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Elon Musk seizes control of Twitter for $44B, Internet says 'he could've been less annoying'

Twitter, which is publicly traded, will now become a private company owned by the world's richest man

Elon Musk is set to buy Twitter for $44 billion, a deal that he struck on Monday, April 25. The firm, which is publicly traded, will now become a private company owned by the world's richest man. Musk reportedly negotiated a purchase price of $54.20 per-share.

Musk has been a steadfast proponent of ‘free speech’ on Twitter. The Tesla co-founder had earlier opened up about an ‘Edit Button’ on the platform, and went on to hold a poll, delibereate misspelling yes and no, possibly to bring to the users' attention that the button is needed as people often make typographical errors while tweeting. Twitter has reportedly now confirmed the the Edit button will be introduced.

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"Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated," Musk has said in a statement released by Twitter. "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. Twitter has tremendous potential - I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it."

Musk is one of the most prolific users of Twitter with more than 83 million followers. In January, he began amassing a stake of about 9% and had ramped up his criticism for the microblogging platform by March, alleging that Twitter's growth was inflated by bots. He also said that the platform's feeds are overwhelmed with automated junk posts, and that the company's algorithms are biased. "I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means," Musk has now tweeted.

What is Twitter saying?

Twitter users have taken to the platform to put forth various opinions after the news surfaced. Popular entrepreneur David Sacks said, "The American Dream attracted Elon Musk as a college student. American freedom allowed him to become the world’s richest man. And when America lost its way on free speech, he used his wealth to put it back on track. That’s a self-correcting mechanism! Only in America." "Prepare for blue check mark full scale meltdown after @elonmusk seals the deal and I should get my personal Twitter account restored," wrote American politician Marjorie Taylor Greene. 'Huddle Up' founder Joe Pompliano wrote, "The Elon Musk hate is so weird to me. He is the greatest entrepreneur of our lifetime, and he is attempting to solve the world's most challenging problems (climate change, multi-planetary living, etc.). He should be the role model for an entire generation."

"Elon musk spending $43 billion to stop getting bullied on twitter when he could’ve simply been less annoying is insane," one user wrote, while another said, "Elon Musk is a greedy misguided dum**** piece of sh** who thinks that becoming the King of Twitter is more important than ending homelessness, stopping hunger, or fighting climate change. What a narcissistic selfish as*****." "After Elon Musk fully takes over it will be interesting to see whether in addition to the removal of censorship practices, throttles on conservatives will be lifted," one user commented.