Elon Musk considering big changes for Twitter after $61.4 billion deal

Tesla CEO Elon Musk is considering big changes for Twitter after he struck a deal to buy the social platform for $61.4 billion.

Elon Musk’s deal to buy Twitter means big changes could be in store for the social media site – including potentially bringing back Donald Trump, verifying every human user of the site and converting the company’s headquarters into a homeless shelter.

While the SpaceX boss hasn’t explicitly promised to allow the former US president back onto Twitter after he was previously banned by the site, he has said that Twitter’s current moderation policies are too restrictive, the New York Post reports.

But Mr Trump, who was banned last year over his role in the January 6 Capitol riots, claimed in a Fox News interview that he doesn’t want to return to Twitter despite its new owner, and instead plans to use his own struggling Twitter alternative TRUTH Social, even though he hasn’t posted on the site since February.

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Elon Musk is considering big changes for Twitter. Picture: Theo Wargo/Getty Images for TIME.

In another indication of how Musk might handle content moderation issues on Twitter, he wrote last week: “A social media platform’s policies are good if the most extreme 10 per cent on left and right are equally unhappy.”

The billionaire has also said he wants to verify “all real humans” who use the site in an effort to crack down on spam.

“If our Twitter bid succeeds, we will defeat the spam bots or die trying!” he tweeted earlier in April.

In addition, Musk has said he’s considering adding an “edit button” to Twitter, saying in an interview last week that a way to reduce abuse of the feature could be to “zero out” retweets and favourites when a tweet is edited.

Musk has said he’s looking to make Twitter’s algorithm publicly available online in order to address concerns of some users who claim certain tweets are unfairly promoted or demoted.

“I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans,” Musk said in a statement.

‘If our Twitter bid succeeds, we will defeat the spam bots or die trying!’ Musk said. Picture: Scott Olson/Getty Images

Musk has also mused about more outlandish changes including converting Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters into a homeless shelter – an idea endorsed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos – and dropping the letter “w” from Twitter’s name.

“I’m serious about this one,” the billionaire said earlier in April about changing Twitter’s name to an apparent reference to breasts.

pic.twitter.com/OL2hnKngTx

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 1, 2021

Ahead of the announcement that Twitter’s board had accepted Musk’s proposal to purchase the platform, employees were divided over the potential takeover.

One Twitter employee called Musk “a racist demagogue with a god complex,” while another said, “Let’s go Daddy Elon!”

One Twitter employee who’s likely unhappy about Musk’s acquisition is CEO Parag Agrawal, who critics say has enforced unfair bans on users.

Prior to Musk’s takeover bid, the billionaire posted a meme comparing Mr Agrawal to Joseph Stalin.

Twitter’s press release announcing Musk’s acquisition quoted Mr Agrawal but made no mention of his future.

This article originally appeared in the New York Post and was reproduced with permission