Queue the tiny violins
Billionaire Elon Musk – the same man who has taken over Twitter controversially – said on Monday he was working “at the absolute most amount…from morning til night, seven days a week”.
His admission comes when asked about his recent acquisition of Twitter and his leadership of automaker Tesla Inc.
“I have too much work on my plate that is for sure,” Musk said by videolink to a business conference on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali.
Understandably Musk, by definition, should be fairly busy. He is the chief executive of both companies and also runs rocket firm SpaceX, brain-chip startup Neuralink and tunneling firm the Boring Company.
So it should be no surprise to anyone that he needs to work for his money.
Wearing a batik shirt sent by the organisers, he appeared on screen lit by candles, explaining that he was speaking from a place that had just lost power – even rich people are impacted by the energy crisis.
Tesla investors worry that Musk, a self-confessed “nanomanager” who has been personally involved in working-level decisions from car styling to supply chain issues, is distracted at a critical time for the world’s largest electric vehicle maker.
Tesla’s shares have halved in value since early April, when he disclosed he had taken a stake in Twitter.
His Tesla share sales, including another $4 billion last week to bring his Twitter-related sales to $20 billion, have added to the pressure.
Meanwhile, things at Twitter haven’t gone that smoothly.
One of Musk’s first moves after taking control of Twitter on October 27 was to revamp the blue-tick verification process Twitter had used to confirm that the accounts of certain public figures were legitimate.
Since then, several Twitter users have established “verified” accounts, complete with the coveted blue check mark, falsely claiming to be companies, politicians, celebrities and other familiar names. Then they set about making Musk’s job to transform Twitter a whole lot harder.
Twitter “paused” the sale of blue check marks on November 11 as fake verified accounts began to pile up.
No wonder the man is so busy, he creates a lot of work for himself
Related links:
- Man makes VR headset that kills the user if they die during game
- Twitter employee seen sleeping on office floor as Elon Musk pushes tight deadlines
- 3,700 Twitter employees have been fired via email following Elon Musk’s takeover
