There is a meme, in the original sense of that word, going around that #Musk bought #Twitter to destroy it. Firing 3/4 of the employees, removing effectively all moderation, the $8 blue checkmark special … it’s all part of a cunning master plan. After that he’ll put on an iron mask and buy a small Eastern European country.

Naaah.

First of all, if he really wanted Twitter to go away, he could do that, you know? Fire all the employees, travel around the world personally pulling the plugs on every server, auction off the physical assets, and go back to cars and spaceships and flamethrowers. Nothing’s stopping him. There would be lawsuits, but he’s looking at plenty of those already: a few more should be no big deal.

Second, if there’s anything bigger than his stock portfolio, it’s his ego. Twitter is his most visible public forum. It’s where he shares his semi-coherent ramblings with the world for legions of followers to repost like the words of the one true prophet.

Third, it’s a rather large investment, and while I’m reasonably sure he’ll lose a lot of money on it, I don’t believe he wants $44 billion to disappear. His fan base might start experiencing seeds of doubt, and we can’t have that.

A much simpler explanation is that he’s in over his head.

He doesn’t understand what makes Twitter valuable to its current user base. He has no grasp of how small his cult is in comparison to the internet as whole. He thinks his imprimatur is so magical that everything he touches will be a hit. He believes every word of his utopian babble, no matter how incoherent. Worrying about contradictions is for the little people.

Destruction will come, sure as the snowfall. But it won’t be the work of an evil genius. That’s my job.