Tuesday, April 26, 2022

Elon Buys Twitter - Now What?

Peter Kafka looks at different ways Elon Musk could make Twitter a profitable business.

I think the question is mostly moot. Musk could run the company at a loss and simply take the write-off. Nobody asks how Jeff Bezos can turn a profit with the Washington Post (hint - he can't). Having a free speech haven would be reward enough for Musk.

Having said the above, here's three suggestions for improving Twitter's bottom line:

1. Get into the web hosting business. Twitter requires a tremendous number of servers and cloud services to stay up and running. Beef up those data centers and start charging the other Musk companies for hosting services. This would be a bit of the left hand paying the right but it could also open up Twitter hosting to other major clients and create a new revenue stream for Twitter.

2. Make creating and posting short videos on Twitter easier. Maybe eat into some of TikTok's business. The tech should be easy enough and the selling point would be better security and privacy. Does anyone really want the Chinese having access to their private data and phones?

3. Make creating and posting pictures on Twitter easier. Same premise as above but this time it would be an attack on Instagram's bottom line. Same selling points would apply - do you really want Mark Zuckerberg having access to all your data?

Basically Musk can make Twitter a financial success by making Twitter the social media platform that adheres to Net Neutrality. Twitter won't favor one political party over another, won't sell your private data to third parties, and respects your privacy and right to free speech. Doesn't have to be any more complicated than that.

No comments:

Post a Comment