheduled to be deposed by Twitter’s attorneys starting on Thursday, which would have forced him to answer potentially embarrassing questions under oath.
TIMELINE OF ELON MUSK’S CHAOTIC ATTEMPT TO TAKEOVER TWITTER
April 2: Musk announces that he owns 9.2 percent of the company, making him its largest single shareholder
April 14: Musk offers to take Twitter private at $54.20 a share, valuing the company at $44billion
April 25: Twitter accepts Musk’s offer
April 29: Musk sells $8billion in Tesla shares to finance deal
May 13: Musk says Twitter deal is on hold pending a review of bot accounts
May 26: Musk is sued by Twitter for stock manipulation during takeover
July 8: Musk says he’s backing out of the deal.
Twitter sues, trying to force him into seeing it through.
October 4: Musk proposes again to go ahead with the deal at the original price
October 17: Proposed trial date in Delaware
Now, Musk is expected to own the company within a matter of weeks, if not days. He has not commented publicly about the new offer.
Once in charge of Twitter, Musk plans to make changes to enhance freedom of speech.
Among them is adding an ‘edit’ button to tweets.
He also wants to stamp out fake accounts and bots which he says dilutes the experience and he wants to abolish permanently banning users.
Former CEO Jack Dorsey – who banned Trump in January 2021 during the Capitol riot – agrees with the latter.
He also wants an open-source algorithm, which would expose how the website decides what appears on users’ feeds.
It is given the name ‘Open Source Algorithm’ and would work to restore faith in the town-square mentality that inspired the site in the first place.
Musk has also indicated that he’ll add the option for long-form tweets that exceed the current limit of 280 characters.
Trading of Twitter shares was halted on Tuesday as news of his offer emerged and drove the company’s share price up by 13 percent.
Musk’s original offer in April was to buy the company for $44billion – 38 percent more than what the market said it was worth at the time.
But after months of back and forth, he tried to back out of the deal in July, citing Twitter’s apparent refusal to hand over enough information about how many spam and bot accounts were active on the site.
Twitter sued him for attempting to back out and the two sides were due to fight it out at a civil trial in just a few weeks.
Tuesday’s new proposal signals an end to that dispute, though it’s unclear what prompted Musk to change his mind.
However, Twitter may push to keep the October 17 trial date on the court’s calendar until the buyout actually closes.
‘I don´t think Twitter will give up its trial date on just Musk´s word – it´s going to need more certainty about closing,’ Andrew Jennings, professor at Brooklyn Law School, told the AP.
Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick recently rejected Musk’s request to delay the trial
Jennings noted that the company may be worried about Musk’s proposal being a delay tactic, after the billionaire already twice tried unsuccessfully to postpone the trial.
He now is likely to own the company within days, sources cited by CNBC said.
It comes within days of super agent Ari Emanuel, one of Musk’s friends, urging Twitter to come to a settlement with him ahead of the court date.
Hollywood titan Emanuel recently contacted Egon Durban, a member of Twitter’s board, urging him to end the dispute.
Emanuel is friends with both Musk and Durban, who sits on the board of his company, Endeavor.
Musk’s retreat from the court battle signals a surprising end to the months-long saga.
In April, Musk announced that he was Twitter’s largest shareholder, owning 9.2 percent of the company.
He then proposed buying the company, speaking publicly about how tired he’d become of its bias and its squashing of free speech.
Months of toeing and froing ensued and Twitter employees were driven into a meltdown at the thought of unpredictable Musk becoming their new boss.
AN EDIT BUTTON, OPEN-SOURCE ALGORITHM AND BANNING LIFELONG BANS: EVERYTHING ELON MUSK WANTS TO CHANGE AT TWITTER
EDIT BUTTON
One of the most memorable features that Musk has promised is an edit button that would allow users to change their tweets without having to permanently delete them.
In its current model, Twitter has no such tool.
Many have long demanded a function to edit their past tweets and get rid of the permanency of the site, that Musk says encourages cancel culture.
In a poll on his own Twitter page – where he has more than 100million followers – 75 percent agreed with him that an edit button would improve the site.
NO MORE LIFELONG BANS
The most notable subject of a lifelong ban is Donald Trump.
Musk doesn’t believe in permanent bans on accounts that the company disagrees with.
He says it contradicts the notion of Twitter being a virtual town square where all opinions are welcomed, and that it enhances bias.
The most notable subject of a lifelong ban is Donald Trump.
After being banished by Twitter, he set up his own social media website, Truth Social.
Musk says it was ‘stupid’ for Twitter to send him directly towards creating a competitor.
OPEN SOURCED ALGORITHM
The algorithm to decide what appears on each user’s Twitter feed is currently held secret by Twitter, but Musk thinks that should change.
He wants to expose how the company decides what people see.
LONG FORM TWEETS
In an effort to get rid of ‘threads’ – where users number tweets in a series of numbers to indicate the order of them – Musk said long-form tweets should be available to users.
Currently, users are limited by 280 characters per tweet.
Leaked texts revealed how Jack Dorsey, Twitter’s former CEO, backed Musk’s idea. He said: ‘A new platform is needed. It can’t be a company. This is why I left.’
Texts from April 9 (above) reveal a fallout between Musk and Agrawal. Musk had offered suggestions on how to improve the website and seemed eager to join the board. When he was ignored, he said he was going to offer to take the company private and that trying to improve it was a ‘waste of time’
Twitter founder Jack Dorsey (left) had tried to get Musk on the board for at least a year and said he quit after facing opposition from the board. He also offered to smooth things over between Musk and current Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal (right)
In July, the Tesla billionaire however announced that he wanted to back out of the deal. He said he’d demanded to be shown how many bot accounts were active on the site, and that Twitter had refused.
Twitter then sued him, claiming he couldn’t back out of the deal so suddenly and accusing him of general, reckless mischief.
‘From the outset, defendants’ information requests were designed to try to tank the deal.
‘Musk’s increasingly outlandish requests reflect not a genuine examination of Twitter’s processes but a litigation-driven campaign to try to create a record of noncooperation on Twitter’s part,’ the company’s attorneys said in a filing in July.
He has not commented publicly about the new offer. Instead, he tweeted about his internet satellites not making money on Tuesday and asked his followers for ‘support’
Both sides were due to go to trial in Delaware on October 17.
Musk’s chaotic takeover attempt happened six months after Twitter’s long-serving CEO Jack Dorsey announced he was stepping down.
He was replaced by Parag Agrawal.
At first, Musk was invited onto the board of the current, publicly-listed Twitter.
He exchanged friendly text messages with Agrawal and seemed eager to improve the site.
But when his suggestions were ignored, he went nuclear – threatening to buy Twitter and take it private to enact the changes he believes the site needs.
‘This is a waste of time,’ he fumed at Agrawal in a text in April before he tweeted about the site.
The texts were revealed in court filings last week, along with others by former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, who was enthusiastic about Musk joining the board.
‘I’m not joining the board, this is a waste of time,’ Musk told Agrawal on April 9th.
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