As a result of as Musk has stated immediately:

Musk has stated, straight up, that he’ll look to take away advertisements from the platform fully, which might re-shape lots of advertising approaches at many manufacturers.

However now, after visiting Twitter HQ, and with $44 billion about to be debited from his account, Musk has modified his thoughts on this.

As per Musk:

“There’s been a lot hypothesis about why I purchased Twitter, and what I take into consideration promoting. Most of it has been flawed.”

Which, from, the primary line, feels a bit revisionist. Musk has additionally stated that he hates promoting, along with the above tweet about eradicating advertisements from Twitter.

However once more, with the readability of debt, Musk has now switched up, and says that he truly needs to make Twitter ‘probably the most revered promoting platform on this planet’.

“I additionally very a lot consider that promoting, when carried out proper, can delight, entertain and inform you; it may well present you a service or product or medical remedy that you just by no means knew existed, however is best for you. For this to be true, it’s important to point out Twitter customers promoting that’s as related as potential to their wants. Low relevancy are spam, however excessive relevancy advertisements are content material.”

Ah, so promoting is okay as long as it’s good. Preserve that in thoughts entrepreneurs.

How Musk plans to implement this, and be sure that Twitter solely publishes good, related advertisements just isn’t clear. However relaxation assured advert companions, Musk’s not going to chop you off from the app – regardless of his earlier and repeated statements that that’s precisely what he would do. That was simply hypothesis, in keeping with Musk. Didn’t come from him.

So goes the standard Elon Musk method – saying one factor, then fully denying it, and blaming outdoors forces for misinterpreting his statements.

The identical additionally pertains to his current assertion that he’ll look to chop 75% of Twitter employees as quickly as he takes over as ‘Chief Twit’ (as per his new Twitter bio).

But, after he visited Twitter HQ yesterday, he posted that he’d met ‘lots of cool folks’ on the app.

Sure, he purchased a sink with him, for a random and unfunny sight gag. Wacky.

In fact, saying that he met lots of cool folks doesn’t imply that he gained’t sack them. Nevertheless it does counsel that Musk’s not going to be as militant in his method as he’s advised in his earlier statements.

So what are his plans then?

To unite the world, apparently:

“The explanation I acquired Twitter is as a result of it’s vital to the way forward for civilization to have a typical digital city sq., the place a variety of beliefs will be debated in a wholesome method, with out resorting to violence. There’s at present nice hazard that social media will splinter into far proper wing and much left wing echo chambers that generate extra hate and divide our society.”

Musk additionally notes that he ‘didn’t do it to become profitable’. Which is fairly apparent, since he spent months attempting to renege on the deal, and in addition lately famous that he’s ‘clearly overpaying’ for the app.

That’s one other ingredient that Musk is now attempting to minimize – Musk has spent months criticizing Twitter, its board, its employees, poking holes in its enterprise mannequin, and customarily, highlighting why it’s a disastrous funding.

However now? All smiles.

‘Along with adhering to the legal guidelines of the land, our platform have to be heat and welcoming to all, the place you may select your required expertise in keeping with your preferences, simply as you may select, for instance, to see motion pictures or play video video games starting from all ages to mature.”

Heat and welcoming. That’s undoubtedly not the Twitter imaginative and prescient that Musk has been portray.

However once more, the readability of debt.

The latter reference right here pertains to Elon’s imaginative and prescient of making variable algorithms, which customers may then select to use to their Twitter feed. The idea is fascinating, however whether or not customers will truly wish to go to the hassle of curating their very own expertise, versus simply trying out what the app has on supply, stays to be seen.

And that’s the true rub right here. Musk says that he has a plan, and he’s now making statements like these about the way forward for the app, and the way it may be a transformative, uniting expertise.

However making {that a} actuality looks like a very inconceivable activity. And whereas Musk prides himself on taking up the inconceivable, this one feels prefer it may very well be past even his attain.

It looks like, in some ways, Musk might be counting on his public persona to win over customers. However do folks actually like his wacky wealthy man shtick?

I don’t know, it’s a large, and really public activity, which may harm Musk’s status, alongside together with his internet price. The final ideas that Musk’s been touting do make sense – user-defined expertise, freedom of speech versus freedom of attain, improved algorithmic focusing on (ala TikTok), and funds, purchasing and extra, like WeChat in China.

Musk has pointed to all of those apps and choices as reference factors for his Twitter imaginative and prescient. However so has each social media app. Meta’s been attempting for years to duplicate the utility of Chinese language messaging apps, each platform’s attempting to work out TikTok’s secret sauce, and customers already do have lots of alternative relating to what they see in-stream.

The issue is within the software. Western customers haven’t warmed to app functionalities in the identical approach as Chinese language customers have, TikTok’s profitable as a result of its algorithms are higher and nobody can match it, and whereas customers are in a position to change their feed expertise, in numerous methods, most can’t be bothered, and even when they do, engagement declines because of this

So whereas Musk is eager to discover this stuff, every is, certainly, simpler stated than carried out.

Nevertheless it’s Elon Musk, if anybody can do it, he can. Proper?

The Musk period is about to start, and it’ll be fascinating to see how, precisely, he appears to enact any of this.