After his surprise entry to Twitter, the tech billionaire provocatively questioned the platform’s survival chances. “Is Twitter dying?” Elon Musk wrote in a tweet on Saturday. To do so, he provided statistics for the 10 Twitter accounts with the most followers, lamenting: “Most of these ‘big’ accounts rarely tweet and post very little content.”
Among the top ten Twitter accounts are those of former US President Barack Obama, pop stars Justin Bieber, Katy Perry, Rihanna, Taylor Swift, Lady Gaga and soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo. Musk is ranked 8th in the rating with more than 81 million subscribers.
Musk went on to say that Taylor Swift hasn’t posted anything in the past three months. Justin Bieber has only made one post per year.
Wealth: nearly 300 billion
At the beginning of April, it was announced that Musk had become the largest shareholder in Twitter with a stake of 9.2 percent. At first it seemed as if he wanted to be content with a passive role as an investor. Shortly thereafter, his entry to the company’s board of directors became public.
Musk officially has more influence on Twitter’s strategy. Twitter head Parag Agrawal commented that Musk believes in the platform and is also a harsh critic. This is exactly what Twitter needs to get stronger in the long run.
Musk uses Twitter not only to advertise his electric car maker Tesla and his space company SpaceX, but also to forward prank tweets, exchange blows with critics — and to express a provocative opinion.
The 50-year-old is considered the richest person in the world thanks to his holdings in Tesla and SpaceX. Bloomberg Financial Service currently estimates his fortune at $288 billion.
(dsc/sda/dpa)
