Elon Musk has taken charge of Twitter following the apparent completion of his $44 billion deal with the company on Thursday—and promptly fired CEO Parag Agrawal as well as CFO Ned Segal and chief legal counsel Vijaya Gadde.
The billionaire announced the news by tweeting, “The bird is freed.”
The platform he’s acquired is, of course, hurling out opinions left, right, and center about his takeover—with some making light of the situation, and others lamenting the ushering in of a potentially chaotic era on the social media site.
Amid the initial trickle of realization that Musk’s ownership was a reality, several Twitter users discussed whether they would stay or leave the site. One viral tweet suggested a migration to LinkedIn, while Jimmy Wales, cofounder of Wikipedia, encouraged users to switch to WikiTribune Social, which markets itself as “the nontoxic social network.”
Others launched into making witty jokes about what a Twitter under the Tesla founder might look like.
Jokes aside, some users mulled over the repercussions of another billionaire taking ownership of a powerful sphere of influence, comparing it to today’s big tech companies and historical attempts to use such platforms to drive political narratives.
Regarding the future of social media, the founder of investigative journalism group Bellingcat, Eliot Higgins, said that Musk’s takeover and intent to push for free speech could in fact do the opposite overall.
Others focused on the usability of Twitter itself as a platform, saying that it could descend into chaos and become particularly toxic, or that users who wanted to stay would have to figure out a way to meticulously curate their timelines.
Across the Atlantic however, European commissioner Thierry Breton implied the impact of the acquisition would not be felt so much on the continent.
Right-wing politicians were largely positive about the news, including Texas congressman Dan Crenshaw and California congressman Darrell Issa.
And naturally, plenty theorized about the return of former President Donald Trump after he was banned from the platform for life.
A Delaware judge set Friday as the official deadline to finalize the deal.