How Elon Broke Twitter — and Twitter Broke Elon — with Ben Mezrich
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On September 28th, the Global Citizen Festival will gather thousands of people who took action to end extreme poverty. Join Post Malone, Doja Cat, Lisa, Jelly Roll, and Raul Alejandro as they take the stage with world leaders and activists to defeat poverty, defend the planet, and demand equity. Download the Global Citizen app today and earn your spot at the festival. Learn more at globalcitizen.org slash bots. It's on!

Hi, everyone, from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. This is On with Kara Swisher, and I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Naeem Araza. Our guest today is writer Ben Masryk. He is a fantastic author whose books translate really well into films, actually, into scenes. He wrote Accidental Billionaires, which, of course, gave us the film Social Network, About Facebook.

And now he has a new book out called Breaking Twitter, which means we're going to be talking about Elon. Yeah, sorry, everybody. But that's the case. A lot of people are rushing to do Elon books. There's a lot of them and contracted. Waiting for yours, Kara. No, thank you. He's in my memoir, which is already done, but it's not a lot about... Well, it's a little bit about... The tech love story. Yeah, the tech love story, which has gone sour. So, you know, Ben has a different attitude towards Elon a little bit. He was more of a fan than...

I mean, I admired a lot of what Elon had done, but... So it'll be interesting. And, of course, he's famous for his takedown of Mark Zuckerberg, which Mark Zuckerberg didn't agree with how he depicted him. So, you know, he's written about a lot of stuff that intersects and sort of made more Hollywood-y versions of the stuff that, you know, me and other tech reporters do, and including...

Dumb Money, which was a movie that came out about the meme stock thing around GameStop and others. And so he's always been doing really interesting and entertaining stuff around tech and made it entertaining. He calls his format dramatic narrative accounts. And that is basically not totally journalism and also not totally fiction. It's kind of a hybrid format. I remember when James Frey wrote that book that was memoir, but it was actually fiction.

Yeah.

I think creative license is there. And I think as long as people caveat what they're doing, it's very fair. And I think Ben Masur, because Ben very much caveats that this is a dramatic narrative account. Yeah, I think he's very clear about it. I mean, everyone gets dramatic license. And I think he does take that. Ben does take that. But I think he's a very canny observer of getting the right ideas in. And, you know, I think he's done it here. And it's fine. It's a way for regular people to understand tech. I don't think everything written about tech is...

accurate even by regular media. It's just his impression of it. And it's largely, it colors between the lines with maybe a little more color. You know, Elon is dramatic. Yeah. So he kind of offers you the first part. Well, he is a drama queen himself. So, you know, he loves to be in the spotlight. He's someone who

really needs the attention. And, you know, he's sort of cosplaying. Cosplaying. Cosplaying, whatever. Pretending he was Iron Man. And then I think he thinks he is. And then, you know, he becomes what he was just playing around with in terms of identity. And so it's fine. He's a dramatic figure. And he will spur a lot of dramatic narrative movies about him as a character. He's already been. Yeah, there's so many already. In The Morning Show, there's a character that could be Bezos or Musk. Oh, yeah, Jon Hamm's character. Yeah.

Yes, I'm watching him. And so, you know, there's a lot of versions of Elon in succession. Alexander Skarsgård's character. Sort of. A composite character. Composite. But a lot of Elon. I talked to Alexander about it. On the format point, Ben says, this is from his prologue, he says, scenes and comments from Elon's perspective are triangulated from various inside sources.

And are based on speculation as well as deep reporting. Yeah. My own speculation as well as deep reporting, which is interesting, speculation plus deep reporting. You know, I can always guess what some of these people are going to say just having spent time with him. So he knows these people. So it's fine. This will be a movie. So this seems like a script to me and where it's going, and I'm excited to go see it. Who do you think should play Elon in the movie? I don't know.

No, he would like Jon Hamm too, but unfortunately he does not have the same looks. I mean, none of them look like Jon Hamm. Nobody looks like Jon Hamm. Yeah, nobody looks like Jon Hamm, but Jon Hamm. He's very handsome. He's a handsome man. It is true. What about Brendan Fraser? That could be good. Oh, I don't know. Yeah, it could be. No. Or Nick, you know who could be good? Nicolas Cage. No. No.

No? There's a lot of people. Vince Vaughn in his earlier days, I guess, could be. Oh, that's a good one. Yeah. Two things before we get into the interview, two newsy elements about Elon that we should talk about. Twitter talked about its own valuation, how the company is valuating itself, and came up with the figure of $19 billion. This is for internal purposes, for employee equity purposes.

$19 billion is almost 60% less than the buying price of $44 billion. Were you surprised, Kara? Do you think it was high? No, I think it's even less. No, I think it's high. I think it's worth maybe $8 to $10 billion based on its business, but it doesn't really matter. It's owned by the world's richest man, so it's worth whatever he wants to pay for it. I've spoken to a lot of people recently, investors in it, and also people looking at the debt that they have, and most people feel it's going to be a dramatic downturn

downgrade. So I think it's, you know, it makes sense. I don't think he's running it like a business, so it doesn't, does it hardly matter. What is he running it as? It's his yacht. It's his mega yacht. It's his mega yacht. It's his right-wing fever dream. I don't know, but whatever. It doesn't matter. He's rich. Valuations aside, the moment right now is another important reminder of Elon's power, something we've spoken about at length. But

In the midst of a war, Twitter has been a source of information, a firehose of disinformation, as we discussed on a recent panel. And Elon chimed in this weekend when service in Gaza was cut off during the Israeli escalation to say that he'd provide Starlink services to internationally recognized aid organizations and allow them to survive what was a near total communications blackout. Of course, Starlink.

Service is returning slowly, and of course, godsons can't really use Starlink without Starlink dishes there. Yeah, I know. It's just him coming in. What can I do? I think he just likes to talk about himself. Why doesn't he just give it and bring it in and don't say anything? That would be a new, fresh twist from this guy. Everything has to be very dramatic and very loud. And so if he wants to give it to Acer, that's great. I just would like to hear less from him.

And more about his products. Yeah. I think as journalists, we can agree on the importance of communication access, especially in such a humanitarian crisis and access to journalists, access to the international community. But Elon has a history of doing just the opposite of what you described. He says something and then doesn't do it. So the Thai cave rescue, Hurricane Maria. He did send a submarine. He sort of did.

I'm tired of him, you know, parachuting into dramatic incidents and pretending he's the hero. So whatever. Okay, give the Starlings, bring them over, deliver them in your helijet or whatever the heck or your time machine. I don't care. Just get them, you know, just stop talking about yourself. It's all about himself. And that's what we're going to talk about, which is I think one thing that Ben has said in this book

is that breaking Twitter actually broke Musk. Yeah. Musk broke Twitter and Twitter broke Musk. Right. Let's end this open with how Masaryk ends a section in his book. It's titled A Note from Best-Selling Author Ben Masaryk. It comes right before the prologue.

Quote, Mm-hmm.

That part is pretty factual and a very good explanation of his motivation for writing this book and our motivation for talking to him today. Yeah. I just don't think it's the center of anything anymore. I think people have really moved on to – it's really interesting to watch the movements out of Twitter. And I think this war has really clinched it for people. It's really hard to find good information, and I don't think it'll be good at the election. I think he's really ruined a really –

a problematic but useful platform. I literally, I was looking at my numbers. I'm down to a couple hours a week, which is crazy. Used to be 11. There are many more than that, you know, and I just don't have the time. I just, I'm exhausted and I go over and to,

Mark Zuckerberg is not my favorite person, so it's kind of hard. Yeah, but right now it feels very needle and haystack. I just can't find things, and it exhausts me. So I just don't have the time for it, and I think a lot of people don't. But around the world, it's a critical way for people to communicate. Unfortunately, it's also a critical way for malevolent people to manipulate. So

So, Elon, you know, you can send Starlink. That sounds great. But why don't you fix Twitter so that we can use it? Yeah, fix Twitter. In moments of crisis. He's not going to fix it. I'm not holding out hope. Let's take a quick break and we'll be back with Ben Masryk. This episode is brought to you by Shopify. Shopify.

Oh, yeah.

Ben, thanks for joining me. You've got a new book coming out November 7th called Breaking Twitter. Oh, just in my arena. You're always in my arena, Ben Mesrick. I'm trying to follow in your footsteps. You're always in front of me, actually. That's how I've noticed it. No, I've been around. You know, I'm very excited to talk about it.

I want to start with, you describe breaking Twitter as a dramatic narrative account. You begin with this note, some dialogue has been reimagined, the dates of some events have been adjusted or compressed. Also, some points in the story employ elements of satire, in some instances composite characters have been created or descriptions and character names have been altered at my request and my source's discretion.

to protect privacy. How do you look at it? Is it journalism, fiction, somewhere in between? You've gotten that criticism. I've heard it from Facebook people, etc. So basically, it's a nonfiction book. It's a true story written in a cinematic thriller-esque style. So I'm not a journalist like you would find at the New York Times or you yourself. I'm more of a

a writer who tells a true story in a way that I think is palatable for my audience. I write it in a thriller-esque fashion. I attempt to tell the story as truthfully as I can through the eyes of the people, you know, who are in the scenes, but I believe that there's

always a subjective element in telling a story like this, especially a story like this. And so I do my best to tell the true story, but I'm doing it in a way that I hope is cinematic and fun and exciting. So I approach it differently than a Walter Isaacson does or Michael Lewis does. Maybe not Michael Lewis as much, but...

In that I interview as many people as I can. I get as much information as I can. I get all the legal documents. I spend a lot of time on the research phase, but when I write it, I'm envisioning it as a movie. So it's meant to be read as if you're watching a movie. And yeah, there are some journalists who say what I'm doing, you know, shouldn't be nonfiction. And there are other journalists who say, you know, this is

pushing the boundaries. I call it creative nonfiction, actually. It's kind of funny. I argue with people about it. When your book came out, the Facebook one, I was like, he's not off on the sense of what's happening. I mean, Mark, one of the things Mark, I remember, complained to me about was that the character, Jesse Eisenberg, was not like him. And I was like, it's not meant to be like you. And I said, he talks too much. I wish you talked as much as he did, right? Like, you never talk. He was, at that time, now he's blabby as can be. But

He's different than you, and it's sort of an imagination cartoon of you. Right. I mean, I think you can look at the social network, and I think it's, in my opinion, a really good telling of that first year at Facebook, even though he's going to disagree with it. I mean, you were there. You know it better than anybody. You got the themes right. It was just more dramatic. It's so much more boring in real life is what it is. I mean, you're not going to watch the movie that Zuckerberg wants you to watch about the founding of Facebook.

that's going to be a torturous movie to watch. No, it was more dramatic. They're all more dramatic. I'm curious, how do you look at Michael Lewis different? I'm going to get to Walter Isaacson in a second. Well, I mean, I'm a big fan of both of them. I think Michael Lewis is someone who does something somewhat similar to I do. I think he's a little bit less... I think Walter Isaacson is almost...

writing an encyclopedia at times. And I think that Lewis is dramatic in some ways. I think he'd probably consider himself more of a journalist than I consider myself, but I do think that he dramatizes and he uses a lot of the same stuff that I do. I would say not this latest book, but let's, speaking of Walter Isaacson, I agree, encyclopedia is a very good way to put it. You could kill a small creature with it. I assume you read it. What did you think?

Well, you know, when I came out of my nine months of reading... No, I'm just kidding. It's a big book. I feel like, for me anyways, the story that I'm trying to tell, I feel like he missed in that he did get a lot of the details about Twitter, but I see the Elon before Twitter and the Elon after Twitter as two very different Elons. And I feel like...

just as an example, Walter Isaacson would not have chosen to write Elon's biography today. He chose to write it before Twitter because Elon at that time was widely beloved. He was, you know, considered a genius by most people. You know, he was like the Edison or the Einstein. And now half

the country hates him. Glimpses of problems all over the place. Yeah, oh yeah, Mercurial, right? But if you look at him today, no way the famed biographer of our time would spend a year hanging out with Elon to write his story. I mean, I've always maintained that perhaps the worst person to talk to when you're writing a story about someone is the main character, because they're the least credible person to tell their own story. And you have to do a lot of

second guessing and disagreeing but when you've given you know the keys to the city and listen it's happened to me too you fall in love with your main character it's impossible not to interesting I never do well I mean you know I

Because they let you into their lives in such a way that you're with them all the time and suddenly you're in the inner circle. And these are very charismatic people. And I think with Isaacson, it's very clear to me anyways that he fell for Elon in a big way. And even though he has, you know, misgivings about Elon does this and that, Elon always wins, you know? Yeah, but...

We're not here to talk about Walter's book, but actually it's important because this is how some people get to know this person. And I do think he's got the facts of his life there and where it led to. But you're focused on what this particular transaction did for Elon Musk. So how,

Talk about how much of your book is based on recordings that's corroborated by multiple credible sources and how much is a creative imagining? How did you look at it? Yeah. So I would say that, you know, in my opinion, it's a very credible telling of the story.

although it dramatizes the scenes, for instance, where Elon is at Tesla or Elon is at SpaceX. You know, it's written in a way that sort of draws the picture of those places based on the research that I do. I talk to a lot of people, some of whom haven't really talked to many people. Right. I'm guessing who you talk to from reading, and I could guess pretty easily. Now, a lot of people will not publicly talk to me. Many of them do privately in very in-depth ways.

I had a board member from Tesla come up to me and just unload. I thought they were going to attack me. And I was like, I don't have time for you. I don't want to hear you being mean to Elon. And he's like, please keep being mean. It was interesting. He's like, I don't think you're mean at all, which is interesting. But talk about what deep reporting plus speculation is from your perspective. Yeah. I mean, I think for my opinion, deep reporting is talking to the main sources or main sources who are in the orbit.

as much as you can, getting as much time as you can with characters who were there. And you have to remember, I'm telling the story of him walking through the doors of Twitter. So I'm also talking to a lot of Twitter personnel, people who, you know, were right in front of him, who ran up to him, who were involved from day one, and then talking to people in his orbit as much as I can. And then you have all of the different sort of secondary sources, which are those, you know, the

the texts that were released, any lawsuit that happens, you've got. You've got the Twitter lawsuits. You've got all of those pages. And then you've got interviews by people who are interviewing the in-depth characters as much as you can as sources. Sure. And also, actually, his emails are quite his personality. He actually comes through rather quickly.

in his emails and texts, he's quite like himself, unlike a lot of people. I think so. And I mean, I do reach out to Elon. I reach out to everyone and say, will you talk to me? And as you know, it's a mixed bag. Some people want to talk to you and some people really don't. Some people will talk on background and some people, you know, send legal letters. I mean, you get a mix of sort of responses. Can you give us some, did you talk to Parag or Yoel? You talked to Esther, correct? You've said that.

Yeah, I'm not going to go into too much detail other than Esther because I don't want to sort of – some people don't want me to say that I talk to them and some people barely talk to me. And so I don't really go into detail about who I talk to and who I don't. All right, but I have to ask, did you talk to the goons as you call them, David Sachs, Jason Calacanis? There are some goons that I've had interaction with, yes. Oh, I can hear the goons. I know who they are.

Like, if you know these people, I'm like, uh-huh, right there. Right, right. And then, you know, the speculation part is you can sort of see it in the book. There are places where I throw the word maybe in, and that's the kind of thing where you can see that I'm sort of signaling that this scene is more... And I use satire a lot, and this is something that I enjoy using in my books, where, you

that became Dumb Money, you had Ken Griffin sitting on a throne made of stone, of bones and skulls. And with Elon, you know, he's waking up in the spaceship that is the Gigafactory and describing that stuff. So I think you can tell what I'm doing. You know, as you can tell, I'm a huge fan of Hunter S. Thompson. I was a big fan of that sort of form of journalism and the idea that there aren't really these

these strict barriers when you're doing what I do. This is my impression is what you're saying. This is my impression. I mean, this is my feeling and my impression based on all the information that I have. And you might disagree with it. And Elon certainly will disagree with it. I would agree with that. And that's the way, but I'm not, but I'm open with my process. And I feel like people pick up my books. You know, in my, I just finished my memoir and in my, in the part, the footnotes part, they said, there's no footnotes. I'm not Bob fucking Woodward. And

You know, these are my remembrances. It may be inaccurate in some places. I've tried my best to remember it and this and that. But you didn't sit down with... And I'm relying a lot on interviews. I actually did publicly and some privately. But you didn't sit down to do any interviews with Elon, but you tried. Tell me about this. I reached out to Elon. Tell me about those efforts. You know, there's...

So in the past, he has responded to me on Twitter before, and as has Jack. And so I reached out through- Jack Dorsey. Yeah, Dorsey. I reached out via email. I reached out via people who are connected to him to get to him.

And he's, you know, if he wants to talk to you, my impression is he's not that hard to get to. And he made it very difficult. And in the end, I was told by an intermediary that it was not going to happen. And I respect that. You know, the same thing happened with the social network with Facebook is that, you know, Mark, in the end,

I had questions sent to him. I had Sean Parker working on him. Sean and I talked a lot. And in the end, Mark said no, and the reason being that he couldn't control what I was going to say. And I think with Elon, his response essentially was –

The Walter Isaacson book. Yeah, I get it. I'm surprised. He loves to engage. Mark is not someone who loves to engage in general. He's quite shy, as you know. I think that Elon made the choice that Walter was telling his story. You know, in my book, I consider the Walter book as part of Elon's reputational resuscitation efforts in that he announced the book – he announced the book –

The same week they announced Lindy Acarona taking over. I don't think these are unrelated. I think that he's seen the hit that his reputation has taken. And this is a one-two punch to attempt to sort of move the table back, you know, and get it straight again. That I don't think will work. But I think that that's why he wouldn't talk to me is my guess. But, you know.

I think it's because he found his water carrier. Right. And I think he thinks he couldn't have tricked you as easily. I think he might have snowed you a little bit, but not. Well, I think I would have had fun with it. I mean, people don't realize how easy I am. I mean, Janet Maslin called me the billionaire's best friend. And I think that's true. I fall in love easily to my characters. I don't think you are. I thought your depiction of Mark was...

Mark was eviscerating and highly accurate, actually. Well, thank you. I appreciate that. It was eviscerating in a very different way than people realize. All right. The narrative kicks into high gear when Elon sends his then CEO Parag Agrawal, who I just referenced, an angry text that contains, as you put it, eight fateful words. We'll make an offer to take Twitter private. Very typical of him to do things like that. I've gotten lots of texts like this. Walk us through that decision and what led up to it. So, you know, I,

I believe, and I think it's pretty clear to me that... Let me just preface this by saying that I came into this as a huge fan of Elon Musk. I didn't come into it as someone who wants to take him down. I've always... I've wanted to write about him. I've reached out to him many times in the past saying, I'd love to write your story, because I truly saw him in these sort of terms of being an Edison or his incredible mind who's moving us forward. I believe that he...

saw this as part of his mission, that Twitter was supposed to be this beacon on the hill of free speech, that we're moving through this window of time in which we can reach Mars to save our civilization, and that this is one element of that. If there isn't this global town hall where freedom reigns, we'll never get there.

And he saw what happened with the Babylon Bee. So the Babylon Bee got kicked off of Twitter. That was what really got him mad. Really got him upset because they made a joke about the...

A Biden administration official who's trans. It was a trans joke. It upset Elon that they got suspended for that. And the whole idea of the woke virus, which was part of his thinking, is that this woke virus is taking over Twitter. I need to come in and save Twitter. Now, he was, to some extent, not serious. It's the woke mind virus. Yeah, woke mind virus. I don't think he was serious until he started to think about it. And he wrote this tweet where he basically did a poll of

on whether or not we all felt that Twitter was upholding the values of free speech. - Right, which has been debated by a lot of Elon-like characters in Silicon Valley for a while, right? They can't ever shut up about it, actually. - And I think, you know, the response, it wasn't just the response, but then his group of people around him rallied around him and excited him and pushed him forward.

and I think that he essentially decided almost whimsically that he could do this, that this wouldn't be that hard, and that he would save the world by buying Twitter. I think it fit in like that. Can I ask then, then why did he try back out of buying it if he really thought that fixing Twitter was a battle for the future of civilization? Well, he had second thoughts almost immediately. Which he uses a battle. He talks in these terms almost constantly, that if he dies, then all of humanity will die out.

And by the way, that fits into the whole simulation theory that he believes he's player one in the simulation. I get into this in the book a lot, that he believes the whole world is a simulation. Explain what a simulation is for people who think that. So the idea is that mathematically, it's likely, if you look at the math, that the whole world is just a simulation like a video game. It's a video game of teenagers of the future. He did this in an interview and blew everybody's minds. Yeah. And actually, I think there's a lot to simulation theory. I mean, it's somewhat religious, but the idea is that

Not only is the whole world a simulation, but most of us aren't even the real player. Most of us are non-playing characters. But he is player one. He is player one. He is the main playing character. And by the way, successful people in general, people who have ridiculous success, kind of believe this deep down. I think you see it in a lot of... Because you see the whole world is working out. Well, it's because when they do past lives, they're always Cleopatra. I'd be like, is anybody a slave?

Is anybody like a horse trader or something like that? And when good things happen in your life that seem unbelievably lucky, it's hard not to look at the world and say, oh, it's designed around me. Why did he try to back out of it then if civilization is? Well, he tried to back out because as soon as he sort of started to dive into it, first of all, he realized he was way overpaying for it, which I think was a problem. Second of all, there was immediate backlash from the people that he least expected it from, being the Tesla faithful.

So he's had this incredibly glowing reputation as this sort of godlike figure to a lot of people for a long time. And this was kind of the first moment, in my opinion, where he got backlash from the people who usually worshipped him. And I think it made him nervous because he was spreading himself out.

Too thin, I think. He was going to have to sell Tesla's stock, most likely. And this kind of response that was almost immediate, I think, shook him a little bit, and he decided he didn't want it anymore. But then it became this game, you know, it became this backing. He couldn't back out without, you know, paying a little bit, which he should have done, but...

But he, you know, and it gets into that a little bit in the book, but basically he reached a point where he decided he had to buy it. And that's where his competitiveness comes in, his inability to lose. I'm going to do it. I'm going to show them wrong. I'm going to show them wrong. I can do this. Do you think he's really committed to, he had to get sued into going through the purchase, by the way. I don't think he had, I think once- He had no choice. He had zero choice. Once he got to that point, he came in with a lot of anger. And he came in

really mad. And not only did he want to fire people, but he wanted to fire Parag with cause. You know, he wanted to make sure he didn't pay them anything. And I think when he walks through that front door with the sink, you know, it's barbarians at the gate, but it's the reluctant barbarian who's now going to take it out on everybody there.

Right. Well, that's his whole story, isn't it? That's the frustrating thing to me about Elon in general through this whole story is that he has these noble ideals. He has this vision of saving the world, which is not a bad thing at all. I guess. But he can't get away from this competitiveness, this need, and this sort of childlike angers that come out again and again and again that drive him and –

Yeah, I just, I get the messianic thing is attractive. I think it's narcissism is that's all it is. And I think it's the putting yourself as player one tells you everything that you that you want. And I think at some point, there's a part of him that regrets this impulse tweeting and regrets when he's, I think that's gone now. But it was there for certain.

Well, I think there's a big transformation that happens during Twitter. But I think that, you know, he was forced into it. And once he walks through those doors, it was game on for him. And that begins the whole scorched earth process. So he needs enemies. So obviously he contains multitudes. And let me say, I've given him credit for what he's done at Tesla and SpaceX. I have benefited.

I wouldn't say a fan, but I have certainly regarded him in a lot better light than a lot of people I cover because I was really inspired by a lot of what he was doing. And I always like a good try. I always thought he was narcissistic like the rest of them. But there's a lot of hypocrisy at the core of this entire project. So let's go through some of the worst instances, which you allude to in various ways in the book.

We already talked about how he's going to save the world and then try to get out of it. I don't think he was trying to save the world. I think he was trying to save Elon Musk in a lot of ways. So how to explain his approach to free speech? Let's start with that. He's throttled links to the news organization he dislikes. He suspended journalists reporting on his suspension of ElonJet. He banned Substack links. He threatened to sue the ADL. What

What is the clear ideology about free speech? I mean, I think there was a transformation. I really think he went in with the idea that free speech was going to be easy, that Twitter was moderating and holding back all of these voices, kicking Donald Trump off, you know, stifling the New York Post and all of these kind of things.

And he was gonna fix it with an algorithm. I think he went in the door thinking free speech was as easy as building a rocket. And I think free speech is way harder than building a rocket and that you can engineer it. And I think he realized pretty quickly when it started to impact him personally,

that this ideology had to go out the window. And that is a big, big issue. And I think it happens in the course of the story. The way I tell the story is everything spirals out of control. And when it becomes personal, he throws all that out the window. So, you know, later in the story, what happens in a period of one week,

is his car gets attacked with his kid in it, and he blames that on this ElonJet website, which is tracking his jet. So he kicks that person off. Then he starts to kick all the journalists off who link to that person or even mention that person. And then it suddenly becomes, you know, free speech is thrown out the window, and he's

searching for a way to just to do what he wants without, you know, breaking down entirely. And that all fits into the same week when he goes on Dave Chappelle and, you know, he goes on stage with Dave Chappelle. And that's the first moment where he is face to face with booze, with the whole world looking at him in a negative way suddenly, which has never happened before. And I think this is groundbreaking for him. So anyways, yes, he starts

to his ideology disappears as soon as it comes up against his own. There wasn't an ideology. I'm sorry, Ben. I'm sorry. I think he had a broad, I call it libertarian light with these people. Sometimes when I press them, including Mark Zuckerberg, when he was talking about free speech, I literally wanted to get up at Georgetown. Were you at that speech?

I literally wanted to stand up and I said, you need to read the First Amendment before you talk about it or something. It's very half-baked. It's someone who doesn't know it very well. Yeah. And who hadn't thought about the complexities that it gets into once you go down that road. Yeah, and I 100% agree that no one is really for 100% free speech. It's not possible. But I do drink the Kool-Aid more than you do, way more than you do, in that I really think he came into this with

that he believed in free speech and that he was going to make Twitter. I mean, if you look at him and Jack going back and forth on their texts, which is in the book as well, you know, they're talking about this beautiful sort of beacon on the hill where people are going to say what they want and there's almost no moderation going on. And it's not until you realize that it's going to affect you personally that suddenly this goes out the window with Elon. Elon, it's not that his ideology, you know, comes up against it. It's his personal life comes up against it.

We'll be back in a minute. So the last third of the book is essentially a portrait of his unraveling. Here's the timeline according to the book. I'm going to read it, and then I'd love your thoughts on it and walk us through it. He tweets a conspiracy theory about the attack on Paul Pelosi, which is where I got off the train. I was like, then we're done. After he, you know, it was really crazy. Yoel Roth, who had stuck with him, quits. This is the head of trust and safety. He gets challenged on his everything app vision by an employee at an all hands.

something he's dreamed of with the X app. He gets booed at Chappelle, as you noted. A stalker follows his son. He reacts by suspending it. He tweets a poll asking if he should step down as CEO in the majority. Say yes. In fact, you should. Biden's Super Bowl tweet gets more than twice as many impressions as his, and he demands that engineers magnify his tweets out

Yeah, I mean, to me, it's a startling sequence of events. So I start with the Paul Pelosi thing. And in the book, I actually, I write the scene from Paul Pelosi's point of view because it's this terrible moment where this...

old man is beaten with a hammer nearly to death. And then you go straight to Elon at a Halloween party, Heidi Klum's Halloween party, where she's dressed as a giant worm and everyone's shouting, Elon, Elon, Elon. And then he tweets this ridiculous conspiracy theory tweet. Something that he does all the time. You know, he doesn't think about it. He throws off a meme or a tweet because it's funny or whatever. This is about a gay love triangle. Right, a gay love triangle that Paul Pelosi... And it's feeding into the...

the right-wing people who have gathered around Elon in this moment. And it's a horrible tweet. And I think he realizes it pretty quickly, or he's at least told it, because he deletes it. He tries to apologize for it. And it's a horrible moment. It's a really horrible moment, whatever you want to joke about. I mean, and that's why in the book, I really try and show you the two scenes next to each other.

And then that's the beginning where all of the people at Twitter have to now deal with this. The advertisers, the people who are trying to keep Twitter afloat. This is a big deal. And it's the beginning of this spiral downward. And then you go- He probably ended up blaming Heidi Klum, but go ahead. Right, right. Heidi has this giant worm, right? And then you go from there and it just gets worse and worse and worse and worse. And at one point it gets so bad after he's

tweeted this poll where he said, should I be replaced as CEO? And he's truly shocked that the answer is yes. I think he fully expected that even though he's been faced with sort of all of this negative stuff at the Chappelle thing and from Twitter himself. And you have to remember, by the way, his paranoia has been growing through all of this. Not only does he walk around Twitter with bodyguards, but he's made it a rule that no people are allowed to gather together in Twitter. He fears a real mutiny.

You know, when Yoel leaves, he attacks Yoel over the site, basically calling him a pedophile so that he has to run out of his house in the middle of the night. It's this spiral downward that you can see in his personality changing as paranoia sort of takes over. So why is...

is the spiral always aggression towards others? I mean, nobody, he's not getting hurt in any way. He's the world's richest man, but it's the aggression towards others, including Yoel, which I thought was reprehensible. Yeah, well, I mean, he felt betrayed. I mean, I think that he sees himself as the main character in this movie and that everyone is supposed to rally around him. And he can fire people, but people can't leave him. And I think the Yoel thing hit him personally because it seemed like he was back

Why not listen to Yoel? Why not listen? Listen, I had a back and forth about Twitter that was very reasonable, and then he called me and asked.

Yeah.

who talk him off of ledges, Yoel and Esther. Why didn't that kick in instead of the aggression from your perspective? Well, what's intriguing about Esther is how she approached Elon when she still had his ear. And she went very clearly. Solicitous. You have to talk to him in a certain way. You can't

you can't go at him among other people. It has to be one-on-one because if anyone else is around, he needs to be the king of the story. And if you go at him one-on-one, it has to be in a way that helps him get to the answer you're looking for. You have to use memes and comedy and show him that he's found the right way to the answer. So yes, you have to work the certain angles that he needs you to work to get something through to him. If you oppose him, he's going to have to go after you.

And so I think that— But why is that? Why? Because then nobody can have staying power because nobody—one of the things— Well, I really think it goes to this non-player character thing is that, you know, he's the main character and you're all non-player characters. We're not real. And if you're playing a video game and a non-existent pixelated thing walks up to you and starts to tell you things—

You're not going to listen to it. You're going to throw it away. And I think that's the way he looks at the world around him is he's the main character. And if he's the main character, everyone else is just – is not even a supporting character. It's a non-playing character. And therefore you need to be – You have to find a way to make him come to the answer that you want. Yesterday someone asked me how to deal with him and they were going to see him in a thing. And I said, be complimentary and I know this is going to sound weird, but touch the bottom of his arm once.

because he'll calm down. I felt like it was like a dog. You know what I mean? Yeah, I mean, that's great. When Esther first starts working with him, his assistant, Jen, comes up to her and says, this is how you talk to Elon. And there's actually sort of a script on how you're supposed to approach Elon. You have to look at him in a certain way. You have to speak to him in a certain way. And that's sort of given to people who are going to be one-on-one with him. But I think

You know, the revelations that I think are interesting parts of the story that, you know, haven't been covered before is, number one, how affected he was. And as I was saying, you know, he reached a point after the poll when people voted against him.

And shocked him by that because he really believed people were going to support him in staying CEO of Twitter. He locked himself in a conference room. He refused to talk to anybody. It was as much as a day. And people at Twitter were so concerned that they were going to call the San Francisco Police Department and do a wellness check on him. And that, you know, is such a low moment. This is a guy who's the richest man in the world or close to it.

Right. But you close the book with a scene from a SpaceX launch, even though it eventually explodes, which he does this a lot. I think it's the most incredible sort of visual where all of these guys are jumping up and down, applauding as this giant spaceship explodes on the screen behind them. Yeah, clears the launch pod. Then as you write, there was reason for raucous worldwide celebration. Instead of praise, the press unfairly focuses on the explosion. Why end with this scene? Because I believe that before his purchase of Twitter...

That space launch would have led to ticker tape parades. People would have been applauding him. Every newspaper article, though, would have been, this is the first step towards going to Mars. But post-Twitter, all the headlines read, failure, explosion, this is a destruction. And I think that's what's happened. That's what we've missed in telling this story is that

Twitter has broken Elon. It's destroyed his reputation. And Elon today is not the Elon of Elon before Twitter. Do you think he's misunderstood and unfairly marooned? Or he's just getting the... Oh, he's definitely not misunderstood. I think he came into Twitter and he has done a lot of...

bad things. He's made a lot of mistakes. Self-harm. He's done a lot of self-harm to himself. And I don't, I'm not saying he can't recover from this. I'm not saying he can't rebuild himself and become the Elon of before. But we're not misunderstanding what happened. I mean, this is a guy who tweeted conspiracy theories, who's suing the ADL for this and that, all of the things that he's doing. He's doing, and he's proudly doing them. He's aligned himself with people that, you know, and what he's done to sort of

So he came into Twitter saying that this was going to become the most true place on the Internet. And it is exactly the opposite. And the reason is, is that he's elevated the least true voices and turning it into an engagement engine. He's turned it into an outrage engine. Twitter is entirely...

driven now by outrage and anger, right? Because that's what raises engagement in his mind. So he's chased all of the sort of

truth off of the site because truth doesn't sell as well. Right. But is he unfairly maligned? Like an honest assessment from your... I mean, I think that because of what he's doing on Twitter, it's very hard for him to get praise outside of Twitter. So in that respect, yes, I think it is unfair to look at the Starship launch

And say, oh, this was a disaster. I had called it remarkable. Right. It wasn't a disaster. It was brilliant. It was incredible. None of us could have done that. And he's pushing the world forward. It's crazy to me to look at what Tesla is trying to do with automatic driving and attack it. I mean, I think he's pushing the world forward. No, I think he's a little sloppy there. But we'll –

He's pushing the world forward. You know, I really think he's pushing the world forward. And I believe, different than you, that his ideology is good. And I think he does want to save the world. But I think that what he's done at Twitter has been a disaster. And I think that it is causing harm both to his reputation and to his person. Sure.

And I think, as I've said numerous times, I mean, that he got to a point where people wanted to call in a wellness check on him. This is not because he was doing the right things. It's because things were going wrong and the world was telling him that. And I think this is a big moment for him. Do you think he is salvageable? You just said that. You said he could –

I don't think he's going back. Yeah, I mean, as I said, I'm a fan. I think that this is a guy who has... I think he sees what's happening. This is why he had Walter write his biography, and this is why he hired Linda, the adult in the room. In the book, I say it's like bringing in Sheryl Sandberg to make Zuckerberg look like a real boy, right? It's the idea that you bring an adult into the room to try and fix it. She's not Sheryl. I'm sorry. Well, okay. I think her purpose, though...

is similar. You're right. It's a different person, but it's someone who's there for the same reason. So I think Elon recognizes there's a problem. And so in my view, in my most optimistic view, he walks away from Twitter

before he completely destroys it, and he goes back to SpaceX and Tesla and saving the world. I think it's difficult for him to do that because, number one, he can't lose, and that would be looked at as a loss. And number two, he has this idea of this everything app, which I think he's now going to shift Twitter into. Good luck. And so rather than walk away and let Twitter be, he's going to take it down. Yeah.

which is sad to me. But, you know, could he resume being the Edison of our times? I think so, but it all depends on how quickly he can get away from this mess he's created. He's not going to do it. He's not. He's like a gambler who's going to keep betting...

You know, he's at the slot machine and he's staying there. That's the whole thing. And he's surrounded himself. There's nobody around him he's listening to that will tell him the truth. They can't. They're all paid by him. Well, we're telling him the truth. Well, I know, but he hates us. My heart is seething with hate. I don't know if you know that. I saw that. I saw that.

I know. Well, I have no hate. I've only love in my heart, but I really, really believe it. I don't only have love in my heart, but I'm not seething with hate. I have a life, my friend. I'm the main character in my video game. Anyway, speaking of ideology, the book largely leaves out Elon's racist tweets, which I think they really truly are. He tweeted misleading charts about black crime. He supported the Dilbert creator after his completely unhinged racist rant. He says the media is racist against white and Asian people, retweeted anti-Semitic conspiracies like...

you know, every day of the week. Why did you leave those out? I'm just curious. You know, it's an interesting question, and it goes into sort of my view of Elon. I personally don't believe that Elon is racist. I don't think—I think that he is tolerant of—

And tolerant of a lot of these sort of racist tweets that are conspiracy theories and things like that. Part of it is performative because he's pushing rightward because he felt like it was those are the people who are cheerleading him. And so he plays into that.

And part of it is that, you know, he likes sort of drama, as you said. So you're essentially saying some of his best friends are racist. He's not racist, but he supports racism. I mean, he certainly, you know, has a tolerance for these tweets that most people wouldn't.

And I think he knows it's the bread and butter of the site right now also. So he's playing a performative role. So I think that, you know, it goes back and forth on that. I'm troubled by it. I'm more troubled by the fact that, you know, you can't go on the site now without seeing it over and over and over again. And not, you know, from him, but it's an entirely anti-Semitic racist hotbed right now. And I think the idea that it isn't is ludicrous, you know. And so I

I think that that is more troubling to me than Elon personally retweeting this and retweeting that. But yeah, I don't go deep into that. I don't, you know, in the end, I'm not attacking Elon with this book. I'm attacking what's gone on here and this huge misstep

and this disaster and this spiral downward that has happened in very dramatic fashion. Although one might ask, being a performative racist is better than being an actual racist. Like, I kind of like the last group more if I had to choose because the others know better. I think he knows better. Yeah, I mean, it's a tricky thing. It's a tricky thing. I think that for me anyways, it's hard for...

So it's something that I didn't want to get too deep into in the book. I think people can see what they see. But I think it's more him engaging in this sort of dirty circus he's created than it is him sort of, you know. Dirty circus. That's sort of been the name of the book, Dirty Circus. So let's leave the book for a bit and talk about Twitter post April 2023, where the book ends.

Let's do a quick lightning round. I'd like to go through a list of many catastrophes, and I want you to tell me what you've heard about how they've affected both Elon personally and Twitter as a company, X as a company. The DeSantis campaign kickoff Twitter spaces fiasco. Yeah, that was a mess. You know, he fired everybody, so the site doesn't work anymore. Okay. Tucker Carlson brings homemade show to Twitter and then signs a shared revenue deal with him.

I mean, I think one of the biggest disasters that Elon has done is attempt to destroy journalism and his attempt to sort of equate citizen journalists with people who have trained in it. He would not have a citizen engineer building his rockets. No, he wouldn't. No, he would not. Of course not. Because they're stupid. They're stupid. He likes to say stupid to people. Linda Yaccarino's meltdown at the Code Conference.

I have a lot of feelings about her and her role there. I don't think she's going to be there very long. And I think, you know, hey, we're all opportunists and we all take opportunities in front of us. And I think she took an opportunity and she's going to milk it and then she's going to be gone. So when? I've heard rumors that she's not long there. What have you heard?

I mean, I'm amazed she's left this long, to be honest with you. But I can't imagine she makes it through the end of the year. Oh, okay. All right. Elon's threatened lawsuit against the ADL. I know quite a bit about this. I mean, in my opinion, you probably know way more than I do. I think this is totally ugly. And I think it's...

In the book, I go deeply into the fact that there was a targeted troll attack on Twitter. As soon as he took over, there were something like 50,000 racist tweets testing him that a troll farm did, and I have a troll farm scene in the book. However, him blaming his problems on the ADL, it sounds real bad to me, and I think it's

I thought he was all for free speech, but he's not for free speech. Yeah, boycotts are speech. You know, when it's against him. Well, also, I think they backed off because he threatened, he truly threatened them and they couldn't. Right. I mean, he's the richest man in the world who has a phalanx of lawyers. And so he's scary. Yeah. The avalanche of disinformation regarding the Israel-Palestine conflict. Oh, God. I mean, this is, we're seeing right now the disaster of,

getting rid of moderators, of saying we can moderate it with an algorithm or we can just let it run. It's just fueling so much hate on both sides, right? Antisemitism, Islamophobia, it's just fueling hate because it's a hate engine. It's an engagement engine and it's ugly. And, you know, I thought it would be really hard to make Zuckerberg and Facebook look good, right?

Right. And Twitter makes Facebook look fantastic right now. And I think that's a scary thing and it's unnecessary. And I think they need to moderate. I want to finish up talking about a couple of things because there's obviously parallels between how you present Elon and his nemesis, Mark Zuckerberg. They're both portrayed as lonely, insecure, misunderstood billionaire geniuses. I find them very different. But I want to hear your thoughts on what do they have in common?

And what are the differences? Yeah, great question. So I think that what they have in common is somewhat the view that the world revolves around them and that they're going to remake the world in their image. You know, Zuckerberg created— Emperor. Right. Zuckerberg wanted us all to live online on Facebook so he could be the king, basically. And I think Elon—

Right. And I think Elon is similar. I think that Elon is much more, in my opinion, the dictatorial control person than Mark is. I think Mark...

to me anyways, is a little bit more of the nerd, the guy in the corner with the computer. And Elon isn't that. Well, his team has stayed around him for a decade. Like, it's the same people. Yeah. And so I don't know. There are differences between them. I think it's interesting in the book, there's a scene when he signs the papers to take over Twitter. The first thing he screams out is, fuck Zuck, fuck Zuck, which I haven't seen reported anywhere else. And I think that that's...

I think he definitely sees Mark as a rival. One time Mark asked me if he was crazy, and I said, indeed. I didn't know what to say. You know, they're very fixated on each other in a weird way. And I... In my...

This is just my opinion. Mark is actually a much nicer person, more stable. He obviously has a good relationship with his wife. He has kids. He's kept the same people there. Again, I have a lot, as you know, have a lot of problems with what he's done at Facebook. But, you know— I mean, Elon has pushed you to like Mark. I don't like Mark that much. I like him as a person. I'm saying he's a better—

Person. Person. Like, away from all of this. He has a life that is... He's a good father. He's a good husband. I think he has a lot of people around him that he's kept for a long time. When the fight happened...

Tell me what you think of that, because here's two people you've written about quite a bit. It is right up my alley. I feel like this should have been my next book and my movie was literally just their fight. And I think if Elon really wants to beat Zuck, he needs a social network about himself. So he should be supporting me and not coming against me. But I really I was blown away by that fight situation. And for a few moments, I literally thought it might actually happen.

which would have been spectacular. I would have put my money on Mark just because he's trained and he's young and Elon is, although Elon is crazy and crazy is good in a fight. I think that Mark's, you know, Mark is skilled and he's,

going to probably win that fight. But I was blown away by the drama of it. And I loved it. I would have loved to have written about it. Yeah. All the men, my sons wanted it. I was like, no, no, this is, I actually wrote market notes saying, please don't do this. It's beneath you. Like you love your sport. Like whatever you think of is like dancing around and putting up his videos. He likes it. Like it's a real, it's a real thing, right? He's earnest about it.

He didn't write back, by the way. Sad. But I said, you're better than this. This is a ridiculous circus by men who are not good people. So please stop. Please don't do it. I mean, it could go very bad. But on the other hand, it would be a great movie. Oh, all you people, all you want is a spectacular...

Spectacles. Well, you know, I mean, if the world is a simulation, you know, you got to make it fun. That's true. It doesn't really matter, does it? But speaking of which, there are also quite a few Trump parallels in the book. Being rich, right-wing Twitter trolls are both surrounded by yes-men, thin-skinned, emotionally volatile, paranoid, convinced there's a deep state or in Elon's case, Twitter 1.0 holdovers trying to undermine them.

And they both think they know everything. Going back to this messianic thing, both talk explicitly of themselves as saviors. I am the only one. Trump thinks he's just saving America, whereas Elon thinks he's saving humanity. Is that comparison fair? I mean, in some ways. Look, I think Elon is league smarter than Trump. I mean, I think Elon truly is a brilliant man, whatever you want to say about him. And I think he

I think they both are people who take that role of being this strong man, right? The strong man leader, the charismatic leader.

person who bends people to their will. I think that's something that they both see themselves as and is similar. There are similarities for sure. You can't walk away from them. I think that I don't believe that Elon is a supporter of Trump. I don't think he liked Trump. I think, you know, I agree with what's in the Isaacs book. I don't think he thinks highly of Trump. He didn't. I have texts about it. Yeah. So, but, you know, obviously there are parallels in how they act.

and behave. I just think Elon's way, way smarter. And it's sad. We would never even be having this conversation if he hadn't taken over Twitter. It never would have even crossed your mind that they're the same people. Yeah, absolutely. Let me ask you, your movie Dumb Money came out during the middle of the strike. Of course, it's a terrific movie. I recommend people see it. You know, what was happening in that book was about meme stocks. What has happened from when you were writing Accidental Billionaires, which was adapted into the social network,

What's happened to tech from your perspective? Wow. I mean, it's a big... I think they've lost their fucking minds, but go ahead. What do you think? It's a big question. It's certainly not the brilliant college kids sitting in their dorm room dreaming up ways to make the world better. I think it became a machine. It turned a lot of people out. And then you have all these outside characters that dominated these people who became like the unicorns, right? I think the unicorns

you know, went crazier and crazier and crazier to the point we are today. But I think everything's kind of shaky now. I think the meme stock revolution that we talk about in Dumb Money is the beginnings of a revolution. I think that there's sort of so much anger, there's so much bubbling up in the world, and it's coming out everywhere. So, I mean...

It's a mishmash. It's a mess. It's a disaster. You have someone like Elon who doesn't want to just build Tesla. He wants to own and build everything, right? He wants to save the world rather than, you know, make a car or whatever it is. And I think that that unicorn thinking has just expanded and expanded and expanded. One of the things about dumb money that I liked is they can't – these rich people maybe aren't as smart as you think they are, right? Yeah.

And the other part of it is that a lot of these people, including Elon, are always like, let's get the man. And I keep saying to the people that were doing the dumb money, you know, the people that were sort of trying very hard to make money at this stuff and play their same game is,

You're backing the man in fighting the man. Like, they're the man. Like, they are the man. I mean, it's all very confusing, right? Because, you know, Elon is somewhat of a rebel leader in the dumb money phenomenon. I mean, he's trying to rally the people in a way against the man, and he's the man. Well, Andreessen just did that. Yeah, you know, that happens a lot. Like...

you look at Zuckerberg's transformation from being the rebel to being the establishment, right? You know, in the end, you become what you hate, I guess, is sort of the moral of all these stories. But yeah, I mean, it's...

Revolution always leads to a new leader, right? It doesn't lead to the people running and everything. No, never. Breaking Twitter reads like a screenplay. Unsurprisingly, you've had incredible success optioning your books. Has this one been optioned? Yes. So we sold it to MGM is developing it. I think the plan right now is an eight-part television series, you know, one of those limited series because there's so much in it. It's hard to sort of tell it in a quick movie, but we're out to –

As soon as the acting strike is out, we will be out to actors. So hopefully any minute now. But yes, it is being developed. So streamers this time? Not necessarily, but most likely. It could be a network. Could be a network. Would you like to say how much you got an option for?

How much money? Yeah. Dumb money. I mean, I'm doing all right. Okay. All right. Let's put it that way. I'm teasing. I would never tell you things I'm doing either. But the last question, who plays Elon? Yeah. You know, we've talked about it a lot, who I would dream about. Like, I think half the cast of Succession to do it. And I like Ben Affleck. I think Ben Affleck would be awesome in this role. He's one I'm thinking about. You know, as the author of the book, as you know, you have –

about as much control of this as the caterer does, but I'm definitely, you know, thinking of a few different people who could do it. Who else? Ben Affleck. We thought of Brendan Fraser. Who else? I mean, Brendan Fraser would be a home run. He's someone we've definitely talked about. Yeah. What was the other one? Gosh, I can't even remember. The guy from Succession who ended up taking over at the end. Oh, Alexander Skarsgård. He's already played in Elon. No, not Skarsgård. The one who was married. Oh, Tom. Oh, Tom. I love Tom.

Tom? Tom would be awesome. No. I do. He's got the face. Look at his face. He's got the face. Oh. But yeah, I think there's a number of people we've talked about. I don't know. Mm-mm. No, that's not where you'd go. You need a big guy. I was thinking Vince Vaughn before this.

Vince Vaughn. Long ago. I think that would be old Vince Vaughn. No, old Vince Vaughn. I said old Vince Vaughn. Like, you have to have someone who has the size. Yeah, the size is a big part of the story, I think. And yeah, you do need the size. Yeah. But the magic of Hollywood. Everyone in Hollywood is so small that anybody looks big. All right. My producer name is asking me to ask about Nick Cage. I disagree. Nick Cage? I love Nick Cage. Too crazy. But I mean, he'd almost take him too crazy. Yeah. But you could see the crazy scenes going well.

In the end, I think it'll be a stunning show. Stunning show. Well, super excited. Who's playing me? I know. You can play yourself, I'm sure. Yeah, I will. I just did. I just did in The Simpsons, so I can do it. That's fantastic. I'm good as a cartoon character.

Anyway, I really love the book. Ben, I really enjoy your stuff. They make me laugh. And I know it drives them crazy. So that's why I like it even better. Oh, well, thank you so much. I'm a huge fan of yours as well. I think you're the best at this. And I appreciate it. Some people don't get what I do. And I love that you had fun with it because I think in the end, we have to laugh. Yeah, he is a character. That's for sure. Anyway, goodbye and thank you. Thank you. It's on!

Touch his arm. Yeah. Did you caress his elbow? Who did you tell to caress his elbow? No, there was a thing on Twitter where they said I was touching his leg with my foot. It was that code a couple of years ago. I remember that. He looked down and said, nice shoes to you. She liked my shoes. I was not touching him.

All these creepy straight men on Twitter. Like, let me just give you some information. Creepy straight men of Twitter. I'm a lesbian. I'm not interested in Elon Musk. Despite your comments about Jon Hamm at the top of the interview. I love Jon Hamm. He's very... Even lesbians acknowledge the handsomeness of Jon Hamm. And Mitt Romney. Well, he's also a handsome man. Not as like... Jon Hamm is the handsomest man. So you were not playing footsie with Elon Musk. I was not. My point was that sometimes when people are manic, as he can be, if you...

Calm them down. If you touch them lightly, it calms them down. And that's what I was talking about. Touching them reminds them you're not a pixelated nothing burger running around town, right? I guess. I liked Ben's point that Elon thinks of himself as a main character. He's certainly not alone in that. A lot of main character energy and a lot of the people we interact with. They do. They think they're the center of the universe. They're different in their manias, egomania and narcissism. Yes.

These powerful people, a lot of them feel they are constantly under attack. They do. And I get it because notoriety makes you a target. Sure. You get pushed back. Some deserve, some not. But the challenge is when they start to take every critique as an

Yes, they do.

You know, at taking critical feedback, Dara Khosrowshahi, who we just interviewed, for example, an adult. I call them adults and everybody else is either an adult toddler or the grievance industrial complex, which they benefit from that because then it gets their users going, you go, man. It's sort of like the you go girl for toxic men, really.

Right. Or you're kind of trying to very much thread this needle, like walk a tightrope, what he described Esther Crawford doing, trying to talk him off of that. I thought it was a mistake on her part. I think it hurt her more than it did her own, the sleeping bag thing. And by the way, she did a very thoughtful thing about it later. And I get what she was trying to do, but what it does is- You mean when she came on Twitter and talked about the whole experience? Yeah, exactly. And I think here's the problem. When you're cosseting over rich men, you're not going to win. Putting them in these-

that they're as if that they are children. They are not children. Like you enter into their fantasy of coddling them. Yes, right. It doesn't help them in any way. And also, I mean, there's no staying power for it unless you're willing to basically become a non-plexilated, non-character in the world, right? You become a vessel just for carrying water, just for reflecting back onto this person what he thinks of himself. That's right. They have to take responsibility. They all have to take responsibility for what they've done and what they're doing, good and bad.

That's what adult men do. Do you think he's misunderstood or unfairly maligned? Because for a long time you were helping kind of unpack nuance around Elon when others weren't, right? Now, no. Now, no. You think he's just... I think we see him exactly as he is. I think we see all of them exactly as they are. But he also could feel misunderstood. I guess. I don't think you can be the world's richest man and play the victim.

I'm sorry. You just can't. Actually, it reminded me of the Amanpour episode, that conversation we had with her about the Yuval Harari quote, right? The, can you hold two thoughts at the same time? I don't think he's misunderstood. And I don't think we should feel sorry for him. Okay. Don't feel sorry for him. Do not play footsie with him. Don't cry for me, Argentina. Don't cry for him, Argentina. It's unfortunate or maybe good for Ben that he didn't talk to Elon because he disclosed many times that he's a bit of a fan. Right.

But I don't agree that the worst person you can talk to when you're doing a story is the main character. I think it's okay sometimes, but at this point, I just finished my memoir. I really don't want any of them to call me anymore. I'm not picking up the phone. Because it's called burn book here. Yes. It's like a specific ask to not call. I don't want to reunite with any of them. The best is if you can do what Tim Alberta did in that Atlantic profile of Chris Lick. He reported it out very well, so he had access to Chris Lick, but he was never drinking the Kool-Aid because he...

No? Chris is not exactly these people. He just didn't. He talks too much. Are you saying that, like, Elon is smarter than Trump, that Elon is smarter than Chris Leibniz? That is correct. That is correct. Two last things. We talked about the Walter biography, and it would have actually been a good question for us to ask Walter, would he still write the biography now on Elon? Yeah, probably he would. I think he would, too. Ben was like, no. The other thing that he said that was interesting is that he compared Linda to Sheryl Sandberg, which, of course, no. No, no. Oh, no. No.

No, Cheryl is a real pro. I'm sorry. I think Linda's very talented, as I've said time and again, in the genre she was in. I don't think she's CEO level yet. Maybe she could be someday. Cheryl wasn't the CEO. She was the COO. I think Cheryl understood her role. But she was never obsequious this way. No, for a time.

She was quite tough on Mark, I would say. Very honest. I think over time she herself got, you know, they got insular as a group of people. But in general, I thought she was very honest with Mark at all times. And I think she had command of herself in a way that maybe Linda does behind the scenes, but I doubt it. But they're different people. Again, Mark is more willing to hear the message, and I don't think Elon is. I do think one of the most dangerous things Elon has done, it's what Ben said about...

He, like Trump, has been trying to undermine media. Yes, forever. And this post-truth era in his crusade for free speech is completely undermining truth. Yeah, well, he's undermining journalism. He doesn't like journalists. He is undermining journalists. He thinks he's saving speech. Whatever. I think he's become a malevolent character. If he's the main character, he's become malevolent, and he shows no signs of turning it around. Maybe, you know, I don't know, at the end, Darth Vader...

redeemed himself, I guess it could happen. All right. Read us out, Cara. Today's show was produced by Naima Raza, Christian Castro Rossell, and Megan Burney. Special thanks to Kate Gallagher. Our engineers are Fernando Arruda and Rick Kwan. Our theme music is by Trackademics. If you're already following the show, your book is getting optioned. If not, you have to sit in the Citizen Engineered Rocket. Go wherever you listen to podcasts, search for On with Cara Swisher and hit follow.

Thanks for listening to On with Kara Swisher from New York Magazine, the Vox Media Podcast Network, and us. We'll be back on Monday with more.