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Elon & Twitter
- Thread starter Buckminster
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EVNow
Well-Known Member
What you are talking about materially lying to customers & share holders for years
This is a worthless argument. Neither of us are lawyers. Let the courts decide.
EVNow
Well-Known Member
Elon is now going after .... youtube ?
Looks like things that have been obvious to social media users for a long time .... seems to surprise Elon (or he is just expressing his outrage now).
Looks like things that have been obvious to social media users for a long time .... seems to surprise Elon (or he is just expressing his outrage now).
mspohr
Well-Known Member
Elon tilting at windmills again.
I can't believe he's this naive.
Daniel in SD
(supervised)
I'm guessing this is because Elon only watches conspiracy and crypto videos. Scam ads are where the gullible people are.
Isn't Elon rich enough to pay for YouTube Premium? I highly recommend it!
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EVNow
Well-Known Member
I've youtube premium and I see scam ads / clickbaits ALL the time (usually when I search).
Youtube does have a big problem. Their algos force youtubers to use clickbaity titles. Exact same content and plain fact titles don't get them noticed / promoted as much. Here is a good video by Veritasium on that - he shows how his videos got more / less views depending on the titles.
Funny thing is Youtube kept recommending to me a video by Veritasium - which I assumed was a click bait because of the title "The Simplest Math Problem No One Can Solve". Only when I watched a different video by the channel I realized its a serious channel. I've been trying to watch some informative videos on Starship - I can't easily find any. They all look so clickbaity !
bkp_duke
Well-Known Member
Are you going to repeat the SAME argument you made yesterday? I made it clear yesterday that LEGAL PRECEDENT allowed Elon to ASSUME that SEC filings by Twitter were accurate and that fills "due diligence". IF HOWEVER there is even a HINT that those were NOT accurate, then any reasonable judge is going to tell Twitter to comply with Elon's request for more information, REGARDLESS of if he waived prior due diligence rights.
Waiving of due diligence was based upon certain assumptions (like correct SEC filings). It's NOT UNIVERSAL and doesn't give twitter a blank check to not comply with information requests from Elon as more information becomes available (i.e. bot reporting could very well be erroneous).
You may WANT it to be that way, but that's not how the law actually works.
Daniel in SD
(supervised)
If the SEC filings are false then Elon certainly has a case. The contract states what information Twitter is required to provide. People are assigning nefarious motives to Twitter's refusal to change the terms of the deal when Elon is clearly not acting in good faith.
There is no new information. I bet Twitter's ad revenue will be unaffected.
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I don't pretend to be intimate with the details, but I'll go out on a limb and guess that Twitter is going to have a legally defensible position with the "monetizable" adjective in the clause. They may have a hard time with that defense (I see Skadden is representing Elon et al), but it's my guess. The main reason I've been reiterating that point is (emphasis mine):
Most bots are unlikely to use twitter.com, I think we can agree. If you do a search for how to write a Twitter bot, they all reference using the Twitter API. These would not be included in the caveats above. So the vast majority of "active bots" are likely outside of the mDAU clause. The API doesn't display ads. A python bot cannot display ads and is not monetizable, therefore wouldn't be grouped into the 5% number. The SEC filing is about how to monetize ads and create revenue, so including those would be a terribly deceiving way to build the metric.
There is no way that I know this and Elon doesn't. So doing polls asking "how many bots follow you" is entirely disingenuous in my view.
Most bots are unlikely to use twitter.com, I think we can agree. If you do a search for how to write a Twitter bot, they all reference using the Twitter API. These would not be included in the caveats above. So the vast majority of "active bots" are likely outside of the mDAU clause. The API doesn't display ads. A python bot cannot display ads and is not monetizable, therefore wouldn't be grouped into the 5% number. The SEC filing is about how to monetize ads and create revenue, so including those would be a terribly deceiving way to build the metric.
There is no way that I know this and Elon doesn't. So doing polls asking "how many bots follow you" is entirely disingenuous in my view.
_Redshift_
Member
Is Elon clever enough to understand the downsides of continuing this obsession with everything that’s wrong with social media nowadays?
I absolutely hate the fake videos on YouTube, not been on FB since 2010, never been on Twitter. However, these companies and their problems say a lot about us. People in general don’t care to be discerning and serious.
The movie ‘Idiocracy‘ captured the essence of our society well.
Changing one social media platform doesn’t solve the problem. A new social media platform will take its place.
Until humans learn to turn off their mobile devices and start turning away from the (free) meaningless stuff nothing will change. It will take a long time too, but let’s hope we do this “for the future of humanity” (as Sir Elon likes to say).
I absolutely hate the fake videos on YouTube, not been on FB since 2010, never been on Twitter. However, these companies and their problems say a lot about us. People in general don’t care to be discerning and serious.
The movie ‘Idiocracy‘ captured the essence of our society well.
Changing one social media platform doesn’t solve the problem. A new social media platform will take its place.
Until humans learn to turn off their mobile devices and start turning away from the (free) meaningless stuff nothing will change. It will take a long time too, but let’s hope we do this “for the future of humanity” (as Sir Elon likes to say).
mspohr
Well-Known Member
That's the point. Even if Elon "fixes" Twitter, there are lots of other cesspools of social interaction. This is a fools errand.
EVNow
Well-Known Member
Not just other investors - I think he has thrown the entire paying customer base in to confusion. If indeed Twitter has been overstating users, then there will be dozens of lawsuits. Twitter is really damaged property at this point.
Daniel in SD
(supervised)
I've heard that Twitter is also running a pedophilia ring. We have no idea how deep this goes. I'm sure all the best investigators have contacted Elon to provide their services.
Seriously though, if Elon is wrong it seems like this could cost him a lot of money.
EVNow
Well-Known Member
Bet TSLA
Active Member
Not that I'm a lawyer, or particularly canny in the art of the takeover. But I'll hazard a guess that Elon's maneuvering is intended to get out of the deal either completely or by negotiating for a lower price. Here's why I think he'll succeed.
His tactic is simply to raise issues that indicate he'll go to court if they try to force him to honor his current offer. This will take years, even if Twitter is sure to win. This is the same tactic the SEC used against him in the "funding secured" situation. So long as Elon doesn't care how long it takes, it's the Twitter board that has to compromise. Especially because if they lose there will be shareholders lined up to sue them. Why would they even consider exposing themselves to this big downside risk?
This is true regardless of who is right, or who would win, and how it plays out possibly just depends on who can hire better lawyers. Delay is a powerful tactic.
His tactic is simply to raise issues that indicate he'll go to court if they try to force him to honor his current offer. This will take years, even if Twitter is sure to win. This is the same tactic the SEC used against him in the "funding secured" situation. So long as Elon doesn't care how long it takes, it's the Twitter board that has to compromise. Especially because if they lose there will be shareholders lined up to sue them. Why would they even consider exposing themselves to this big downside risk?
This is true regardless of who is right, or who would win, and how it plays out possibly just depends on who can hire better lawyers. Delay is a powerful tactic.
Daniel in SD
(supervised)
Couldn't shareholders sue them if they sell for less than the agreed upon price?
I don't see why the Twitter board wouldn't drag it out as long as possible if they think they'll win. They're still getting paid.
bkp_duke
Well-Known Member
In a word - no.
In more than one word - Twitter already went around soliciting other bids, there were none. No one wanted to even come close to the amount that Musk offered. Additionally, if there is fraud in the SEC filings (i.e. bot accounting was way way off), then the Board is in even more of a pickle because that would show the company is worth even less.
The BoD (Board of Directors) wants this to close, so that they can all go away. In total the BoD owns something STUPID low like 77 shares (not a typo) of Twitter. When the board owns that few shares, they don't have a strong conviction in the company they are steering. By comparison, look at the BoD for TSLA (aside from Musk). They are invested heavily in the company. They (each member of the BoD, personally) can all be sued unless they follow a pretty "straight and narrow" pathway. That pathway basically is to get as high a sales price as they can for the company, but within the confines of following the law (i.e. this is where the whole bot issue and monetizable accounts comes in, because that would effectively be selling a "bill of goods" - i.e. a straw sale).
I don't believe this is accurate, based on my knowledge of previous M&A lawsuits. If the Board acquiesces to a lower Musk et al deal, but didn't need to do so, they can be sued for fiduciary irresponsibility.
The only case in which they would be without risk is if there is indeed some misreporting ahead of the deal, or if there is some sign that Musk et al's reduced offer (assuming there is one) is once more vetted against the public market and other suitors. But I am pretty sure they can and will be sued if they allow Musk and company to strong-arm them when they're in a beneficial position contractually.
I haven't seen an ad on Youtube for years now, because I literally run an ad blocker. I don't understand how Elon sits there and watches ads instead of running an ad blocker, I thought he was supposed to be good with technology?
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