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Elon Musk Answers Rumor That He Wants To Purchase Conservative News Network

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OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.


Elon Musk has made a decision on purchasing the conservative news network One America News Network and he has decided against it.

“We just received a call from somebody very close to [Musk] telling us that he would like to talk to us about purchasing [OANN],” OANN CEO Robert Herring said in a tweet that started the speculation on the Internet.

But the Tesla, Space X and Starlink CEO ended that speculation pretty quickly when he tweeted “Only Twitter.”

But Musk did get fantastic news on his Twitter deal on Thursday.

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The Twitter Board of Directors has agreed to comply with the demands of Elon Musk as it pertains to his concerns regarding bots and fake accounts on the platform.

The Tesla, Space X and Starlink CEO has asked for user data so that he and his team can analyze how many users are bots or fake accounts.

“After a weeks-long impasse, Twitter’s board plans to comply with Elon Musk’s demands for internal data by offering access to its full ‘firehose,’ the massive stream of data comprising more than 500 million tweets posted each day, according to a person familiar with the company’s thinking, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the state of negotiations,” The Washington Post reported.

The move aims to end a standoff with the billionaire, who has threatened to pull out of his $44 billion deal to buy Twitter unless the company provides access to data he says is necessary to evaluate the number of fake users on the platform.

The information could be provided as soon as this week, the person said. Currently some two dozen companies pay for access to the trove, which comprises not only a real-time record of tweets but the devices they tweet from, as well as information about the accounts that tweet.

This week he threatened to walk away from the deal because he said that Twitter is not providing him information about spam bots and fake accounts on the social media platform, Fox News reported.

“This is a clear material breach of Twitter’s obligations under the merger agreement and Mr. Musk reserves all rights resulting therefrom, including his right not to consummate the transaction and his right to terminate the merger agreement,” his attorneys said in a letter to Twitter on Monday.

Twitter said in a statement Monday that it has been cooperatively sharing information with Musk “in accordance with the terms of the merger agreement” and noted that the deal is in “the best interest of all shareholders.”

“We intend to close the transaction and enforce the merger agreement at the agreed price and terms,” it added.

Musk had threatened to put the deal on hold last month over his concerns over bots and fake accounts.

Musk tweeted that the deal was “on hold” in response to a story that showed Twitter claimed spam and bot accounts comprise less than 5 percent of its users.

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“Twitter deal temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of users,” he said.

Hours later he said, “Still committed to acquisition.”

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“Twitter Inc estimated in a filing on Monday that false or spam accounts represented fewer than 5% of its monetizable daily active users during the first quarter,” the Reuters story said.

“The social media company had 229 million users who were served advertising in the first quarter,” it said.

“The disclosure came days after Tesla Inc Chief Executive Elon Musk, who has inked a deal to buy Twitter for $44 billion, tweeted that one of his priorities would be to remove “’spam bots’ from the platform,” it said.

The news comes after it was reported this week that Twitter Chief Executive Officer Parag Agrawal is freezing hiring and taking other cost-cutting measures now that Elon Musk’s bid to purchase the company has been accepted.

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