Bill Gates warns that Elon Musk could make Twitter ‘worse’

Bill Gates warned that Elon Musk could make Twitter “worse”, as the CEO of Tesla offered to buy the company for $ 44 billion, according to CNBC.

Speaking to the Wall Street Journal CEO Summit, Gates said it was unclear how Musk would change Twitter if he took ownership, and expressed concern about the spread of misinformation on social media platforms.

The Microsoft co-founder admitted that Musk’s track record at other companies is impressive. Gates said he believes Musk did a good job of assembling a large team of engineers at Tesla and SpaceX.

“I have some doubt that this will happen this time, but we need to be open-minded and never underestimate Elon,” Gates said.

Bill Gates’ comments came after Musk accused him of sorting out Tesla shares last month. Musk also wrote on Twitter a bad joke about Gates, with the latter stating that the insults do not bother him.

Gates, who has surpassed Musk as the richest man in the world in recent years, wondered what Musk’s goal is on Twitter and whether his effort to promote free speech makes sense.

“How does he feel about a Twitter post that says ‘vaccines kill people’ or that ‘Bill Gates is watching people?'” Gates asked.

A spokesman for Musk did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In recent weeks, Musk has hinted at a number of ways he can try to improve Twitter beyond promoting free speech. Late Tuesday, for example, he said he could start charging companies a “small” fee for using the platform.

Fight against misinformation

Vaccine misconceptions spread rapidly on social media during the coronavirus pandemic, with some falsely claiming that Gates was somehow using the vaccines to implant 5G chips in humans so that he could detect the their position. “This is so unexpected and so strange,” Gates said.

He noted that it is “dangerous” when people reject the basic tool used to save people’s lives and believes that those who own social networking platforms have an important role to play in ensuring that the truth is spread effectively.

“When you do not have credible leaders talking about vaccines, it is very difficult for the platform to work against it,” he admitted. “So I think we have a leadership problem and a problematic platform.”

“The way you make these platforms spread the truth, not crazy stuff, requires a real invention,” Gates said.

“The fact that information about the effectiveness of drugs can be spread quickly and cheaply should be a blessing to humanity,” Gates said, calling the story with hydroxychloroquine “crazy.”

“I can not explain that,” he said. “I do not think digital technology is responsible for this obsession with drugs that do not work.”

Gates said he plans to set up a 3,000-person social networking unit to help spread accurate vaccine information in the future. He noted that “good messages” should be promoted by people who trust the communities.