Musk Admits He Doesn't Fact-Check Himself and Has Two Burner Accounts on Twitter
Musk Admits He Doesn't Fact-Check Himself and Has Two Burner Accounts on Twitter
New defamation suit against Elon Musk over tweets reveals how the billionaire spreads misinformation and lurks on secret Twitter accounts.
Elon Musk‘s erratic posting on X, formerly Twitter, has come back to haunt him once again as a 22-year-old Jewish man pursues a defamation case over tweets in which the tech mogul baselessly suggested the recent college graduate was an undercover federal agent posing as a neo-Nazi during a street fight between far-right groups. Musk’s excruciating March 27 deposition in the matter, which a judge ordered released to the public over the objections of the CEO’s lawyer, reveals the extent to which he has continually sabotaged both himself and the social media platform he owns.
An entertaining read that further cements Musk as an honest-to-god unhinged idiot. I've seen a lot of people speculate that him buying Twitter and tanking its value was some kind of genius plot, but the simpler explanation is that he's just unironically stupid and a bad businessman.
The fact that he has another burner account which he uses to get around blocks and hurl insults at others is both really funny and completely expected. I'm willing to bet a signed dollar that he has yet another alt that he uses to lean even further right and say the N-word on a regular basis.
There's a third explanation: He's a fairly bad businessman but Twitter was always expected to lose money, and the purpose of owning it is to use it as a cost center for massive political influence.
I'm not necessarily espousing this theory, I have no real evidence either way, but lots of billionaires buy media outlets so they can direct public sentiment. Twitter, managed correctly, could have been a pretty good way to do that, but even within that lens it has been managed very badly, so IDK
He is an actual idiot.
When his name first became popular, I was like others thinking, hey, this guy sounds like a genius, maybe I should pay attention. Then I did pay attention and he ventured into my industry: comp sci and user experience. That’s when I realised he was an utter moron. When you know more about what he’s talking about than he does, it becomes obvious.
The fact that people think that he didn't buy twitter because he thought he could print more money is frightening
Umm, some things are more important than money, namely, power. He bought twitter because it allows him to silence critics and break up a social media platform that was allowing citizens globally to communicate and take stands against governments.
His incompetence as a business runner should have been blatantly clear when the SEC had to step into Tesla due to his comments and have him removed from all financial decision making for the company.
https://www.sec.gov/news/press-release/2018-226
He straight up has no idea how to run a business itself and always acts like he's the full blown god of the companies he claims to run.
Fun story: He didn't found Tesla as he claimed. He bought in and part of the deal was he could claim as a founder. (founded by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning)
Also fun Fact: He only started Space X because he was ousted from PayPal for being a shitty CEO by the board.
…the simpler explanation is that he's just unironically stupid and a bad businessman.
Occam’s Razor.
It does seem like he's ignorant on many subjects, but if he is a complete idiot, how did he manage to make the right investments to become among the richest of the world?
Because of dad's money (it seems there's no clear information about the money from the mine https://www.snopes.com/news/2022/11/17/elon-musk-emerald-mine/)? That's a good start, sure, but many smart people, with a similar good start or more, try to become richer and don't reach this level. So what's the additional element?
Is it really not an acceptable explanation that he had good guts at detecting the bubbles and did multiple smart investments at the right times (early internet website, internet payment, electric cars, low cost space)?
Let's try to have an opinion of a higher quality than what Musk usually writes on his media, that is to say, not solely based on some strong feelings.I believe a combination of inertia and "throwing shit at the wall to see what sticks" may be applicable here.
If his recent ventures are anything to go by, he's an "idea guy" that makes a convincing case of sounding smart enough to succeed. He makes big promises about revolutionizing something, and because of his persona as a successful inventor, investors and fans buy into those ideas.
With support behind him, he's free to burn other people's money in the hopes that one of his fantastical projects actually succeeds. And if it doesn't, just sweep it under the rug like the Hyperloop.
Or, you know, he could always use his capital to fund others' ideas and then take credit as though they were his original idea, like with Tesla.
He frequently picked markets where he was bought out for hefty sums and the rest is government contracts. Tesla was the first thing bought that shipped a somewhat usable product and you can see what he's done to it.
He could have ruled the EV market but he had to ship inferior products, waste money crushing unions, overstate its capabilities, and now Tesla has a bunch of cars they can't sell.
What right investments? He was born into money and failed into getting anything from his X.com (banking!) website which was bought out by PayPal long after he was fired. The only reason he got anything out of that at all was he'd kept the stocks around.
He "invested" in Tesla so that he could get a cool car (he royally fucked over the actual founders in the process).
Low cost space? Low cost space? Do you live on Mars or some shit? Every one of those "Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly" events cost over one Billion. That ain't cheap buddy.
"Not fact checking" and "spewing objectively dumb shit" are not the same thing.
True, but this was a legal admission. He said it under oath.
The whole article is pretty wild.
Elmo never misses an opportunity to demonstrate what an utter moron he is.
X is “the most accurate, timely, and truthful place on the internet,” Musk said during his questioning about a false statement he made on the site that has been viewed by over a million users and has yet to be retracted or deleted almost a year later.
Hilarious.
Truth in this case, comes from the ability to be proven wrong. If they removed it, the truth wouldn't have a chance to be relevant and challenge the wrong statement. I assume that is what Elon has in mind when he considers his site to be more truthful. Much on the common internet these days gets shut down and removed before even being able to be challenged. Like on Reddit. Which ironically leads to less truth, since less people have their opinions challenged and are instead removed, or the challenge is removed.
No I'm pretty sure truth is just information that maps to material reality.
Like, it's more complex than that, and if anyone wanted to have a serious discussion we should probably lay down sonevprimers and talk about thought and models and standardized abstractions like language, but without getting about 5000 pages deep; truth is just that; information that maps to material reality. It remains true if it is not known, and a lie is not made truth if everybody fails to call it bullshit.
Bad bot
Having private accounts isn't that unusual for public figures, sometimes people just want to soapbox and vent in public a little but not attract too much attention to themselves.
Roleplaying your own infant son on one of your private account, however, is super, super weird.
What he said as that account is the extra weird part. Some rather inappropriate things.
I'm gonna guess he has way more than two burners. The dude is an addict, tweeting is all he has.
There was that bizarre scenario with “Adrian Dittman” recently, where Musk - I mean uh, Dittman - called into Alex Jones’ show and was immediately called out for being Musk because he sounded almost identical. However, the caller denied it. Then Musk started doing little podcasts with “Dittman” apparently because it was so neat they just happened to talk almost exactly alike. Hmm.
Then, there’s “Doge Designer”, who is supposedly an Indian engineer at some Dogecoin focused company, but often says precisely what Musk would say about things, frequently gets replied to by Musk, and has somehow come up with TwitX stats and yet unseen personal photos of Elron with no explanation.
I liked it so much, I bought the company!
Are we just going to ignore the fact that an account can't be a "burner" account if you keep reusing it? This abuse of language doesn't fly with me
Just like how a drug dealer throws away their burner phone after every drug deal. /s
Or maybe you're not thinking about what this word means in context. Burner doesn't mean "use once and abandon", it means "use anonymously and abandon if needed".
Hey now, this is Lemmy. There's no room for nuance, just unbridled pedantry.
Yeah, he's clearly too far down the reddit rabbithole.
Has to "uhm ackshually" about everything.
For a plug thats not a "burner", its the trap phone. Hearing lemmy nerds talk about this stuff is amusing
What a sad pathetic little man. Proof that money is no substitution for a parents love if you want your kids to grow up normal.
I'm sure he had a relatively normal upbringing. After all his father's current wife is his step sister. Who among us has not lived through something like that.
You don't need to fact check yourself when you're always right.
And the richer you are, the smarter you are, so he is always right.
He’s the rightest guy in the room.
That’s just a corollary to Worthington’s Law
One flew over the Twitter’s nest
I want to know if one of his burner accounts is Adrian Dittmann.
Alex Jones thinks it's Elon. Maybe. I don't know.
Dittman has come up on Knowledge Fight a couple of times.
Exactly what made me think that. If Dan's still not sure...
Oh god same! It's uncanny how similar their voices and speaking manners are.
When you're rich enough, you can fight and settle all of the slander cases you want.
Only 2?
So busy working all day yet he runs two burner Twitter accounts.
This asshole doesn't do shit but play Diablo 4 (which sucks ass), tweet, and boss around the people who actually make his companies successful.
He's one of those CEOs that teams have two meetings for: one where the CEO joins and they only say things the CEO wants to hear, and a second to actually discuss the relevant issues.
Not far off from the truth and a big part of the reason SpaceX actually gets some cool stuff done.
More like two million bot accounts
At this point, he doesn't need those burner accounts. Go ahead and say what's on your mind, Elon.
So @emonlusk and @loneskum are not real user??
What about @melonhusk and @skulnemo?
So disinfo is the currency of X now. Their gas bill is gonna be outrageous
Why bother trying to tell the truth when there are no consequences for lying.
Is this news been checked?
So what?
He says what he feels and its not always factually correct. Sounds like a human to me. If people believe everything he says thats on them.
It’s a problem when it’s defaming someone.
He owns the platform and actively dismantled fact checking and moderation. Your point is shit.
Wait, you're saying its not possible for people to call him out for being wrong on X?
Found your alt account, Elon, nice try.
He is deliberately using his celebrity status as an avenue to spread disinformation and promote his personal agenda in a public forum. The public that he is attempting to manipulate that occupy said forum have every right to ridicule and criticize his attempts.
Not everyone is able to purchase a popular social media platform in an effort to enhance the visibility and normalization of their beliefs.
If his questionable opinions "sound human to you," then so should the public response that they create.
What makes you think he is deliberately spreading disinformation?
He says what he feels. It is a responsibility for the people to not take everything he says as fact. Its like talking to a friend who says some wild shit to get it off their chest. Doesn't mean you need to change your opinion because of it.
I see the theoretical idea of him intentionally trying to shape the opinion of his sheep enough to do what he wants for him. But I don't personally buy it. Albeit it is good to be aware of the possibility.
Telling his advertisers that if they don't like that he allows antisemitism and hatred on X, to fuck off, in person in an auditorium is not "human". it's disgusting and evidences that He himself believes in spreading hatred as long as it makes him rich/powerful
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/elon-musk-bob-iger-should-be-fired-immediately
this isn't how you run a business. (unless you're perfectly fine with spreading hatred)
BREAKING: Musk is a big dumb meanie! And we write 50 ad-laden articles every time he posts something.
If you're going to kiss his ass this hard, at least do it on X where there's a chance he'll see you.
I fucking despise Musk. And you obviously can't read.
Why are you not using an ad blocker
Lolol neither do any of you. And none of you are posting your public information either.
I regularly check my facts. And I admit it when I get them wrong.
I wish more people would do both.
I have a feeling that even if you do the former, you rarely do the latter.
I have a feeling that even if you do the former, you rarely do the latter.
I have no idea if we have a murderedbywords community here, but let's pretend this reply contains a link to one.
You're definitely not an AI, @IsThisAnAI, because an AI wouldn't be stupid enough to defend Musk. Even Grok wouldn't do that.
On the other hand, if it is an AI, then we've finally discovered an AI with sentience, because only something like a human could be this stupid.
He's been allover the site posting the most inane oppositional comments to verything. Either a bot or paid account.
We're also not calling ourselves "Free Speech Absolutionists" or claim Lemmy is “the most accurate, timely and truthful place on the internet,”
what compels people to be defensive about one of the worlds richest oligarchs? If he wants to addresss this he has the platforms and money to do so. He's not some baby who needs to be defended online.