San Francisco: Amazon founder Jeff Bezos Tuesday took the first test of Elon Musk’s commitment to allow free speech on the platform, posting that Tesla’s business interests in China could give the government leverage over Twitter via its new owner.
A New York Times reporter tweeted that “After 2009, when China banned Twitter, the government there had almost no leverage over the platform. That may have just changed”.
Bezos replied: “Interesting question. Did the Chinese government just gain a bit of leverage over the town square?”
Interesting question. Did the Chinese government just gain a bit of leverage over the town square? https://t.co/jTiEnabP6T
— Jeff Bezos (@JeffBezos) April 25, 2022
The Amazon founder further said that his own answer to “this question is probably not”.
“The more likely outcome in this regard is complexity in China for Tesla, rather than censorship at Twitter,” Bezos said.
My own answer to this question is probably not. The more likely outcome in this regard is complexity in China for Tesla, rather than censorship at Twitter.
— Jeff Bezos (@JeffBezos) April 26, 2022
“But we’ll see. Musk is extremely good at navigating this kind of complexity,” he kept trolling the Tesla and SpaceX CEO.
But we’ll see. Musk is extremely good at navigating this kind of complexity.
— Jeff Bezos (@JeffBezos) April 26, 2022
Musk, who is worth $282 billion and over $100 billion richer than Bezos, has frequently criticised the latter on Twitter.
From calling him ‘Copycat’ to after Bezos announced plans to launch a new satellite-based broadband service to trolling him on the micro-blogging platform, Musk is facing fierce competition in the affordable satellite-based internet market from Amazon.
Amazon this month announced the biggest rocket deal in the commercial space industry’s history, signing a pact with three rocket companies for up to 83 launches under its Project Kuiper internet satellites.
The contracts total up to 83 launches over a five-year period, providing capacity for Amazon to deploy the majority of its 3,236-satellite constellation.
Just before Twitter announced it is accepting Musk’s $44 billion buyout bid, the world’s richest man tweeted: “I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means.”
I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 25, 2022
Will Bezos remain on Twitter or whether Musk will let him stay? Only time will tell.
