Musk aims to ease concerns in address to Twitter workers

New York: In an unusual move for what’s been an unusual takeover bid for Twitter by the world’s richest man, Tesla CEO Elon Musk met virtually with the social platform’s employees Thursday, even though his $44 billion offer has not yet been completed.

“Trust is as trust does. I tend to be extremely literal in what I say...One does not (need) to read between the lines. One can simply read the lines,” Musk said in the meeting, according to a tweet from Nola Weinstein, Twitter’s global head of brand experiences and engagement.

Weinstein did not immediately respond to a message for further comment and she subsequently deleted all her tweets about the meeting. Twitter declined to comment. Musk, according to multiplenews reports, also addressed possible layoffs at the company, saying that, right now, “costs exceed revenue. That’s not a great situation.”

He also touched on growth, saying he’d like to see Twitter reach a billion users — roughly four times its current user base ) and anonymity, where he earlier created a stir when he said he wants to “verify all humans” on the service

. At the meeting, he clarified that this does not mean he wants to have everyone on Twitter use their real names, like on Facebook, since pseudonyms can allow people to express their political views freely, according to The New York Times. Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal announced the allhands meeting to employees in an email on Monday, saying they’d be able to submit questions in advance.

The meeting is a “clear step in the right direction towards the chances of a deal happening and a smart strategic move as Twitter employees have been left in the dark over the past few months and have many questions during this volatile period of uncertainty,” said Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives. One of Musk’s key points at the meeting, which started a little after 9 am Pacific time, was to make Twitter “so compelling that you can’t live without it,” Weinstein tweeted.

Musk, who has more than 98 million followers on Twitter and its one of the platform’s most prolific users, also said that while some people “use their hair to express themselves, I use Twitter,” according to Weinstein. Musk, according to multiple reports, also praised Chinese apps such as TikTok, which he said is good at keeping people engaged and not being “boring,” and WeChat, which he said could be a good model for what Twitter could be. —AP