Flipping the Bird: Elon vs Twitter | Assassination Coordinates | 5

Summary

Business Wars: Flipping the Bird – Elon vs. Twitter | Assassination Coordinates | Episode 5 Summary

Hosted by David Brown, Business Wars delves into the intense battle between Elon Musk and Twitter, exploring the strategic maneuvers, internal chaos, and public fallout that shaped this high-stakes corporate war.

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1. Elon Musk’s Drastic Measures and Internal Chaos

In early 2025, Elon Musk issued a stark ultimatum to Twitter employees: adopt his "extremely hardcore" work ethic or leave the company. This abrupt decision sparked immediate confusion and fear among the workforce.

Zoe Schiffer (00:49): "The vast majority of people were like, what the hell is he thinking? What is he talking about?"

Musk's email not only mandated a stringent work culture but also included a Google form with a single option: "Yes, I'm in." This one-sided demand led to widespread uncertainty, with many employees questioning the email's authenticity.

Zoe Schiffer (01:20): "People who they really needed at the company were effectively resigning."

The move backfired as Musk and his team realized the depth of dissatisfaction, leading to chaotic attempts to retain key staff. By the end of the first week, approximately 1,200 employees had resigned, shrinking Twitter’s workforce by two-thirds and jeopardizing the platform’s stability.

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2. Musk’s Vision for Free Speech and the Twitter Files Controversy

Despite the internal turmoil, Musk sought to transform Twitter into a bastion for free speech. He reinstated Donald Trump's account following a favorable poll but faced backlash when Kanye West was re-suspended after posting anti-Semitic content.

Elon Musk (09:53): "Frankly, the risk of something bad happening to me, of even literally being shot, is quite significant."

Musk aimed to enhance transparency by releasing the "Twitter Files," internal documents revealing past content moderation practices. However, the rollout was flawed, with unredacted employee information leading to privacy concerns.

Elon Musk (10:45): "The idea here is simply to come clean on everything that has happened in the past in order to build public trust for the future."

While Musk viewed the files as exposing collusion between government agencies and Twitter, critics argued that the selective release lacked concrete evidence of wrongdoing, undermining his transparency goals.

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3. Public Reaction and the Struggle for Control

Musk's attempts to engage with users directly via Twitter Spaces highlighted the polarized public opinion. Supporters lauded his efforts to champion free speech, while detractors criticized his inconsistent policies and authoritarian control.

During a high-profile Twitter Spaces event, Jack Dorsey voiced support for Twitter’s future under Musk, emphasizing the necessity of Musk's leadership.

Jack Dorsey (14:26): "He took on a gargantuan battle. And increasingly, I am not a fan of this battle..."

Conversely, Musk faced significant pushback, notably during his unintended appearance at Dave Chappelle’s comedy show, where audience hostility underscored the deep divisions surrounding his management style.

Elon Musk (17:54): "I'm rich, bitch."

These public confrontations reflected the broader societal split on issues of free speech, platform governance, and Musk’s unconventional leadership approach.

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4. Undermining Trust and the Collapse of Safety Protocols

Musk’s dismantling of Twitter’s Trust and Safety Council marked a significant downturn in the platform's commitment to user protection. Key members resigned, citing a rise in hate speech and inadequate response to threats against vulnerable users.

Marcinde Kaminski (18:34): "It is clear from research evidence that contrary to claims by Elon Musk, the safety and well-being of Twitter's users are on the decline."

In urgent crises, such as an activist facing life-threatening harassment, Twitter’s delayed responses starkly contrasted with its previous proactive measures, raising alarms about the platform's capacity to safeguard its users under Musk’s leadership.

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5. The Final Struggles and Musk’s Resignation Attempt

Amid mounting pressure, Musk attempted to democratize decision-making by polling Twitter users on his leadership. The poll resulted in 58% favoring his resignation, highlighting widespread dissatisfaction.

Elon Musk (37:55): "This company is like basically you're in a plane that is headed towards the ground at high speed with the engines on fire and the controls don't work."

Despite the clear mandate from his followers, Musk remained defiant, leading to further instability. His erratic policy changes, such as banning accounts tracking his jet, undermined his initial promises of free speech and transparency.

Elon Musk (38:07): "If somebody's got to pay the servers, okay, so the speech has got to cost at least $8..."

Ultimately, Musk's frustration culminated in a public declaration of potential resignation, though he humorously deferred the decision to his dog, signaling a reluctant acceptance of his untenable position.

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6. Legacy and Lessons from the Musk-Twitter Battle

Elon Musk’s tumultuous tenure at Twitter serves as a case study in the complexities of merging visionary leadership with the operational demands of a global social media platform. His failure to balance free speech advocacy with effective platform governance led to systemic instability and loss of user trust.

Jack Dorsey (34:16): "This is a man who has essentially proven that he can bend the laws of physics on behalf of humanity... But he's quickly finding out that half the population will always find fault with him, no matter what he does."

The episode underscores the importance of strategic leadership, the necessity of maintaining functional support systems, and the challenges inherent in navigating the intersection of technology, free speech, and corporate responsibility.

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Conclusion

This episode of Business Wars illustrates the high-stakes conflict between Elon Musk and Twitter, highlighting how leadership missteps, policy inconsistencies, and public backlash can destabilize even the most prominent social media platforms. As Musk continues to redefine free speech boundaries, the lessons from this battle offer valuable insights into the delicate balance required to manage and sustain digital communities.

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For more detailed insights and exclusive content, listen to the full episode of Business Wars: Flipping the Bird on the Wondery App or your preferred podcast platform.

Transcript

[David Brown]

This is Business War's Flipping the Bird. Episodes will drop Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. For the next two weeks, Wondery subscribers can binge the entire season of Business Wars Flipping the Bird right now. Start your free trial in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. Elon Musk had sent Twitter employees an email with an ultimatum. My extremely hardcore way or the highway. Many Twitter employees had feared this message, this culture, from the very beginning. And now they had just till the end of the day tomorrow to decide, do I stay or do I go?

[Zoe Schiffer]

The vast majority of people were like, what the hell is he thinking? What is he talking about?

[David Brown]

Zoe Schiffer covers Twitter for Platformer.

[Zoe Schiffer]

If you're trying to rally the troops, to me, this is just so not the way to do it.

[David Brown]

The email quickly caused chaos. Beyond the alarming message, it contained a link to a Google form which gave only one option. Yes, I'm in. Twitter employees wondered if the email was even real or if it was spam.

[Zoe Schiffer]

And then the transition team, the people that Twitter employees called the goons, followed up and were like, no, this is legit. Like, please click the link if you want to stay. And so it was kind of mayhem internally.

[David Brown]

A lot of employees didn't want to stay.

[Zoe Schiffer]

A whole bunch of people had not signed the email, and they started trying to shut off accounts. And they realized that, like, a lot of people who they really needed at the company were effectively resigning.

[David Brown]

Elon and the Goons quickly realized that they had miscalculated. His plan had been to keep only the true believers, to get rid of the employees who didn't want to be a part of Elon's Twitter. But even he knew he couldn't run Twitter without some semblance of a workforce. When they realized what they'd done, his advisors started to panic.

[Zoe Schiffer]

And so then they had to personally call those people and say, like, hey, can you, you know, please reevaluate your decision? Would you consider staying?

[David Brown]

By the time the Thursday deadline rolled around, Elon's attempt to reset the company after the chaos of the mass layoffs and the disastrous Twitter blue rollout had just turned into another mess. The New York Times is reporting that as many as 1200 employees resigned this week.

[Katie Notopoulos]

Now, sources tell CNBC Twitter's headquarters and all of its offices will be closed until Monday. And engineers and other employees posted goodbye messages to group chats.

[Jack Dorsey]

As questions mount over Twitter's future, Elon Musk offered little reassurance. He has a permanent plan, tweeting, what should Twitter do next?

[David Brown]

One ally stuck With Elon through the continued chaos, Jack Dorsey. He tweeted out his belief in Twitter's future. Under Elon, Twitter will survive and thrive, but it'll take some time. When asked if Twitter's survival depended on a change in management, Jack was unequivocal. Yes, it. Going public to private was critical, and I'm very grateful. With 1200 more employees gone, Twitter's workforce was about two thirds smaller than it had been just a few weeks earlier. People both inside the company and out were now worried that the site was going to break, possibly even that night. The hashtag riptwitter trended, flooding timelines with sarcastic memes, earnest eulogies, and angry shots at Elon. It's been a pleasure tweeting with y' all the past 13 years. Elon always thinks he's the smartest person in the room. He's about to be standing in an empty room, and it still won't be true. I just tried sending a tweet to someone via dm and it sent the wrong one. Twitter's already starting to fail. RIP Twitter. Reports circulated about internal chaos that certain teams critical to the site had resigned en masse. There were unconfirmed stories of employees getting stuck in the parking garage after their badges had been turned off. But it turned out reports of Twitter's death were greatly exaggerated.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Everyone was like, this is it. This is the end. Goodbye, everyone. And I looked at that and was like, okay. Clearly a lot of these people have never worked in a tech company. Like, this isn't how tech companies work. They do so, so much work over the years to make the sites stable so that it can operate for a really long time without that many people.

[David Brown]

Twitter did not die on that November night. But with what happened next, some people may wish it had. Because soon after Elon lost control of his workforce, he took his chaotic reign directly towards the users. This message is brought to you by Apple Card.

[Katie Notopoulos]

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[David Brown]

And [e-mail] after telling hundreds of stories about business battles throughout history, I've learned one constant truth. Having the right support systems in place can make or break a new venture. Trust me, it was a battle even I faced on my business journey. That's why AT&T business makes so much sense for entrepreneurs today. When you're building something from scratch, or even just at the point where you're ready to grow, you need a provider that makes things easy. With AT&T business, you. You can have reliable, protected Internet connection you can count on, so you do not miss a beat. Building your dream might take time and a lot of work, but that doesn't mean it can't be a little easier. Wake up to the power of ATT business and turn your vision into reality. Business.att.com from wondering I'm David Brown, the host of Business wars, and this is flipping the bird. Elon Virgin versus Twitter. This is episode five, Assassination Coordinates. I must confess, I've made a mess.

[Katie Notopoulos]

Of what should be a small success.

[David Brown]

But I digress.

[Katie Notopoulos]

At least I've tried my very best, I guess.

[David Brown]

Put me on a pedestal, and I'll only disappoint you. Tell me I'm exceptional. I promise to exploit you. It had been just over two weeks since Elon Musk sent his email demanding his employees be extremely hardcore. His deputies had begun asking employees to refer their friends. He needed more people to keep key functions going. Now Elon was boarding his $70 million Gulfstream jet in Oakland, heading to Washington, D.C.

[Elon Musk]

Elon, can you hear us?

[Katie Notopoulos]

Awesome.

[Elon Musk]

Elon, can you hear us? I think he's up. It takes a while to load. Can you hear me now? Yeah, I can hear you now. Hello, Mr. Fantastic. Sorry, guys. I think there's, like, maybe some glitches in the spaces that we need to fix. I'll dig into it next week.

[David Brown]

Elon had been extremely busy, barely sleeping, but he didn't rest. He decided to spend most of the flight chatting with users on Twitter spaces.

[Elon Musk]

I do have a lot of shit going on right now, so. And also I got to make sure Twitter is stable from a financial standpoint and it's not losing tons of money and goes bankrupt. So there's, you know, juggling a lot of things here, to say the least.

[David Brown]

The connection wasn't great, but it was Elon's own satellite Internet system, Starlink, that was allowing him to participate. At its peak, 100,000 users crowded into the virtual room to listen and interact directly with Elon Musk.

[Elon Musk]

Now, I was just saying how cool it is that you talked to us from your private jet. You know, we really appreciate it. It's like a typical Elon moment, and we're just all in awe about you taking these risks to your business and to yourself. To fight for free speech.

[David Brown]

Elon had spent the past couple of weeks making Twitter his version of the free speech haven he wanted it to be, despite the threat it posed to his already dwindling advertising revenue. Elon reinstated Donald Trump's Twitter account after running a snap poll that came out in favor of the former president. But Trump had declined to return to Twitter, preferring to keep posting on the platform he owned, Truth Social. When Twitter had allowed Kanye west to return to the site just before the takeover, Elon had enthusiastically tweeted, welcome back to Twitter, my friend. His friend who had been suspended for posting anti Semitic tweets. But just two nights before this Twitter spaces event, Elon had to ban him again after Kanye posted an image of swastikas.

[Elon Musk]

I think it's important that people know, okay, that was my decision. At a certain point, you have to say, what is incitement to violence? Because that is against the law in.

[David Brown]

The U.S. turns out these kind of content moderation decisions weren't easy.

[Elon Musk]

I think, you know, hosting swastikas is an incitement to violence. I personally wanted to punch Kanye, so that was definitely inciting me to violence.

[David Brown]

He reminded his audience that running Twitter and defending free speech was putting him in danger.

[Elon Musk]

Frankly, the risk of something bad happening to me, of even literally being shot, is quite significant. I'm definitely not going to be, you know, doing any open air car parades, let me put it that way.

[David Brown]

Maybe he was referring to the fact that he was in the midst of his biggest push yet to promote his idea of free speech and transparency. Elon had recently given a few handpicked journalists access to Twitter's internal documents so they could see how the old Twitter had made content moderation decisions that supposedly suppressed conservative voices and amplified liberal ones. The journalists claimed to reveal how Twitter had worked inappropriately with government agencies to ban certain content. The expose was called the Twitter files.

[Elon Musk]

You know, on the Twitter files stuff, I mean, the idea here is simply to come clean on everything that has happened in the past in order to build public trust for the future. I think that's essential. Like, why should people believe Twitter in the future if Twitter does not come clean about the past?

[David Brown]

The night before, one of the journalists involved, Matt Taibbi, had tweeted out the revelations. Here's Taibbi talking with Maria Bartiromo on Fox News. I think the major revelation of the.

[Elon Musk]

Twitter file so far is that we've discovered an elaborate bureaucracy of what you.

[David Brown]

Might call public private censorship, typically through.

[Drew Harwell]

The DHS and the FBI.

[Elon Musk]

But these Requests were coming from basically every agency in the government, and in many cases, Twitter is complying.

[David Brown]

Taibbi had unspooled These revelations over 41 tweets, several minutes apart. He shared screenshots from emails and Slack messages that showed how Twitter employees came to the decision that the New York Post story about Hunter Biden's laptop violated their policy against posting hacked materials and banned the link. Erin Wu covers Twitter for the information, and she had watched the tweets slowly trickle in.

[Erin Wu]

It's essentially a look at how content moderation was happening within Twitter using a lot of Slack messages and internal emails and things that are really interesting, like things that do, in a way offer kind of an unprecedented look into how a major social media company is making these decisions.

[David Brown]

On Twitter spaces, Elon shared what he believed the Twitter files uncovered.

[Elon Musk]

It's just obvious that there's been a lot of controlled information, suppression of information, including things that affected elections.

[David Brown]

But to other observers, it was something else entirely.

[Erin Wu]

It ended up being something that gave some interesting insights into the ways that Twitter employees were making these decisions. But I don't think that it was something that led to the kind of bombshell that he was hoping for. There was like no evidence of collusion or anything like that.

[David Brown]

Rather than a smoking gun, observers were divided over what the files showed or didn't show. Some, like Elon, saw collusion between politicians and content moderators, a pattern of suppression. While others raised suspicions about Elon's hand picked selection of journalists and wondered what the fuss was all about. They saw a company engaging in the tough and messy conversations about what content moderation looked like in practice. The rollout of the Twitter files predictably included some missteps.

[Elon Musk]

There are a few cases where I think we should have excluded some email addresses.

[David Brown]

Yep. Names and email addresses of Twitter employees had appeared all over unredacted documents, doxing them and putting them at risk. And perhaps most embarrassing for Elon, that included Jack Dorsey's private email.

[Elon Musk]

Sorry, Jack, Jack at Pizza is now, you know, might need a different email address, but so we often need to, you know, not have email addresses in there.

[David Brown]

But it wasn't sharing his email address that had rubbed Jack the wrong way about the project. If the goal is transparency to build trust, why not just release everything without filter and let people judge for themselves, including all discussions around current and future actions. Make everything public now. Jack called Elon out for doing the very thing he railed against, cherry picking and gatekeeping information.

[Erin Wu]

The thing about the Twitter files is that the way that they were rolled out. And the writers that he chose to work with him on this turned the release of the files themselves into this really partisan event where it was hard to know what was being released compared to the bigger picture of what was going on because of kind of the selective nature of how that information was released.

[David Brown]

But the crowd on Spaces was appreciative of the Twitter files.

[Elon Musk]

And Elon, you know, there are a lot of people in the last decade that have lost hope because what's happening in politics, what's happening in the media, there's so much frustration. And I think the most important thing that you've done here, Elon, with your steps that you are taking, is to give people hope again. Well, great. I mean, I'm really glad to hear that. And like I said, I'll do my best here. A lot of us have been fighting this culture war for free speech, basically.

[David Brown]

And, you know, I think a lot.

[Elon Musk]

Of people have lost hope because they didn't see anyone caring about it. Yeah, I mean, I'm kind of like, sort of worried about the future of civilization. You know, just like, are we headed in a good direction? The overarching goal here is that, on balance, that Twitter be a force for good, for the future of civilization.

[David Brown]

The public was sharply divided on Elon's approach to free speech on Twitter. Like so much in America today, it really depended on your point of view. On Twitter spaces, fans of Elon were praising him for being on the front lines of the culture wars. Inside the Chase center in San Francisco was a different story. Less than two weeks later, another frontline combatant in today's culture wars was on stage. Dave Chappelle, co headlining a show with fellow comedian Chris Rock. 18,000 people were packed into the arena laughing at edgy jokes about cancel culture, politics, and of course, how Rock felt about getting slapped by Will Smith at the Oscars. As the show was nearing the three hour mark, in the middle of his set, Chappelle brought out a special guest. Elon strutted onto the stage in black pants and a Twitter T shirt. There was a smattering of cheers and applause, but the booze kept growing. Elon awkwardly paced the stage, following Dave Chappelle around with a mic held limply in his hand.

[Elon Musk]

It sounds like some of them people you fired are in the audience.

[David Brown]

Anytime Elon tried to talk, they drowned him out.

[Elon Musk]

Dave, what should I say? Don't say nothing, okay? It'll only spoil the moment. Do you hear that sound, Eli? That's the sound of pending civil unrest.

[David Brown]

Chappelle tried to keep the show moving, making some jokes about how the people booing had terrible scenes, but the heckling wouldn't stop. After what felt like an eternity, Elon thanked Chappelle for having him and headed off stage.

[Elon Musk]

I'm rich, bitch.

[David Brown]

Yes. He shouted Chappelle's famous line, I'm rich, bitch, on his way out. If Elon was affected by being booed on stage for almost 10 whole minutes, he didn't take it as a sign to slow down the pursuit of his vision for a quote unquote free Twitter. His next target? Twitter's Trust and Safety Council. This was an outside group of experts that had advised the company on how to address issues like hate speech and abuse on the site. The council worked as volunteers. Marcinde Kaminski was a member of that council and is the director of security and Innovation at a human rights organization in Sweden.

[Drew Harwell]

The Trust and Safety Council played an important role for making the platform safer because part of the conversation that we had with Twitter was always on looking at the most vulnerable users that they have on their platform.

[David Brown]

Marchen had first hand experience on how vital Twitter's role was in protecting those vulnerable users. His organization worked with activists in some of the most repressive countries in the world. Twitter had been a bastion of activity among human rights and democracy activists. Think Arab Spring. Twitter invited people like Marchin onto its Trust and Safety Council. It sought their feedback and change their product to serve their needs. One women's rights activist Marchen had worked with in an East African country had her address posted on Twitter. A literal mob had formed outside her gates. A journalist he worked with in Central Asia was detained by the government, who then took over his account to identify and target the journalists network. People like colleagues, sources and family. Both times Marchen reached out to his contacts at Twitter, who had immediately sprung into action, blocking accounts and taking down the offending posts.

[Drew Harwell]

They did it urgently because they understood that this is a matter of not only a social media account, but actually a matter of life and death.

[David Brown]

Possibly now. When Marchen reached out to his contacts at Twitter, no one responded and Twitter had repeatedly pushed back the date on the next Trust and Safety Council meeting. First a week, then a month, the week before. Three key members of the council resigned because of Musk. In a press release they said it is clear from research evidence that contrary to claims by Elon Musk, the safety and well being of Twitter's users are on the decline. They pointed to reports that showed a clear spike in hate speech since Elon had taken over, particularly slurs against black people and gay men, as well as a rise in anti Semitic posts. So as Marchand was getting ready for the first meeting of what was left of the Trust and Safety Council since Elon took over, he was anxious.

[Drew Harwell]

Since Elon Musk took over the leadership of Twitter, he has been very clear on the fact that the Trust and Safety Council was about to be reformed. Exactly how? We didn't know initially, but less than.

[David Brown]

An hour before the meeting we got.

[Drew Harwell]

An email saying that the meeting was cancelled. Trust and Safety Council was dissolved. We were not prepared to have this drastic of a turnover in the relation with Twitter. And it also worries us because the activists that we work with, they are still using Twitter as one of their main platforms for advocacy, for coordination and for organizing.

[David Brown]

By the end of the following week, almost everyone Marchen had worked with at Twitter was gone. Elon was rapidly removing the guardrails that kept users safe on Twitter. This, to Elon, was what a free and open town square should look like. But suddenly, when he felt like he was a target, he took a very different approach to regulating free speech on Twitter. He'd take care of it by himself.

[Misha Brown]

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[David Brown]

Every big moment starts with a big dream. But what happens when that big dream turns out to be a big flop. From Wondery and Ill Media I'm Misha Brown and this is the Big Flop. Every week, comedians join me to chronicle the biggest flubs, fails and blunders of all time. Like Quibi, it's kind of like when you give yourself your own nickname and you try to like get other people to do it. And the 2019 movie adaptation of Cats.

[Katie Notopoulos]

Like if I'm watching the dancing and I'm noticing the feet aren't touching the ground, there's something wrong with the movie.

[David Brown]

Find out what happens when massive hype turns into major fiasco. Enjoy the Big Flop on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can listen to the Big Flop early and ad free on Wondery Plus. Get started with your free trial at Wondery.com plus the Twitter account Elonjet had bothered Elon for years. Elon Jet, as the name implies, tracked the comings and goings of Elon Musk's personal jet. It was run by a 20 year old college student named Jack Sweeney, who is a big fan of Elon's, and the account was a big hit with other fans of Elon's, but Elon hated it so much he'd once even tried to pay the kid who ran it $5,000 to take it down.

[Katie Notopoulos]

It was sort of a high profile account, and one that had interacted with Elon and also directly seemed to be about him.

[David Brown]

BuzzFeed senior tech reporter Katie Notopoulos was at home on the morning of December 14th doing what any good Internet culture writer would scrolling through Twitter.

[Katie Notopoulos]

I am on Twitter all day. I check it, you know, right when I wake up and it's like the last thing I look at before I go to bed, which I don't recommend anyone does that.

[David Brown]

She noticed a bunch of tweets claiming that Elon Musk had suspended the account of elonjet.

[Katie Notopoulos]

He would prefer it not to exist. Here's this guy who puts himself out there as being so pro environment with electric cars, but meanwhile he's flying all over the place in this private jet, which is not good for the environment.

[David Brown]

Elonjet had more than a half a million followers.

[Katie Notopoulos]

People are just obsessed with Elon Musk and what he's up to.

[David Brown]

The flight information it shared was publicly available. The FAA requires that aircraft broadcast their location for safety reasons, and that information is regularly published by people with compatible radio receivers. And Elon had made a big deal when he bought Twitter that he would not ban the account My commitment to free speech extends even to not banning the account following my plane, even though that is a direct personal safety risk. Now he was doing exactly what he said he wouldn't. Any account doxing real time location info of anyone will be suspended as it is a physical safety violation. This includes posting links to sites with real time location info.

[Katie Notopoulos]

This was kind of, huh, what's going on? This is sort of out of nowhere.

[David Brown]

Elon was sharing a brand new Twitter policy. A man who had seemed to not care very much about doxing or safety in the past was now drawing a hard line. Thirty minutes later, he tweeted, why? Last night, car carrying Lil X in LA was followed by crazy stalker thinking it was me who later blocked car from moving and climbed onto hood. Lil X was Elon's two year old son. Elon followed up with a video a member of his security team shot. It showed a young man sitting in a white Hyundai holding up his phone. He wore a black hoodie with the hood pulled tight around his head and a black face mask obscuring his identity. Anyone recognize this person or car? Elon was understandably freaked out. His family had been in danger and he was suggesting the stalker found out where his son was by knowing where his jet was. So he responded unilaterally by banning elonjet from Twitter and changing Twitter policy to justify his ban.

[Katie Notopoulos]

It was one more thing in what felt like a chain of things, making it seem like the inmates were running the asylum. He could kind of control things. He could suspend people, he could change the rules on the fly.

[David Brown]

Elon quickly banned other accounts that tracked flights. And after elonjet popped up on Twitter rival Mastodon, Twitter blocked all links to that site server. Then Twitter announced a policy banning links to any outside social media platforms. Reporters were asking lots of questions, including how exactly was an account that shared publicly available flight information considered to be doxxing. The next day, Katie got a shocking text in a tech reporter group chat.

[Katie Notopoulos]

Oh, my God, my Twitter account has just been suspended.

[David Brown]

The text was from reporter Ryan Mack, who had been covering Elon's Twitter takeover for the New York Times.

[Katie Notopoulos]

And so, you know, we went and looked at his and we were like, oh my God, it's gone.

[David Brown]

And it wasn't just him. Names of other journalists who had also been permanently suspended from Twitter started popping up.

[Katie Notopoulos]

And presumably most of these people weren't, you know, doing the kinds of things that normally would get you, like a permanent suspension, like harassing someone, posting extreme horrible content of some kind.

[David Brown]

These were, well, credentialed journalists with one thing in common.

[Katie Notopoulos]

And the fact that these people all had been covering Elon Musk and Twitter somewhat critically, somewhat adversarially, certainly was eyebrow raising. I mean, it seemed like essentially he was doing something that he had criticized the previous Twitter administration for doing.

[David Brown]

It was alarming and wildly absurd.

[Katie Notopoulos]

My friends and I and Ryan were all sort of joking around. I said, oh, we should do a Twitter space and, you know, treat it as a sort of memorial for Ryan because RIP his account is dead.

[David Brown]

Word spread about poor Ryan's digital Viking funeral.

[Katie Notopoulos]

Ryan Mack has deserved to be banned for years now. And frankly, you know, I think we all appreciate that it's finally caught up with him. Ryan is, you know, he's funny and, you know, and he's a great reporter too. So we wanted to sort of like a little bit make fun of him. You know, he tweets about his leave Ryan Olop about soccer, you know, and no one wants that.

[Drew Harwell]

He does that thing that they do.

[Jack Dorsey]

Where he'll tweet like, blimey, at like.

[David Brown]

7 in the morning.

[Katie Notopoulos]

I think at this point, you know, 30,000 people were tuning in, and then.

[David Brown]

All of a sudden there was a surprise guest.

[Katie Notopoulos]

One of my friends said, oh, my God, Elon Musk just joined. I clicked on his little profile and, you know, invited him to speak.

[David Brown]

Just an hour earlier, Elon had made his position clear with a tweet. Same doxing rules apply to journalists as to everyone else. They posted my exact real time location, basically assassination coordinates, in obvious direct violation of Twitter terms of service information. Now Katie and her fellow journalists would be able to ask Elon about his position directly.

[Katie Notopoulos]

In that moment, I was a little bit like, oh, how do I. How do I navigate this? I just. Real quick, Elon, thank you for joining. I am hoping that you can give a little more context about what has happened. I wasn't sure if he would accept or not. And lo and behold, all of a sudden, his little icon bubble came up to the speakers list.

[Elon Musk]

Yeah, as I'm sure everyone who's been dachshund would agree, you know, showing real time information about somebody's location is inappropriate.

[David Brown]

Washington Post reporter Drew Harwell, one of the suspended journalists who still managed to log on, pushed back.

[Drew Harwell]

I mean, you're suggesting that we're sharing your address, which is not true, and you're suggesting that we're posting. We never. I never posted your address.

[Elon Musk]

You posted a link to the address.

[Drew Harwell]

We posted a link. In the course of reporting about elonjet, we Posted links to elonjet, which are now not online and now banned on Twitter and using, you know, we have to admit, acknowledge, using the same exact link blocking technique that you have criticized as part of the Hunter Biden New York Post story in 2020. So what is different here and there?

[Elon Musk]

It's no more acceptable for me, for you than it is for me. Same thing.

[Drew Harwell]

So anyway, so it's unacceptable what you're doing.

[Elon Musk]

No, what you docs, you get suspended. End of story. That's it.

[David Brown]

As Katie tried to get out a question about Elon making these decisions himself, she noticed that he had gone quiet.

[Katie Notopoulos]

Oh, I think. I think Elon has left.

[David Brown]

The reporters continued chatting for about 30 minutes, but then the space went dark.

[Katie Notopoulos]

All of a sudden, abruptly on my phone, the screen, you know, went black and the space cut out completely. I saw all these people tweeting at me. What happened? My space just cut out.

[David Brown]

Someone at Twitter had shut spaces down. Most people had a guess who had ordered that.

[Katie Notopoulos]

So it really just felt like, okay, this really is just a platform being ruled by a dictator who does things on his own whims.

[David Brown]

Twitter had always had its challenges of deciding where the line should be drawn between free speech and hate speech, between transparency and privacy. But it had never been run by decree. One single individual making snap decisions, turning on and off features, personally banning journalists when he didn't like what they had to say. Even some of his longtime allies were now questioning the lines he was crossing.

[Jack Dorsey]

I think it was a bad decision, and I think that it represented. The least generous statement would be that it represents deep hypocrisy.

[David Brown]

Elon was a frequent topic of discussion and adoration on the all in podcast with Chamath Palihipitiya, Jason Calacanis, David Sacks and David Friedberg. And Friedberg and Pali Hypitia had a lot to say.

[Jack Dorsey]

And then he came in and did exactly what the old regime did, which is that he took the rules and he took the, quote, moderation policies, and he found a way to use them to make some editorialized decisions that he thought was appropriate. I think that if there's any person in the world that can figure out Twitter, it's probably Elon Musk. But, man, has he taken on just a gargantuan battle. And increasingly, I am not a fan of this battle, and I'll tell you why. This is a man who has essentially proven that he can bend the laws of physics on behalf of humanity. He's done it twice. Once in electric cars and once in rocketry. The Problem is that the realm of decision making at Twitter has nothing to do with the laws of physics and is governed by emotions and psychology in which there is no canonically right answer. And so he's quickly finding out that half the population will always find fault with him, no matter what he does.

[David Brown]

Just six weeks earlier, the all in crew had almost messianic visions for what Elon was going to do with Twitter. Now even they were ready for an end to this chaos.

[Jack Dorsey]

And so I think that hopefully he gets all this shit under control over there, he finds a good executive team. I would like to see him get back to landing rockets on barges, getting to Mars. Let's get it finish.

[David Brown]

Self driving. Elon backtracked. He unbanned the journalists accounts. He tweaked the policy banning links to Mastodon, the rival social media platform, so it only applied to bots. He restored Twitter spaces. And he more or less promised that anytime there was a tough decision on Twitter, he would post a Twitter poll and let the people decide. And then he did just that. From Qatar, where he'd spent the day watching the thrilling World cup final in a skybox with Jared Kushner, he posted a new poll. Should I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of this poll. Yes. No. It was the wee hours of the morning in Qatar. Elon probably should have been asleep, but here he was, watching the yeses take the lead. As the saying goes, be careful what you wish, as you might get it. The question is not finding a CEO. The question is finding a CEO who can keep Twitter alive. When a user volunteered to take over as CEO for no salary, Elon tweeted back, you must like Payne a lot. One catch. You have to invest your life savings in Twitter and it has been in the fast lane to bankruptcy since May still want the job. Maybe it was the late hour, the jet lag, or the accumulation of self inflicted wounds, but Elon seemed like he had possibly reached a breaking point. When the poll closed, 58% of voters were asking Elon to step down. But Elon didn't respond. He was uncharacteristically quiet. Two days later, he joined another Twitter spaces. He sounded tired and frustrated.

[Elon Musk]

Well, bear in mind like, you know, the acquisition only closed like, like six weeks ago. Ish. So this is probably like the biggest amount of change that has happened in an acquisition, possibly in history.

[David Brown]

He admitted that some of his actions, like banning links to rival sites, had been a mistake.

[Jack Dorsey]

Can people post Mastodon now?

[Elon Musk]

Yeah, fucking post Mastodon. All Goddamn day long. I don't care.

[David Brown]

And when a user asked him about free speech directly, he didn't launch into his usual ideological talking points.

[Elon Musk]

Well, I mean free speech, let me tell you that if somebody's got to pay the servers, okay, so the speech has got to cost at least $8, because otherwise how do we pay the friggin servable, you know, there's like a billion and a half ish, you know, of all in server related costs.

[David Brown]

The job was hard. Running Twitter cost money and the stakes were high. In the past, pushing companies to the edge of disaster had been the fuel that drove him. It had worked when Tesla flirted with bankruptcy and SpaceX launched rockets that explained exploded after takeoff. But running Twitter seemed to have gotten the best of him.

[Elon Musk]

This company is, is like basically you're in a plane that is headed towards the ground at high speed with the engines on fire and the controls don't work.

[David Brown]

Never mind that Elon was the one who'd set the plane on fire. He didn't seem to be able to stop pouring gasoline on it. Two days after users voted for him to resign in his poll, Elon finally wrote a reply. I will resign as CEO as soon as I find someone foolish enough to take the job. But who would he choose? Or perhaps the better question was would he even choose anyone at all?

[Zoe Schiffer]

People were like, my man is paying $44 billion just to get his tweets back boosted.

[Elon Musk]

My dog is the CEO okay. He's a great dog.

[David Brown]

That's on the next and final episode of Flipping the Bird from Wontry. This is episode five of six of Flipping the Elon versus Twitter. I'm your host, David Brown. Austin Rachlis wrote this. Our producers are Nika Singh and Dave Schilling. Julia Lowery Henderson and Karen Lowe are our senior producers. Reporting by Emily Corwin. Production assistance by Emily Locke and Mariah Dennis. Fact checking by Nawal Anjani. Consultant is Kurt Wagner, Bloomberg journalist and author of an upcoming book about Twitter and Elon Musk. Sound design by Kyle Randall. Music supervisor is Scott Velasquez. For Frisson Sync, Senior managing producer is Latha Pandya. Managing producer is Olivia Weber. Coordinating producer is Heather Beloga. Executive producers are Jenny Lauer, Beckman, George Lavender, Marshall, Louie and Jen Sargent. For wondering.

[Zoe Schiffer]

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