A tranche of Elon Musk’s non-public messages have been made public as a part of his ongoing lawsuit with Twitter. The messages, revealed in a Thursday, shed new gentle on Musk’s behind-the-scenes negotiations with Twitter’s management, as properly discussions with former CEO Jack Dorsey, and the way Musk’s talks with CEO Parag Agrawal shortly soured.
The messages embrace the second Musk tells Agrawal he desires to accumulate Twitter and take it non-public, quite than be a part of the board. Agrawal confronts Musk about an April ninth questioning if “Twitter is dying.”
Agrawal writes to Musk:
You are free to tweet “is Twitter dying?” or the rest about Twitter – nevertheless it’s my duty to let you know that it’s not serving to me make Twitter higher within the present context. Next time we converse, I’d wish to you present you [sic] perspective on the extent of the inner distraction proper now and the way it [sic] hurting our means to do work. I hope the AMA will assist folks get to know you, to know why you consider in Twitter, and to belief you – and I’d like the corporate to get to a spot the place we’re extra resilient and don’t get distracted however we aren’t there proper now.
Musk responded lower than a minute later. “What did you get done this week? I’m not joining the board. This is a waste of time. Will make an offer to take Twitter private.”
Twitter board chair Bret Taylor adopted up with Musk a couple of minutes later asking to speak. “Fixing Twitter by chatting with Parag won’t work,” Musk tells Taylor. “Drastic action is needed. This is hard to do as a public company, as purging fake users will make the numbers look terrible, so restructuring should be done as a private company. This is Jack’s opinion too.”
The messages additionally present a glimpse into the connection between Dorsey and Musk. Dorsey has that “Elon is the singular solution I trust,” however hasn’t publicly commented since Musk sued in an try and renege on the acquisition.
But within the newly launched messages, it’s clear Dorsey has needed Musk to tackle an lively position at Twitter for a while. Dorsey tells Musk that he needed him to affix Twitter’s board of administrators lengthy earlier than Musk acquired a big stake within the firm.
“Back when we had the activist come in, I tried my hardest to get you on our board and our board said no. That’s about the time I decided I needed to work to leave, as hard as it was for me,” Dorsey says. “I think the main reason is the board is just super risk averse and saw adding you as more risk, which I though was completely stupid and backwards, but I only had one vote, and 3% of company, and no dual class shares. Hard set up. We can discuss more.”
Dorsey gave the impression to be referring to the activist investor that tried Dorsey in early 2020.
Notably, this dialog occurred in late March, after Musk had a multibillion-dollar stake in Twitter, however earlier than his stake had been made . He and Dorsey additionally mentioned the Twitter cofounder’s perception that Twitter “can’t be a company.”
Dorsey writes to Musk:
I consider it should be an open supply protocol, funded by a basis of kinds that doesn’t personal the protocol, solely advances it. A bit like what Signal has carried out. It can’t have an promoting mannequin. Otherwise you have got floor space that governments and advertisers will attempt to affect and management. If it has a centralized entity behind it, it is going to be attacked. This isn’t difficult work, it simply needs to be carried out proper so it’s resilient to what has occurred to twitter.
Musk responds that the thought is “super interesting” and that “it’s worth both trying to move Twitter in a better direction and doing something new that’s decentralized.”
The following month, Dorsey additionally tried to play mediator between Musk and Agrawal, at one level arranging a name between the three of them. “You and I are in complete agreement,” Musk tells Dorsey. “Parag is just moving far too slowly and trying to please people who will not be happy no matter what he does.”
“At least it became clear that you can’t work together,” Dorsey later responds. “That was clarifying.”
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