Book Reviewed: Breaking Twitter: Elon Musk and the Most Controversial Corporate Takeover in History by Ben Mezrich

The power and fragilities of Twitter takeover Author Ben Mezrich calls his work a dramatic narrative of the aftermath of the takeover of Twitter by Elon Musk, one of the wealthiest persons in the world. Much of the story you read in this book is not factual but reimagined on author’s speculation. This is not an honest appraisal of the enormous challenges Elon Musk faced when he bought the social media giant to restore free speech. The legacy of Jack Dorsey and his aides had heavy leftist bias that imposed censorship targeting conservative users of Twitter while giving a free hand to Islamists and antisemites to express their hatred of Israel and India. Musk believed in moderation of Twitter led by Yoel Roth's team, but he also believed that it should be done without limiting "legal" free speech. He wanted to expand Twitter's user base-giving more people the opportunity to join in on the conversation. The Twitter Files, a series of tweet-threads filled with data, messages, emails, and dramatic postulation, all derived from Twitter's internal communication channels were curated, and posted by respected journalists like Matt Taibbi, Bari Weiss, and others. The files focused on controversial bans, shadow bans, and account suspensions, the deliberations that resulted in silencing of the New York Post's Hunter Biden Laptop story, and the ban of President Donald Trump. The Twitter Files revealed the platform's relationship with national intelligence agencies such as FBI and individual political heavyweights. They pressured Twitter or made requests for information, account bans, and the elimination of individual tweets. Most leading news media like ABCNews, NBC News, CBS News, NYTimes and Washington Post never reacted to these stunning revelations. It was simple, they were the main actors of the foul play of promoting misinformation during the Jack Dorsey legacy. Another important story that developed but not covered in this book is Elon Musk’s X sued the State of California challenging the constitutionality of a state law establishing new transparency requirements for social media companies, including how they police disinformation. X said the law, known as Assembly Bill 587, violates its free speech rights under the US constitution’s first amendment and California’s state constitution. Musk who supported Obama administration and had moderate leanings came to realize the existence of leftist bias in major news media and prompted him to fight for free speech harder. He is a fearless manager who dares to act against unfair practices and the employees at X who dared to impose their own leftist bias clearly ignoring the corporate policies. This book is largely based on the imagination of a leftist journalist who likes to see Elon Musk fail. All Musk is doing is to fight the misinformation produced and printed by the NYTimes, Washington Post, Huffington Post, Los Angeles Times, and others. As you read the book, you will realize how hard it is to fight for free speech in a polarized world that promotes wokism and leftist bias.