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Elon Musk: Discussion Thread

Ex-CNN star Lemon sues Musk over cancelled X show

Former CNN star presenter Don Lemon has sued multi-billionaire Elon Musk and his social media company X, formerly known as Twitter, over the cancellation of a talk show deal.

The lawsuit alleges that Mr Musk and his company unfairly terminated a partnership with Mr Lemon and refused to pay him after using his name to promote the social media platform with advertisers.

BBC News has contacted X for comment about the lawsuit.

Earlier this year, X reached deals with Mr Lemon, former US congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard and sports radio presenter Jim Rome, as it tries to bring advertisers back to the platform after a series of controversies.

"The lawsuit alleges fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and misappropriation of name and likeness," said a post on the Facebook page of the law firm representing Mr Lemon, Shegerian & Associates.

The filing with the California Superior Court in San Francisco alleged X had agreed to pay Mr Lemon $1.5m (£881,000), along with a share of advertising revenue generated by his content.

It also claims Mr Musk and X used "false promises and representations” to help persuade Mr Lemon to agree to the partnership only to cancel it after he had spent thousands of dollars on creating the show.

However, the deal which would have seen The Don Lemon Show appearing on X collapsed abruptly in March after the recording of the first episode, which featured an interview with Mr Musk.

In a post on X shortly after the deal fell through, Mr Musk said Mr Lemon's approach “was basically just 'CNN, but on social media,’ which doesn’t work, as evidenced by the fact that CNN is dying.”

During the interview, which was recorded at Tesla's headquarters in Texas, Mr Lemon asked Mr Musk about his use of the drug ketamine, as well as the increase of hate speech on X.

The network made the decision after Mr Lemon made on-air comments about then Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley being past her prime.

Shortly after Mr Lemon's exit from CNN, Mr Musk reached out to him on X.

At the time, Mr Musk was looking to attract advertisers back to the social media platform, which was reeling from a string of controversies that followed the billionaire's takeover in 2022.

In October, X chief executive Linda Yaccarino announced a partnership deal with celebrity socialite Paris Hilton.

The following month, Ms Hilton pulled an advertising campaign on X by her entertainment company 11:11 Media.

The departure of Ms Hilton's firm added to the list of advertisers that had cut ties with X over concerns about the platform's content moderation policies.

BBC
 
'No choice' but to shut X San Francisco office – Musk

Elon Musk has said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, that he has "no choice" but to move the flagship office of the social platform out of San Francisco.

The post was in response to a New York Times report about an email from X chief executive Linda Yaccarino to staff, which said the office was closing, with employees moving to San Jose and Palo Alto.

It comes just weeks after Mr Musk said he would move X and his rocket company SpaceX to Texas.

He said it was due to recent laws passed by the state - in particular a new law which prevents schools from making rules to require staff to tell anyone, including parents, information about a child's gender identity.

"No choice. It is impossible to operate in San Francisco if you’re processing payments," the technology entrepreneur said on X.

"That’s why Stripe, Block (CashApp) & others had to move," he added, hinting that it was local laws that triggered his decision.

X did not immediately reply to a BBC News request for comment.

In July, the multi-billionaire said the offices of X and SpaceX would move to Texas, after California introduced the new gender identity law.

At the time, Mr Musk called it "the last straw" in a post on X.

In response, California's Democrat Governor Gavin Newsom posted on X “You bent the knee,” along with a screenshot of a 2022 post from former President Donald Trump criticising the billionaire.

In 2022, Mr Musk bought Twitter for $44bn (£34.4bn) and immediately set about making changes at the company, including cutting jobs and reducing content moderation on the platform.

He moved Tesla's headquarters to Texas in 2021 and is a resident of the state - which has no income tax.

BBC
 
Elon Musk brands Starmer 'two-tier Keir' and asks 'is this Britain or Soviet Union?' over Facebook comment arrest video

Elon Musk has ramped up his row with the UK as he branded the prime minister "two-tier Keir" and questioned if it was "Britain or the Soviet Union" after a man was apparently arrested over Facebook comments.

The billionaire owner of X has been engaged in a war of words with Sir Keir Starmer over riots gripping the UK, amid concerns online disinformation is fuelling the unrest.

In his latest rebuke, Musk reposted a video appearing to show police officers arresting a man for making offensive comments on Facebook.

"Arrested for making comments on Facebook!," Musk wrote on X.

"Is this Britain or the Soviet Union? Is this accurate @Community Notes."

Community Notes is X's own fact checking resource.

In the video, an officer is shown telling a man he is being arrested on suspicion of improper use of the electronics communications network.

This covers sending a message that is "grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character" and can result in a maximum six-month jail term or a fine.

In a later post aimed directly at Sir Keir, Musk asked "why aren't all communities protected in Britain?".

It was in response to a video appearing to show large crowds of masked people gathered outside a pub, some waving the Palestine flag.

Musk directed a similar comment towards the prime minister on Monday after Sir Keir said he would not tolerate attacks on Muslim communities.


news.sky.com

Elon Musk brands Starmer 'two-tier Keir' and asks 'is this Britain or Soviet Union?' over Facebook comment arrest video

The billionaire owner of X posts the hashtag #twotierKeir about the prime minister in reference to "two-tier policing" - a claim often used by the far-right to suggest that police treat certain groups of people in different ways.
news.sky.com news.sky.com
 

Elon Musk shares faked far-right 'detainment camp' post​


Elon Musk has deleted an image he shared on X, formerly Twitter, which promoted a conspiracy theory about the UK building "detainment camps" on the Falkland Islands for rioters.

The image - which was faked to look like it had come from the Daily Telegraph website - had been posted by the co-leader of the far-right Britain First party, Ashlea Simon, though it had appeared elsewhere before she shared it.

Mr Musk's post was viewed more than 1.7 million times before it was removed - with Ms Simon's post briefly tagged with a note reading "this story does not exist" before it too was removed.

It is the latest in a series of controversial interventions from the tech billionaire since the unrest began, some of which have been directly condemned by the prime minister.

The role of social media platforms, including X, in the disorder is also the subject of intense scrutiny, with the government and media regulator urging greater action from them.

Mr Musk has not acknowledged he published then deleted the post. The BBC has approached X for comment.

Before it was removed, comments under Mr Musk's post compared the UK to a fascist state.

It comes as the UK government is grappling with how to deal with misinformation online in the face of unrest across England and in Northern Ireland.

The government and Ofcom both say social media companies should act over their role in the crisis, and the media regulator will get enhanced powers under the Online Safety Act by 2025 to take firmer action against such posts.

Mr Musk has previously replied to a post on X from the prime minister - in which Sir Keir said he would not tolerate attacks on mosques or Muslim communities - asking: "Shouldn't you be concerned about attacks on *all* communities?"

When asked about comments from Mr Musk, Sir Keir previously said "my focus is on ensuring our communities are safe. That is my sole focus. I think it's very important for us all to support the police in what they're doing".

Before Mr Musk bought Twitter in 2022, Britain First had been banned from the social media site under its hate speech rules.
But he lifted the ban after he took over, saying at the time that he was "against censorship that goes far beyond the law", and labelled himself a "free speech absolutist".

For that reason, Britain First - and other far-right figures including its then-leaders - were able to return to the platform.

Mr Musk has used his platform in the past to praise its "community notes" feature, which allows X's own users to partially verify whether posts are real or not.

But it has been accused of taking too long - and in this case, no such notes appeared under Mr Musk's post by the time it was deleted.

It took just under 10 hours for a community note to appear underneath the original post shared by Ms Simon.

www.bbc.com

Elon Musk shares faked far-right 'detainment camp' post

The image was faked to look like it had come from the Daily Telegraph website.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 

Elon Musk’s X faces privacy complaints in Europe over data use​


A Vienna-based privacy campaign group lodged complaints in eight European countries against Elon Musk’s X on Monday over “unlawfully” feeding the personal data of users into its artificial intelligence technology without their consent.

The complaints filed by the European Center for Digital Rights — also known as Noyb ( “None of Your Business “) — come after Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) earlier this month took court action against X over its data collection practices to train its AI.

X had recently started “irreversibly feeding” the personal data of more than 60 million European users into its Grok AI technology, “without ever informing them or asking for their consent”, according to Noyb.

Noyb slammed X for “never proactively informing” its users that their data is being used for AI training, saying many people appeared to have “found out about the new default setting through a viral post on 26 July”.

Last week the DPC — which acts on behalf of the European Union — said that X had agreed to suspend its much-criticised processing of users’ personal data for its AI technology.

But Noyb founder Max Schrems said in a statement that the DPC failed to “question the legality” of the actual processing, seemingly taking action “around the edges, not at the core of the problem”.

Noyb also warned that it remained unclear what happened with already ingested EU data.

Calling for a “full investigation”, Noyb has filed complaints in Austria, Belgium, France, Greece, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands and Spain.

The group has requested an “urgency procedure” against X that allows data protection authorities in the eight European countries to act.

“We want to ensure that Twitter (now X) fully complies with EU law, which – at a bare minimum – requires to ask users for consent,” Schrems said, referring to the bloc’s landmark General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR).

The GDPR aims to make it easier for people to control how companies use their personal information.

The group recently launched similar legal action against social media giant Meta, causing it to halt its AI plans.

Noyb has taken several court proceedings against technology giants, often prompting action from regulatory authorities.

The group began working in 2018 with the advent of the GDPR.

Source: Euro News
 

X to close operations in Brazil ‘effective immediately’​


Media platform X said on Saturday it would close its operations in Brazil “effective immediately” due to what it called “censorship orders” from Brazilian judge Alexandre de Moraes.

X claims Moraes secretly threatened one of its legal representatives in Brazil with arrest if it did not comply with legal orders to take down some content from its platform. Brazil’s Supreme Court, where Moraes has a seat, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The X service remains available to the people of Brazil, billionaire Elon Musk’s platform said on Saturday.

 
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Elon Musk’s SpaceX Booster Topples Over on Fire During Botched Landing

Elon Musk’s SpaceX canceled the second of two scheduled satellite launches early Wednesday after one of its rocket boosters burst into flames and fell over after landing.

The Falcon 9’s first stage toppled as it touched down on a drone ship stationed hundreds of miles off the Florida coast, according to CBS News. Video of the incident showed flames around the bottom of the booster before it keeled over into the Atlantic Ocean, apparently exploding as it crashed onto its side.

“After a successful ascent, Falcon 9’s first stage booster tipped over following touchdown on the A Shortfall of Gravitas droneship,” SpaceX said in an X post. “Teams are assessing the booster’s flight data and status. This was the booster’s 23rd launch.”

The rocket’s second stage continued into orbit where it successfully deployed 21 Starlink satellites, the company said. It later added that a scheduled second launch had been scrubbed “to give the team time to review booster landing data from the previous launch.”

The ill-fated engine—B1062—had set the company’s reuse record, according to CBS News.

The dramatic end to the booster’s life came after SpaceX scrubbed a separate crewed Falcon 9 launch scheduled for early Wednesday due to “unfavorable weather” forecasts in splashdown areas off the coast of Florida. The Polaris Dawn mission is aiming to make history with the first commercial spacewalk when the crew are eventually blasted into orbit.


www.thedailybeast.com

Elon Musk’s SpaceX Booster Topples Over on Fire During Botched Landing

The company canceled a planned launch after the mishap.
www.thedailybeast.com
 
X braced for Brazil ban as judge's deadline passes

X, formerly known as Twitter, has said it expects to be blocked in Brazil after failing to meet a deadline to name a new legal representative for the company.

The social media network closed its office in the country earlier this month, saying its representative had been threatened with arrest if she did not comply with orders it described as "censorship".

The months-long row began with Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes in April ordering the suspension of dozens of X accounts for allegedly spreading disinformation.

X owner Elon Musk has threatened to reactivate the accounts, and has described Justice Moraes as a "tyrant" and a "dictator".

Justice Moraes gave X 24 hours to name a new legal representative or face suspension, with the deadline coming just after 20:00 local time (23:00 GMT) on Thursday.

The order said a ban would remain in effect until X names a legal representative in the country and pays fines for alleged violations of Brazilian law.

But in a post from one of its official accounts shortly after the deadline expired, X made clear that it had not complied with the order.

"Soon, we expect Judge Alexandre de Moraes will order X to be shut down in Brazil – simply because we would not comply with his illegal orders to censor his political opponents," the post said.

"The fundamental issue at stake here is that Judge de Moraes demands we break Brazil’s own laws. We simply won’t do that."

X said it would not comply "in secret with illegal orders", adding that it would publish the judge's demands in the coming days "in the interests of transparency".

Justice Moraes had ordered that X accounts accused of spreading disinformation - many supporters of the former right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro - must be blocked while they are under investigation. He said the company's legal representatives would be held liable if any accounts were reactivated.

Meanwhile, the bank accounts of Mr Musk's satellite internet firm Starlink have been frozen in Brazil following an order by the country's Supreme Court.

Starlink responded with a post on X which said the "order is based on an unfounded determination that Starlink should be responsible for the fines levied - unconstitutionally - against X."

Mr Musk also said on X that "SpaceX and X are two completely different companies with different shareholders."

Starlink is a subsidiary of Mr Musk's rocket firm SpaceX.

In 2022, the government of then-President Bolsonaro gave Starlink the green light to operate in Brazil.

As South America's largest country, Brazil and its remote regions in the Amazon have huge potential for Starlink, which specialises in providing internet services to isolated areas.

Justice Moraes gained prominence after his decisions to restrict social media platforms in the country.

He is also investigating Mr Bolsonaro and his supporters for their roles in an alleged attempted coup on 8 January last year.

X is not the first social media company to come under pressure from authorities in Brazil.

Last year, Telegram was temporarily banned over its failure to cooperate with requests to block certain profiles.

Meta's messaging service Whatsapp also faced temporary bans in 2015 and 2016 for refusing to comply with police requests for user data.

BBC
 
Judge orders Musk's X immediately shut down in Brazil

A Brazilian Supreme Court justice ordered on Friday the "immediate suspension" of social media platform X in the country, after a court-imposed deadline expired for the company to identify a legal representative in Brazil.

The move is the latest chapter in an ongoing feud between Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes and Elon Musk, which also included the freezing of the satellite internet provider Starlink's financial accounts in Brazil.

In the decision, Moraes ordered the full and immediate suspension of X in the country until all related court orders on X were complied with, including the payment of fines amounting 18.5 million reais ($3.28 million) and the nomination of a legal representative in Brazil.

Moraes ordered telecomunications regulator Anatel to implement the suspension order, and to confirm to the court within 24 hours that it has carried it out.

In a bid to avoid the use of virtual private networks (VPNs) to circumvent the blockage, Moraes said that individuals or companies who tried to keep access to the social network that way could be fined up to 50,000 reais a day.

X said late on Thursday that it expected Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes to order a shutdown "soon," after a court-imposed deadline expired for the company to identify a legal representative in Brazil.

Earlier this year, Moraes ordered X to block certain accounts implicated in probes of so-called digital militias accused of spreading distorted news and hate.

Musk, denouncing the order as censorship, responded by closing the platform's offices in Brazil. X, formerly known as Twitter, said at the time that its services would still be available in Brazil.

Amid the underlying feud over X, Brazil's Supreme Court also blocked the local bank accounts of the Starlink satellite internet firm, which is 40% owned by Musk, leading the company on Friday to ask the court to suspend that decision.


Reuters
 
Countries where Elon Musk's X social network is banned

With its ban of X, which went into effect on Saturday, Brazil joins a small club of countries to have taken similar measures against the social network, most of them run by authoritarian regimes.

Beyond permanent bans, some nations have temporarily restricted access to X, formerly Twitter, which has often been used by political dissidents to communicate.

These have included Egypt in 2011 during the Arab Spring uprisings, Turkey in 2014 and 2023, and Uzbekistan around that country's 2021 presidential election.

Here is a list of some of the others:

China

Beijing banned Twitter in June 2009 — before it secured the prominent place it enjoyed in Western media and politics for much of the 2010s.

The block came two days before the 20-year anniversary of the government's crushing of pro-democracy demonstrations in the capital's Tiananmen Square.

Since then, many Chinese people have turned to home-grown alternatives such as "Weibo" and "WeChat".

Iran

Twitter was also blocked by Tehran in 2009, as a wave of demonstrations broke out following a contested June presidential election.

The network has nevertheless been used since then to pass information to the outside world about dissident movements, including the demonstrations against Iran's repression of women's rights since late 2022.

Turkmenistan

Isolated Central Asian country Turkmenistan blocked Twitter in the early 2010s alongside many other foreign online services and websites.

Authorities in Ashgabat surveil closely citizens' usage of the internet, provided through state-run monopoly operator TurkmenTelecom.

North Korea

Pyongyang opened its own Twitter account in 2010 in a bid to woo foreigners interested in the country.

But the application has been blocked along with Facebook, Youtube and gambling and pornography websites since April 2016.

Internet access beyond a few government websites is under tight government watch in the regime, with access restricted to a few high-ranking officials.

Myanmar

X has been blocked since February 2021 in Myanmar, when authorities took aim at the app for its use by opponents of the military coup that overthrew Aung San Suu Kyi's civilian government.

Since then, the junta has kept a tight grip on internet access in the country.

Russia

Access to Twitter was throttled from 2021 by Moscow, which complained the site was allowing users to spread "illegal content".

A formal ban came in March 2022, just after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

Many Russian users continue to connect to X via VPN services that allow them to get around the block.

Pakistan

X has been banned since parliamentary polls in February this year. Pakistan's government says the block is for security reasons.

Venezuela

Nicolas Maduro, who was declared winner of July's presidential election despite grave suspicions of fraud, ordered access to X suspended for 10 days on August 9 as security forces were violently putting down nationwide demonstrations.

The block has remained in place beyond the expiry of the 10-day period.

Brazil

The country's block on X has come from the judiciary, via Supreme Court judge Alexandre de Moraes.

He has highlighted the reactivation of accounts that had been ordered suspended by Brazilian courts.

Users connecting to X via a VPN face a fine of 50,000 reais ($8,900) per day.
 
'These aren't just words': The woman threatened for taking X to court

Australia's internet watchdog says she received "death threats" and that her children were doxxed after she was targeted by Elon Musk for attempting to regulate his social media platform.

Earlier this year, the eSafety commissioner took X to court over its refusal to remove videos of a religiously motivated Sydney church stabbing for its global users.

The case was ultimately dropped, but commissioner Julie Inman Grant says she received an "avalanche of online abuse" after Mr Musk called her the "censorship commissar" in a post to his 196 million followers.

X did not immediately respond for comment when contacted, and the BBC was unable to reach Mr Musk directly.

On Friday, a Columbia University report into technology-facilitated gender-based violence - which used Ms Inman Grant as a case study - found that she had been mentioned in almost 74,000 posts on X ahead of the court proceedings, despite being a relatively unknown figure online beforehand.

According to the analysis, the majority of the messages were either negative, hateful or threatening in some way. Dehumanising slurs and gendered language were also frequently noted, with users calling Ms Inman Grant names such as "left-wing Barbie", or "captain tampon".

Speaking to the BBC, Ms Inman Grant said that Mr Musk's decision to use "disinformation" to suggest that she was "trying to globally censor the internet" had amounted to a "dog whistle from a very powerful tech billionaire who owns his own megaphone".

She said that the torrent of online vitriol which followed had prompted Australian police to warn her against travelling to the US, and that the names of her children and other family members had been released across the internet, in a practice known as doxxing.

"There have been threats to my employees, my family, threats to my safety - including credible death threats. I've had to involve the federal and local police and change my movements," she said.

"These aren't just mean words where there’s a lack of resilience, these are threats of harm that can very easily spill over into real world violence."

Australia's independent internet regulator has a broad remit under local law to police content online that it deems to be violent or sexually exploitative.

And when X refused to take down videos of the Wakeley attack - opting instead to geoblock the content from its Australian users - the commissioner sought and won a court injunction, forcing the company to temporarily comply.

The case turned into a test of Australia's ability to enforce its online rules against social media giants operating in multiple jurisdictions – one which failed after a Federal Court judge found that banning the posts from appearing on X globally would not be “reasonable” as it would likely be "ignored or disparaged by other countries".

In June, Ms Inman Grant's office said it would not pursue the case further, and that it would focus on other pending litigation against the platform.

X's Global Government Affairs team described the outcome as a win for "freedom of speech".

BBC
 
Elon Musk on pace to become world’s first trillionaire by 2027, report says

Elon Musk is on pace to become the world’s first trillionaire by 2027, according to a new report from a group that tracks wealth.

Informa Connect Academy’s finding about the boss of electric carmaker Tesla, private rocket company SpaceX and social media platform X (formerly Twitter) stems from the fact that Musk’s wealth has been growing at an average annual rate of 110%. He was also the world’s richest person, with $251bn, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, as the academy’s 2024 Trillion Dollar Club report began circulating Friday.

The academy’s analysis suggested business conglomerate founder Gautam Adani of India would become the second to achieve trillionaire status. That would reportedly happen in 2028 if his annual growth rate remains at 123%.

Jensen Huang, the chief executive officer of the tech firm Nvidia, and Prajogo Pangestu, the Indonesian energy and mining mogul, could also become trillionaires in 2028 if their trajectories hold. Bernard Arnault, the LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton boss and the world’s third-richest person with about $200bn, is on track to eclipse a trillion dollars in 2030 – the same year as Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta.

A handful of companies have secured valuations of more than $1tn. Berkshire Hathaway most recently topped the valuation in late August, days before its architect Warren Buffett celebrated his 94th birthday. Nvidia joined the $1tn club in May 2023 and in June hit $3tn, positioning it at the time after Microsoft and before Apple as the world’s second-most-valuable company.

However, as CNBC noted, the question of who might be the globe’s first trillionaire has fascinated the public ever since the world crowned its first billionaire in 1916. That was the US’s John D Rockefeller, the founder and at the time largest shareholder of Standard Oil.

Despite that fascination, many academics see the accumulation of immense wealth as a social ill. One report calculated that the richest 1% of humanity account for more carbon emissions – a primary driver of the ongoing climate crisis – than the poorest 66%.

Just days before Informa Connect Academy tapped Musk as the most likely to become the world’s first trillionaire, one of his posts on X earned him backlash from many of the site’s users.

His post said an interview between former Fox News host Tucker Carlson and podcaster Darryl Cooper – a fellow rightwing media figure – was “very interesting. Worth watching.”

Cooper claimed in the interview that the Nazis did not mean to murder so many people when they carried out the Holocaust and killed 6 million Jews during the second world war. Instead, Cooper remarked, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi regime simply was not equipped to care for them – and the podcaster blamed British prime minister Winston Churchill for “that war becoming what it did”.

Musk ultimately deleted his post, and the White House condemned Carlson’s interview of Cooper as “a disgusting and sadistic insult to all Americans”.

The billionaire announced in August that he is supporting Donald Trump as the Republican nominee seeks a second presidency in November’s election. Kamala Harris, the Democratic vice-president, is also running in the election.

SOURCE: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/article/2024/sep/07/elon-musk-first-trillionaire-2027
 
BouncerGuy said:
Elon Musk on pace to become world’s first trillionaire by 2027, report says

Elon Musk is on pace to become the world’s first trillionaire by 2027, according to a new report from a group that tracks wealth.

Informa Connect Academy’s finding about the boss of electric carmaker Tesla, private rocket company SpaceX and social media platform X (formerly Twitter) stems from the fact that Musk’s wealth has been growing at an average annual rate of 110%. He was also the world’s richest person, with $251bn, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, as the academy’s 2024 Trillion Dollar Club report began circulating Friday.

The academy’s analysis suggested business conglomerate founder Gautam Adani of India would become the second to achieve trillionaire status. That would reportedly happen in 2028 if his annual growth rate remains at 123%.

Jensen Huang, the chief executive officer of the tech firm Nvidia, and Prajogo Pangestu, the Indonesian energy and mining mogul, could also become trillionaires in 2028 if their trajectories hold. Bernard Arnault, the LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton boss and the world’s third-richest person with about $200bn, is on track to eclipse a trillion dollars in 2030 – the same year as Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta.

A handful of companies have secured valuations of more than $1tn. Berkshire Hathaway most recently topped the valuation in late August, days before its architect Warren Buffett celebrated his 94th birthday. Nvidia joined the $1tn club in May 2023 and in June hit $3tn, positioning it at the time after Microsoft and before Apple as the world’s second-most-valuable company.

However, as CNBC noted, the question of who might be the globe’s first trillionaire has fascinated the public ever since the world crowned its first billionaire in 1916. That was the US’s John D Rockefeller, the founder and at the time largest shareholder of Standard Oil.

Despite that fascination, many academics see the accumulation of immense wealth as a social ill. One report calculated that the richest 1% of humanity account for more carbon emissions – a primary driver of the ongoing climate crisis – than the poorest 66%.

Just days before Informa Connect Academy tapped Musk as the most likely to become the world’s first trillionaire, one of his posts on X earned him backlash from many of the site’s users.

His post said an interview between former Fox News host Tucker Carlson and podcaster Darryl Cooper – a fellow rightwing media figure – was “very interesting. Worth watching.”

Cooper claimed in the interview that the Nazis did not mean to murder so many people when they carried out the Holocaust and killed 6 million Jews during the second world war. Instead, Cooper remarked, Adolf Hitler’s Nazi regime simply was not equipped to care for them – and the podcaster blamed British prime minister Winston Churchill for “that war becoming what it did”.

Musk ultimately deleted his post, and the White House condemned Carlson’s interview of Cooper as “a disgusting and sadistic insult to all Americans”.

The billionaire announced in August that he is supporting Donald Trump as the Republican nominee seeks a second presidency in November’s election. Kamala Harris, the Democratic vice-president, is also running in the election.

SOURCE: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/article/2024/sep/07/elon-musk-first-trillionaire-2027
Click to expand...
Make him the Prime Minister of Pakistan... maybe we can get some loans paid off. lol
 
Anthony Albanese fires back at Elon Musk’s ‘fascist’ comment as feud simmers on

Anthony Albanese has dismissed Elon Musk’s claims the Labor government was “fascist”, saying the US billionaire needed to recognise X “has a social responsibility”.

“If Mr Musk doesn’t understand that, that says more about him than it does about my government,” the Australian prime minister said on Saturday.

Musk, who owns the social media platform X, formerly Twitter, made the comments about new legislation aimed at tackling deliberate lies spread on social media, which could see social media companies fined up to 5% of their annual turnover.

Musk responded to a post on X about Australia’s measures by simply posting: “Fascists”.

Musk has clashed with the Australian government multiple times over the past year, including over requests for X to take down clips of a Sydney bishop allegedly being stabbed.

In April the eSafety commissioner ordered X to remove the graphic content and initiated proceedings in the federal court to have the material taken down. In June the eSafety commissioner discontinued the proceedings, but a separate administrative appeals tribunal review of the topic is expected to be heard in October.

During the months-long saga, Musk accused the government of suppressing free speech.

Albanese was also asked on Saturday about the huge uptake of renewable power, including in opposition leader Peter Dutton’s home state of Queensland.

The PM said the figures for the uptake of rooftop solar power showed voters were embracing renewables and understood their benefits.

“What these figures show is that Australians know that the cheapest form of energy is renewables. That’s why they’re putting it on their roofs,” he said.

“Nuclear energy is the most expensive, the slowest to roll out, and Peter Dutton is relying upon technology that doesn’t even exist anywhere in the world. What these figures show is that voters themselves are rejecting the idea that nothing should happen until the 2040s and sometime in the future.”

In June, Dutton announced the Coalition planned to build seven nuclear power plants and two small modular reactors. The nuclear pledge drew unanimous blowback from state premiers but Dutton told supporters he was prepared to override state nuclear bans.

Analysis from the Smart Energy Council found the controversial energy plan would cost taxpayers a minimum of $116bn – the same cost as delivering the Albanese government’s plan for 82% renewables by 2030, and an almost 100% renewable energy mix by 2050 – and as much as $600bn while supplying just 3.7% of Australia’s energy mix by 2050.

SOURCE: https://www.theguardian.com/technol...elon-musks-fascist-comment-as-feud-simmers-on
 
Secret Service 'aware' of Elon Musk post about Harris, Biden

The US Secret Service says it is "aware" of a social media post by Elon Musk in which he said that "no one is even trying" to assassinate President Joe Biden or Vice-president Kamala Harris.

Mr Musk has since deleted the post and said it was intended as a joke.

His post on X, formerly Twitter, came just hours after the suspected attempted assassination of Donald Trump at his golf course in Florida on Sunday.

The tech billionaire is a close ally of Trump, who has vowed to enlist Mr Musk to run a “government efficiency commission” if he wins a second term as US president.

Many X users criticised Mr Musk's comments - which were accompanied by a raised eyebrow emoji - with some alleging that the post was a form of incitement against the US President and Vice President.

In a statement, the White House condemned the post, saying that "this rhetoric is irresponsible".

"Violence should not be condemned, never encouraged or joked about," the statement said, adding that there should be "no place for political violence or for any violence ever in our country".

When contacted by the BBC, the US Secret Service said only that it is "aware" of the post.

"As a matter of practice we do not comment on matters involving protective intelligence," the statement added. "We can say, however, that the Secret Service investigates all threats related to our protectees."

After deleting the post, Mr Musk tweeted that "one lesson I've learned is that just because I say something to a group and they laugh doesn't mean it's going to be all that hilarious as a post on X."

"Turns out that jokes are way less funny if people don't know the context and the delivery is in plain text," a subsequent post read.

The controversial tech mogul is considered a close ally of Trump and formally endorsed him in the aftermath of a separate assassination attempt against the former president that took place at a rally on 13 July in Butler, Pennsylvania.

In that attempt, the suspect fired multiple rounds, injuring Trump and killing an attendee at the rally.

Since then, Mr Musk has often tweeted or re-posted messages critical of both Biden and Harris and in support of Trump.

BBC
 
X says its return in Brazil after ban ‘inadvertent'

Some X users in Brazil were once again able to access the social media platform on Wednesday despite a ban imposed by the nation’s judiciary last month.

Brazilian users swarmed the site after X, which is owned by tech billionaire Elon Musk, updated how its servers within the country are accessed.

The platform’s restoration in Brazil was unintended, an X spokesperson said in a statement late on Wednesday.

“To continue providing optimal service to our users, we changed network providers. This change resulted in an inadvertent and temporary service restoration to Brazilian users.”

“While we expect the platform to be inaccessible again in Brazil soon, we continue efforts to work with the Brazilian government to return very soon for the people of Brazil,” an X spokesperson said in a statement.

The company’s explanation caught some observers by surprise.

"Everything that happened during the day led us to believe that it was on purpose," said Basílio Rodriguez Pérez, advisor to ABRINT, the country's leading trade group for Internet Service Providers (ISP).

ABRINT said X moved to servers hosted by Cloudflare, and that the site appeared to be using dynamic internet protocols (IPs) that change constantly, indicating to him that the change in access to Brazilian users was purposeful. By contrast, the previous system had relied on specific IPs that could be more easily blocked.

Basílio Rodriguez Pérez, ABRINT advisor, said those dynamic IPs could also be linked to critical services within Brazil.

"Many of these IPs are shared with other legitimate services, such as banks and large internet platforms, making it impossible to block an IP without affecting other services."

That includes the service PIX, which millions of Brazilians depend on to make digital payments.

Despite the change in server, some experts said Cloudflare was well-positioned to help Brazil reinforce the ban.

“Actually, I think the ban would be even more effective if Cloudflare really cooperates with the government,” said Felipe Autran, a constitutional lawyer in Brasilia, the country’s capital.

“I think they will, since they are such a huge provider for many Brazilian enterprises and also the government.”

Cloudflare declined to comment when contacted by the BBC.

Brazil is said to be one of the largest markets for Mr Musk's social media network.

The platform was banned in the country last month after failing to meet a court deadline to appoint a new legal representative in the country.

It marked the most significant development in a feud between Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes and Mr Musk, which began in April, when the judge ordered the suspension of dozens of X accounts for allegedly spreading disinformation.

At one point, Musk’s satellite internet provider Starlink - a subsidiary of spacecraft manufacturer SpaceX - declared it would allow its customers in Brazil to log onto X. Starlink backed down after the nation’s telecommunication agency threatened to revoke its license to operate there.

Observers in Brazil have expressed frustration with both X and the Brazilian government over the fractured relationship.

“It’s a game of chess and we are the pieces on the board,” Mr Pérez said. “But it's not us who are playing. It's the government and X who are playing.”

BBC
 
Brazil Judge Orders X To Reimpose Block Or Face Hefty Fine

Brazil's Supreme Court on Thursday ordered Elon Musk's X to suspend access to the social network, after service was restored despite a ban, or face a daily fine of over $900,000.

The former Twitter was banned last month in Latin America's largest nation, but access to the phone app returned on Wednesday in what the government slammed as a deliberate violation of the suspension order.

X said the return of its service was "inadvertent and temporary."

Judge Alexandre de Moraes said in a court order that a "recalcitrant" X had "unlawfully, persistently and intentionally" failed to respect judicial orders, and would face a daily fine of 5 million reais ($913,000 USD) until it again suspends its service.

Moraes also ordered state telecommunications agency Anatel to take all necessary measures to once again block access to the social network.

The high-profile judge has been engaged in a long feud with South African-born billionaire Musk, as part of his drive to crack down on disinformation in Brazil.

Last month he ordered the suspension of X after Musk refused to remove dozens of right-wing accounts accused of spreading fake news, and then failed to name a new legal representative in the country as ordered.


www.barrons.com

Brazil Judge Orders X To Reimpose Block Or Face Hefty Fine

Brazil's Supreme Court on Thursday ordered Elon Musk's X to suspend access to the social network, after service was restored despite a ban, or face a daily fine of over $900,000.
www.barrons.com www.barrons.com
 
Elon Musk will take 'anyone' to Mars - but not if Kamala Harris becomes US president, he says

Elon Musk has vowed to get "anyone who wants to be a space traveller" to Mars - but not if Kamala Harris becomes US president.

On Sunday night, Musk told his X followers that in just two years, he will send five spaceships to Mars.

"Eventually," he added, "there will be thousands of Starships going to Mars and it will [be] a glorious sight to see!"

However, the vocal Donald Trump supporter said another Democratic presidency "would destroy the Mars programme and doom humanity" by drowning it in red tape.

Musk also said earlier in the month: "We will never reach Mars if Kamala wins."

It's a claim repeated by Republican candidate Mr Trump.

On Saturday, he vowed to reach Mars during his presidency if his supporters get him to the White House.

"I'll talk to Elon," he said at a rally. "Elon, get those rocket ships going."


news.sky.com

Elon Musk will take 'anyone' to Mars - but not if Kamala Harris becomes US president, he says

"We will never reach Mars if Kamala wins," says SpaceX founder Elon Musk. The red planet has become the latest ammo in the US presidential race.
news.sky.com news.sky.com
 
Elon Musk not invited to top UK investment summit

The world's richest person, Elon Musk, has not been invited to the UK government's International Investment Summit in response to his social media posts during last month’s riots, the BBC understands.

Violence spread across the UK after a stabbing attack in Southport, in which three children attending a dance class were killed. The tech entrepreneur posted on X, formerly Twitter, predicting civil war in the UK and repeatedly attacking the prime minister.

The summit in October is the key moment that PM Keir Starmer hopes to attract tens of billions in inward funding for business from the world’s biggest investors.

Mr Musk went to last year's event and took a starring role in November's AI Summit, including a fireside chat with then PM Rishi Sunak. The government and Mr Musk have been approached for comment.

During the August riots, Mr Musk shared, and later deleted, a conspiracy theory about the UK building “detainment camps” on the Falkland Islands for rioters, on X - the social media platform he owns.

At the time ministers said his comments were “totally unjustifiable" and "pretty deplorable".

The BBC understands this is why he has not been invited to join hundreds of the world’s biggest investors at the event on 14 October.

Coming two weeks head of the Budget, the government is billing it as a huge opportunity to attract foreign investment to grow the UK economy. The Labour Party committed before the general election to hold this event within its first 100 days in office.

Under the Conservatives, Mr Musk, who owns or runs X, Tesla and SpaceX, was quietly shown around various UK sites with potential for a gigafactory for cars and batteries.

He has previously told journalists he opened a site in Germany and not the UK partly because of Brexit.

He is a regular at the equivalent French summit. In July, he attended a three-hour lunch with top executives with President Emmanuel Macron ahead of the Olympics earlier this summer.

Under his ownership of the site formerly known as Twitter, Mr Musk lifted the ban on far-right figures, including on the Britain First group.

The UK is considering a tougher Online Safety Act, after the role of misinformation in the widespread racist disorder in August.

Who is Elon Musk and what is his net worth?

He is the world's richest person and has used his platform to make his views known on a vast array of topics.

Bloomberg estimates his net worth to be around $228bn.

That's based largely on the value of his shares in Tesla, of which he owns more than 13%. The company's stock soared in value - some say unreasonably - in 2020 as the firm's output increased and it started to deliver regular profits.

Since bursting on to the Silicon Valley scene more than two decades ago, the 53-year-old serial entrepreneur has kept the public captivated with his business antics.

Born in Pretoria, South Africa, Mr Musk showed his talents for entrepreneurship early, going door to door with his brother selling homemade chocolate Easter eggs and developing his first computer game at the age of 12.

For a long time Mr Musk, who became a US citizen in 2002, resisted efforts to label his politics - calling himself "half-Democrat, half-Republican", "politically moderate" and "independent".

He says he voted for Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and - reluctantly - Joe Biden, all of them Democrats.

But in recent years he's swung behind Donald Trump, who is a Republican. Mr Musk officially endorsed the former president for a second term in 2024 after his attempted assassination.

BBC
 
Musk hits back after being shunned from UK summit

The world's richest person, Elon Musk, has hit back after not being invited to the UK government's International Investment Summit.

He was not invited due to his social media posts during last month’s riots, the BBC understands.

"I don’t think anyone should go to the UK when they’re releasing convicted pedophiles in order to imprison people for social media posts," Mr Musk claimed on X.

Earlier this month, the government released some prisoners to reduce prison overcrowding, but no sex offenders were included.

Violence spread across the UK in August after a stabbing attack in Southport, in which three children attending a dance class were killed. The tech entrepreneur posted on X, formerly Twitter, predicting civil war in the UK and repeatedly attacking the prime minister.

The summit in October is the key moment that PM Keir Starmer hopes to attract tens of billions in inward funding for business from the world’s biggest investors.

Mr Musk was invited to last year's event but did not attend. However, he took a starring role in November's AI Summit, including a fireside chat with then PM Rishi Sunak.

During the August riots, Mr Musk shared, and later deleted, a conspiracy theory about the UK building “detainment camps” on the Falkland Islands for rioters, on X - the social media platform he owns.

At the time ministers said his comments were “totally unjustifiable" and "pretty deplorable".

The BBC understands this is why he has not been invited to join hundreds of the world’s biggest investors at the event on 14 October.

The government has been approached for comment.

Coming two weeks head of the Budget, the government is billing it as a huge opportunity to attract foreign investment to grow the UK economy. The Labour Party committed before the general election to hold this event within its first 100 days in office.

Under the Conservatives, Mr Musk, who owns or runs X, Tesla and SpaceX, was quietly shown around various UK sites with potential for a gigafactory for cars and batteries.

He has previously told journalists he opened a site in Germany and not the UK partly because of Brexit.

He is a regular at the equivalent French summit. In July, he attended a three-hour lunch with top executives with President Emmanuel Macron ahead of the Olympics earlier this summer.

Under his ownership of the site formerly known as Twitter, Mr Musk lifted the ban on far-right figures, including on the Britain First group.

The UK is considering a tougher Online Safety Act, after the role of misinformation in the widespread racist disorder in August.

BBC
 

Elon Musk denies 'romantic relationship' with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni​


Elon Musk has denied being romantically involved with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni after a picture of them looking fondly into each other's eyes went viral.

The billionaire entrepreneur and Italy's first female prime minister were pictured looking cosy at a black-tie event this week, during which Musk presented Ms Meloni with the Global Citizen Award from the Atlantic Council thinktank.

news.sky.com

Elon Musk denies 'romantic relationship' with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni

He said she was "even more beautiful inside than outside", and she hailed him as a "precious genius" - but Elon Musk has denied rumours of a 'romantic relationship' with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.
news.sky.com news.sky.com
 

Musk hits back after being shunned from UK summit​


The world's richest person, Elon Musk, has hit back after not being invited to the UK government's International Investment Summit.

He was not invited due to his social media posts during last month’s riots, the BBC understands.

"I don’t think anyone should go to the UK when they’re releasing convicted pedophiles in order to imprison people for social media posts," Mr Musk claimed on X.

Earlier this month, the government released some prisoners to reduce prison overcrowding, but no-one serving sentences for sex offences were included.

Following disorder and rioting across the UK in August, some people were jailed for encouraging unrest on social media.

During the August riots, Mr Musk posted on X, formerly Twitter, predicting civil war in the UK and repeatedly attacking the prime minister.

He also shared, and later deleted, a conspiracy theory about the UK building "detainment camps" on the Falkland Islands for rioters.

At the time, ministers said his comments were "totally unjustifiable" and "pretty deplorable".

The BBC understands this is why he has not been invited to join hundreds of the world’s biggest investors at the event on 14 October. The government declined to comment.

The summit is the key moment that PM Sir Keir Starmer hopes will attract tens of billions of pounds in inward funding for business from the world’s biggest investors.

Mr Musk was invited to last year's event but did not attend. However, he took a starring role in November's AI Summit, including a fireside chat with then-PM Rishi Sunak.

Jeremy Hunt, the former Conservative chancellor and now the shadow chancellor, told the BBC it was a "big loss" not to have Mr Musk at the summit.

"He told me last year he was planning a new car plant in Europe and had not decided where but the UK was a candidate," Mr Hunt claimed.

David Yelland, a public relations specialist and former editor of the Sun newspaper, told the BBC that if Mr Musk were to attend the summit, it would be "reputationally disastrous for the whole event".

"He’s a fan of free speech but he behaves like a child and he posts things that are deeply inaccurate and extremely damaging," he said.

"This is not just a guy that is saying stuff in the pub. This is a guy that is encouraging untruths around the world."

www.bbc.com

Elon Musk hits back after being shunned from UK summit

There is concern about his social media posts about the UK during last month’s riots, the BBC understands.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 
Musk faces regulators' questions over X takeover - but will he show up?

Elon Musk has been ordered by a federal court to answer further questions from lawyers about his takeover of Twitter - now called X - on Thursday. And the financial world has one question: Will he be there?

Last month, he was a no-show for a court ordered appearance at the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) office in Los Angeles.

Thursday's planned interview is part of a high-level investigation into whether Mr Musk waited too long to disclose he was building up a stake in Twitter before acquiring the social media platform in 2022.

The billionaire has previously said this delay was a mistake.

The nation's top securities regulator is trying to force him to appear on Thursday by calling for possible sanctions.

For the 10 September court hearing, the SEC said it spent thousands of dollars to dispatch three lawyers - two from San Francisco and another from Washington DC -so they could take a sworn deposition from the billionaire tech mogul.

But three hours before the appointment, Mr Musk's lawyers notified the SEC that he would not be able to appear.

Mr Musk, his lawyers wrote in a declaration, had urgently travelled to the East Coast a day earlier for a "high-risk" launch by his rocket company SpaceX.

But SpaceX had posted about the timing of the scheduled launch two days before Mr Musk's deposition date.

And a day ahead of the meeting, he told interviewers at a conference that he planned to travel to Florida "if the weather is holding up" for the launch.

The SEC says he did not inform them of those plans.

The government lawyers only learned of the post and interview later.

They rescheduled the suddenly cancelled meeting and then they asked a federal court to make sure Mr Musk appeared.

Mr Musk has given two depositions since the SEC began looking into his $44bn (£34bn) purchase of Twitter in 2022. The agency has said in legal filings that it is probing whether his stock purchases before he bought the company outright and statements he made about those investments broke securities laws.

But Mr Musk refused to give testimony a third time, with his lawyers sending a letter to the SEC accusing it of harassment. In October, the SEC asked a court to order him to provide more testimony.

Mr Musk's reason for missing last month's appointment "smacks of gamesmanship," SEC lawyers wrote in a 20 September filing.

They asked US District Judge Jacqueline Corley to impose a penalty on him if he skipped the next meeting, arguing it was needed to deter him from "failing to show up" on Thursday.

Mr Musk was supposed to seek written consent from the SEC or an order from the court to reschedule, they added.

Replying in his own filing, his lawyer Alex Spiro of the law firm Quinn Emanuel, said his client and his companies have cooperated with the SEC in this investigation and several others.

"In this investigation alone, Mr Musk has produced hundreds of documents, he has sat for testimony twice, his wealth manager has sat for testimony three times, and other individuals connected to Mr Musk have also sat for testimony, all without rescheduling or cancelling any of those testimonies," Mr Spiro wrote.

Mr Musk's lawyers say they too had travelled to Los Angeles to be at his deposition last month and "immediately notified the SEC of the emergency".

The SEC declined to comment when approached by the BBC.

But in a court filing, SEC lawyer Robin Andrews asked US District Judge Jacqueline Corley to take a hard line against the billionaire.

"The Court must make clear that gamesmanship and delay tactics must cease," Mr Andrews wrote.

BBC
 

Elon Musk Issues Birth Rate Warning: 'Mass Extinction'​


SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has dramatically declared on social media that declining global fertility rates "will lead to mass extinction of entire nations."

This isn't the first time the SpaceX CEO, known for his controversial opinions, has chimed in on issues of birth rates, fertility and the global population. The billionaire has himself fathered 12 children as of August this year.

In January 2022, in a series of posts on X, he said: "We should be much more worried about population collapse," following up with: "UN projections are utter nonsense. Just multiply last year's births by life expectancy. Given downward trend in birth rate, that is best case unless reversed." He then added: "If there aren't enough people for Earth, then there definitely won't be enough for Mars."

U.K.-based charity Population Matters published a 2022 report on the impact of Musk's social media posts on this topic, noting: "Since at least 2017, Elon Musk has been tweeting and speaking regularly about his concerns regarding population 'collapse.' Due to his high media profile and social media following, his views are widely disseminated and read. His claims are in some cases inconsistent with the existing evidence and/or expert opinion, and his opinions are open to challenge on a wide range of fronts."

Musk's "mass extinction" comment was in response to Marko Jukic, a senior analyst at Bismarck Analysis, who said: "A fertility rate below 1.6 means 50% less new people after three generations, say 100 years. Below 1.2 means an 80% drop. The U.S. is at 1.64. China, Japan, Poland, Spain all below 1.2. South Korea is at 0.7—96% drop. Mass extinction numbers."

Jukic was replying to a September 8 post from an account called Birth Gauge, whose profile description says: "Tracking the global fertility decline." The post included an image titled "Birth and Fertility Data 2024." The table displays "Total Fertility Rates (TFR)" for 2015, 2020 and 2023, and a forecast for an unspecified future year.

In response to questions about the provenance of the data contained in the table, the account posted that it had taken data from multiple sources including the U.K. government and a peer-reviewed German academic journal.

The table includes data for many European countries, as well the U.S., Australia and several Asian nations. Many countries show declining fertility rates from 2015 to 2024.

Some countries, like Ireland and Iceland, showed slight increases in fertility rates between 2023 and 2024, while France has the highest TFR among European countries listed for 2024 at 1.63, South Korea and Hong Kong have very low TFRs, and the U.S. maintains a relatively high TFR compared to most European countries.

The TFR is the average number of children a woman would have over her lifetime. A TFR of 2.1 is considered the "replacement level" in developed countries, meaning the population would remain stable (ignoring migration and mortality factors).

Professor Stein Emil Vollset from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), lead author of a recent study that concluded "the world is approaching a low-fertility future," said in an article in The Lancet that this was not necessarily negative.

"In many ways, tumbling fertility rates are a success story, reflecting not only better, easily available contraception, but also many women choosing to delay or have fewer children, as well as more opportunities for education and employment," said Vollset.

Population Matters added in its 2022 report that it was "deeply concerned that the 'population collapse' narrative promoted by Mr Musk may embolden those who seek to restrict reproductive freedoms, and divert attention from the urgent need to address the human welfare conditions and injustices which drive continued population growth."

The declaration of "mass extinction numbers" from Jukic and Musk is considered an exaggeration by many scientists and academics; the term "mass extinction" is typically used in the context of species disappearing entirely and applying it to human population decline due to low fertility is hyperbolic.

Experts commonly agree that were human extinction to occur, it would likely be related to "nuclear weapons and lethal synthetic biology."

www.newsweek.com

Elon Musk issues birth rate warning: "Mass extinction"

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk took to X to post about his concerns over the "mass extinction of entire nations."
www.newsweek.com www.newsweek.com
 
Brazil's top court says X paid pending fines to wrong bank

Brazil's Supreme Court said on Friday that lawyers representing social media platform X did not pay pending fines to the right bank, postponing its decision on whether to allow the tech firm to resume services in Brazil.

Earlier in the day, Elon Musk-owned X filed a fresh request to have its services restored in the country, saying it had paid all pending fines.

In Friday's decision, Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes requested the payment to be transferred to the right bank.


 
Brazil lifts ban on Musk's X after it pays $5m fine

Brazil's Supreme Court has said it is lifting a ban on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.

In his decision, Justice Alexandre de Moraes said that he authorised the "immediate return" of X's activities in the country after it paid hefty fines and blocked accounts accused of spreading misinformation.

According to a statement, the site has paid fines totalling 28 million reais ($5.1m; £3.8m) and agreed to appoint a local representative, as required by Brazilian law.

Moraes had blocked access to the platform, owned by Elon Musk, after it had refused to ban several profiles deemed by the government to be spreading misinformation about the 2022 Brazilian Presidential election.

Anatel, Brazil's telecoms watchdog, has been instructed to ensure service has resumed for more than 20 million users in the country within 24 hours.

After months of defying the court’s orders, Musk fired the company’s Brazilian staff in late August and closed X's office in Brazil.

"The decision to close X offices in Brazil was difficult," Musk, who also runs electric carmaker Tesla and rocket company SpaceX, wrote at the time.

A self-declared "free-speech absolutist", the billionaire entrepreneur had described Justice Moraes’ move to ban several dozen accounts as an abuse of power and a violation of free speech.

Several days later, Justice Moraes ordered for the entire platform to be blocked across the country.

Many users switched to alternative sites such as Bluesky, and demand for VPNs (Virtual Proxy Networks) in Brazil soared.

But in September, the platform began to comply with the court's orders in an apparent U-turn.

On Tuesday, X said that it was "proud to return to Brazil".

"Giving tens of millions of Brazilians access to our indispensable platform was paramount throughout this entire process," its government affairs team wrote in a statement.

It appears that X has now complied with all of the judge’s demands in order to have the ban lifted.

Brazil is one of the biggest markets for the platform across the globe, as well as its largest in Latin America, with an estimated 22 million users.

BBC
 
Elon Musk unveils Cybercab at Tesla robotaxi event

Tesla boss Elon Musk has unveiled the firm's long-awaited robotaxi, the Cybercab, at the Warner Bros Studios in Burbank, California.

The futuristic-looking vehicle featuring two wing-like doors and no pedals or steering wheel deposited Mr Musk in front of an audience eager to hear details about a project he considers key to Tesla's next chapter.

At the event, billed "We, Robot," the multi-billionaire reiterated his view that fully self-driving vehicles will be safer than those operated by humans and could even earn owners money by being rented out for rides.

But Mr Musk's prediction that production would begin some time "before 2027" raised questions about whether he will once again fail to meet his own deadlines.

"I tend to be optimistic with time frames," he quipped during the event.

He said the Cybercab - which would compete with rivals including Alphabet-owned Waymo - would cost less than $30,000 (£23,000).

However analysts have cast doubt on how realistic that plan is.

"It will be extremely difficult for Tesla to offer a new vehicle at that price within that timescale," said Paul Miller, from research Forrester.

"Without external subsidies, or Tesla making a loss on every vehicle, it doesn't seem plausible to launch at anything close to that price this decade," he added.

Safety concerns

Mr Musk also said he expected to see "fully autonomous unsupervised" technology available in Tesla's Model 3 and Model Y in Texas and California next year "with permission where ever regulators approve it."

But that approval is far from guaranteed.

"It is a big chunk of metal driving on roads at high speeds, so safety concerns are big," said Samitha Samaranayake, an associate professor in engineering at Cornell University.

Tesla's self-driving ambitions rely on cameras that are cheaper than radar and Lidar (light detection and ranging) sensors that are the technology backbone of many competitors' vehicles.

By teaching its cars to drive, Tesla plans to use artificial intelligence (AI) trained by the raw data it collects from its millions of vehicles.

But the research community "is not sold on whether the Tesla style of doing things can give the safety guarantees that we would like," Mr Samaranayake said.

Playing catch up

The cybercab project has undergone delays, having originally been due for release in August.

This summer, in a post on X , formerly Twitter, Mr Musk said the wait was due to design changes he felt were important.

Meanwhile, competing robotaxis are already operating on some US roads.

Tesla also seems poised to post its first ever decline in annual sales as competitors pile into the electric vehicle market, even as sales have softened.

Despite that dour backdrop, Tuesday's event was heavy on spectacle - complete with Tesla's humanoid robots dancing and serving drinks to attendees.

Mr Musk also unveiled another prototype for a "Robovan" which can ferry up to 20 passengers around at a time.

The sleek shuttle "could be a mode of transportation over the coming years that Tesla leverages," said Wedbush Securities managing director Dan Ives who attended the event in person.

"Can you imagine going down the streets and you see this coming towards you? That would be sick," Musk told attendees as Tesla's Robovan rolled into Thursday's event.

Another analyst said the event felt like a step back into memory lane while also signalling the path ahead.

"Musk did a fantastic job of painting an ideal future for transportation that promises to both free up our time and increase safety," said Jessica Caldwell, head of insights at Edmunds.

But despite the showmanship, there are doubts about whether he can deliver the vision he sketched out.

"Many questions remain about how this will be achieved from a practical standpoint," Caldwell added.

State of the robotaxi market

The deployment of robotaxis has encountered setbacks, with driverless cars operated by General Motors subsidiary Cruise being suspended in San Francisco after a pedestrian was knocked down.

But the sector continues to expand.

Waymo said in early October it would add the Hyundai Ioniq 5 to its robotaxi fleet after the vehicles undergo on-road testing with the company's technology.

Ride-hailing giant Uber also wants to add more autonomous vehicles to its fleet to expand on its delivery and ridesharing options for customers.

It announced a multi-year alliance with driverless car developer Cruise in August.

Chinese tech company Baidu is also reportedly looking to expand its robotaxi division, Apollo Go, beyond China - where the vehicles are active in several cities.

BBC
 

SpaceX rocket booster makes successful landing after test launch - as it is caught by 'chopsticks'​


A SpaceX booster rocket has returned to earth and been caught by giant robotic arms - following a successful launch of the company's Starship spacecraft.

It was the first attempt to bring the rocket's 232-foot (71 metre) Super Heavy booster back to the launch tower by re-igniting three of its 33 Raptor engines to slow its speedy descent.

After separating from the Starship at a height of 46 miles (74km), it returned to Boca Chica in Texas, seven minutes after launch, where it was grabbed and clamped in place using what are described as "chopsticks".

Arguably, they look more like metal arms, or giant pincers.

The catching of the booster was not guaranteed to go ahead. Both it and the launch tower had to be in good, stable conditions, SpaceX said.

But it settled into position in what appeared to be a calm, controlled manner.

SpaceX tweeted that "Mechazilla" had caught the "Super Heavy booster!"

"Are you kidding me?" SpaceX's Dan Huot said close to the launch site. "I am shaking right now."

"This is a day for the engineering history books," added SpaceX's Kate Tice.

SpaceX owner Elon Musk said on X, which he also owns: "The tower has caught the rocket!!"

Space journalist Kate Arkless Gray said the booster was still travelling at a supersonic speed less than a minute before landing.

"The deceleration involved in that is wild," she told Sky News.

She added: "SpaceX have really, really innovated. Even just a few years ago, the idea of bringing a booster back to land or a barge in the sea - no one was doing that."

The Starship, meanwhile, landed in the Indian Ocean, west of Australia, following its fifth test flight from a launch pad on the border with Mexico.

"Splashdown confirmed!", SpaceX said on social media.

Starship and Super Heavy are designed to carry crew and cargo to the moon and beyond - and be reusable.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approved the launch only yesterday, weeks earlier than expected.

Previously, the FAA said a decision on Starship 5 was not expected until late November.

But it said Elon Musk's company had "met all safety, environmental and other licensing requirements for the suborbital test flight".

It has also approved the Starship 6 mission profile.

Musk has heavily criticised the FAA - partly over the delay in approving the licence for Starship 5, which SpaceX said was ready in August.

SpaceX describes Starship as the world's "most powerful launch vehicle ever developed", capable of carrying up to 150 metric tonnes.

First unveiled in 2017, it has exploded several times in various stages of testing.

In June, it successfully completed a full flight for the first time.

news.sky.com

SpaceX rocket booster makes successful landing after test launch - as it is caught by 'chopsticks'

The catching of the booster was not guaranteed to go ahead. Both it and the launch tower had to be in good, stable conditions.
news.sky.com news.sky.com
 

US probing Elon Musk's Tesla over self-driving systems​


The US agency in charge of regulating road safety revealed Friday that they are probing Tesla's self-driving software systems.

The evaluation by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) covers 2.4 million Tesla vehicles across multiple models manufactured between 2016 and 2024.

NHTSA's action is the first step toward any potential recall that the agency might seek against the company, which is run by tech billionaire Elon Musk.

Tesla did not immediately reply on Friday to a BBC inquiry about the investigation.

NHTSA's preliminary evaluation follows four crash reports involving the use of Tesla's "Full Self-Driving", or FSD, software.

The agency said the crashes involved reduced roadway visibility, with fog or glares from the sun.

One of the incidents involved a Telsa fatally striking a pedestrian, and another involved someone being injured, NHTSA said.

The evaluation aims to determine if Tesla's self-driving systems can detect and appropriately respond to reduced visibility conditions. It also will examine if other self-driving crashes have happened under similar conditions.

In its notice, the agency noted that despite the label, full self-driving is actually "a partial driving automation system".

NHTSA's announcement comes one week after Mr Musk's glitzy rollout of the Cybercab at the Warner Bros. studio lot in Burbank, California.

At the event, Mr Musk said the fully autonomous robotaxi concept, which operates without pedals or a steering wheel, would be on the market by 2027.

But some analysts and investors were unimpressed.

The company's stock is down 8% since the Cybercab rollout. Shares were mostly steady after the notice from NHTSA.

Unlike Waymo, the self-driving venture operated by Google-parent Alphabet, Tesla's autonomous systems rely largely on cameras and artificial intelligence.

Mr Musk's approach costs less than deploying high-tech sensors like Lidar and radar, which are critical to Waymo's driverless car program.

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Musk's Tesla probed by US over safety of self-driving software

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's evaluation is the first step toward a potential recall of 2.4 million Tesla vehicles
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Blade Runner 2049 maker sues Musk over robotaxi images

The maker of the film Blade Runner 2049 has sued Tesla, Elon Musk and Warner Bros Discovery, alleging they used imagery from the movie without permission.

Production firm Alcon Entertainment claims it had specifically denied a request from Warner Bros to use material from the film at the launch event for Tesla's long-awaited robotaxi.

Alcon alleges that despite its refusal Tesla and the other organisers of the event on 10 October used artificial intelligence (AI) to create promotional imagery based on the film.

Tesla and Warner Bros did not immediately reply to requests for comment from BBC News.

The “financial magnitude of the misappropriation here was substantial," the lawsuit said.

"Any prudent brand considering any Tesla partnership has to take Musk’s massively amplified, highly politicised, capricious and arbitrary behaviour, which sometimes veers into hate speech, into account," it added.

Alcon also accused the event organisers of "false endorsement" by suggesting a connection between the production company and Tesla.

Warner Bros, which hosted the robotaxi launch event at one of its movie studios, was also the distributor of Blade Runner 2049 when it was released in 2017.

The highly-anticipated sequel to the 1982 cyberpunk classic Blade Runner, starred Ryan Gosling, Harrison Ford, Ana de Armas and Jared Leto, and won two Academy Awards.

Elon Musk has referred to the original film several times in the past, hinting at one point that it was a source of inspiration for Tesla's Cybertruck.

Alcon is currently producing a spinoff television series Blade Runner 2099.

Separately, the director of 2004 sci-fi film I, Robot accused Mr Musk of copying his designs for humanoid machines and self-driving vehicles.

The title of Tesla robotaxi event - We, Robot - which played on the the title of an Isaac Asimov short story collection, caught the eye of Alex Proyas.

"Hey Elon, can I have my designs back please," Mr Proyas said in a post on X which has been viewed more than eight million times.

But the claim was met with scepticism online, with some suggesting his own film is derivative.

BBC
 
Musk v Ambani: Billionaires battle over India's satellite internet

The race between two of the world’s richest men, Elon Musk and Mukesh Ambani, is intensifying as they prepare to face off in India’s satellite broadband market.

After India's government announced last week that satellite spectrum for broadband would be allocated administratively rather than through auction, this battle has only heated up.

Mr Musk had previously criticised the auction model supported by Mr Ambani.

Satellite broadband provides internet access anywhere within the satellite’s coverage.

This makes it a reliable option for remote or rural areas where traditional services like DSL - a connection that uses telephone lines to transmit data - or cable are unavailable. It also helps to bridge the hard-to-reach digital divide.

India's telecom regulator has yet to announce spectrum pricing, and commercial satellite internet services are still to begin.

However, satellite internet subscribers in India are projected to reach two million by 2025, according to credit rating agency ICRA.

The market is competitive, with around half a dozen key players, led by Mr Ambani's Reliance Jio.

Having invested billions in airwave auctions to dominate the telecom sector, Jio has now partnered with Luxembourg-based SES Astra, a leading satellite operator.

Unlike Mr Musk's Starlink, which uses low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites positioned between 160 and 1,000 km from Earth's surface for faster service, SES operates medium-Earth orbit (MEO) satellites at a much higher altitude, offering a more cost-effective system.

Receivers on the ground receive satellite signals and process it to internet data.

Mr Musk’s Starlink has 6,419 satellites in orbit and four million subscribers across 100 countries. He has been aiming to launch services in India since 2021, but regulatory hurdles have caused delays.

If his company enters India this time, it will boost Prime Minister Narendra Modi's efforts to attract foreign investment, many say.

It will also help his government's efforts to burnish its image as pro-business, countering claims that its policies favour top Indian businessmen like Mr Ambani.

While auctions have proved lucrative for it in the past, India’s government defends its decision to allocate satellite spectrum administratively this time, claiming it aligns with international norms.

Satellite spectrum is not typically allocated by auction as the costs involved could impact the financial rationale or investment in the business, says Gareth Owen, a technology analyst at Counterpoint Research. In contrast, administrative allocation would ensure spectrum is fairly distributed among "qualified" players, giving Starlink a chance to enter the race.

But Mr Ambani’s Reliance says an auction is necessary to ensure fair competition, given the lack of clear legal provisions in India on how satellite broadband services can be offered directly to people.

In letters written to the telecoms regulator earlier in October, seen by the BBC, Reliance repeatedly urged the creation of a "level playing field between satellite-based and terrestrial access services".

The firm also said that "recent advancements in satellite technologies... have significantly blurred the lines between satellite and terrestrial networks", and that "satellite-based services are no longer confined to areas unserved by terrestrial networks". One letter stated that spectrum assignment is done through auctions under India's telecom laws, with administrative allocation allowed only in cases of "public interest, government functions, or technical or economic reasons preventing auctions."

On X, Mr Musk pointed out that the spectrum “was long designated by the ITU as shared spectrum for satellites”. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU), a UN agency for digital technology, sets global regulations, and India is a member and signatory.

When Reuters news agency reported that Mukesh Ambani was lobbying the government to reconsider its position, Mr Musk responded to a post on X, saying: “I will call [Mr Ambani] and ask if it would not be too much trouble to allow Starlink to compete to provide internet services to the people of India.”

Mr Ambani's resistance to the administrative pricing method might stem from a strategic advantage, suggests Mr Owen. The tycoon could be “prepared to outbid Musk”, using an auction to potentially exclude Starlink from the Indian market, he says.

But it is not Mr Ambani alone who supported the auction route.

Sunil Mittal, chairman of Bharti Airtel, has said that companies aiming to serve urban, high-end customers should “take telecom licences and buy spectrum like everyone else”.

Mr Mittal - India's second-largest wireless operator - along with Mr Ambani, controls 80% of the country's telecom market.

Such resistance is a “defensive move aimed at raising costs for international players seen as long-term threats," says Mahesh Uppal, a telecommunications expert.

“While not immediate competition, satellite technologies are advancing quickly. Telecom companies [in India] with large terrestrial businesses fear that satellites could soon become more competitive, challenging their dominance.”

At stake, clearly, is the promise of the vast Indian market. Nearly 40% of India’s 1.4 billion people still don’t have internet access, with rural areas making up most of the cases, according to EY-Parthenon, a consulting company.

For context, China is home to almost 1.09 billion internet users, which is almost 340 million more than India’s 751 million, according to DataReportal, which tracks global online trends.

India’s internet adoption rate still lags behind the global average of 66.2% but recent studies show that the country is closing the gap.

If priced properly, satellite broadband can help bridge some of this gap, and even help in the internet-of things (IoT), a network that connects everyday objects to the internet, allowing them to talk to each other.

Pricing will be crucial in India, where mobile data is among the cheapest globally - just 12 cents per gigabyte, according to Modi.

"A price war [with Indian operators] is inevitable. Musk has deep pockets. There's no reason why he cannot offer a year of free services in [some] places to gain a foothold in the domestic market," says Prasanto K Roy, a technology analyst.

Starlink has already cut prices in Kenya and South Africa.

It may not be easy though. In a 2023 report, EY-Parthenon noted that Starlink's higher costs - almost 10 times those of major Indian broadband providers - could make it difficult to compete without government subsidies.

Many more LEO satellites - the kind Starlink operates - are needed to provide global coverage than MEO satellites, increasing launch and maintenance costs.

And some of the fears of Indian operators could be unfounded.

"Businesses will never switch completely to satellite unless there is no terrestrial option. Terrestrial networks will always be less expensive than satellite, except in thinly populated regions," says Mr Owen.

Mr Musk could have a first-mover advantage, but "satellite markets are notoriously slow to develop".

The battle between two of the world's richest men over internet of space has truly begun.



BBC
 

US warns Musk political group that $1m voter giveaway may be illegal​


A letter sent to Elon Musk's political action committee from the US Department of Justice (DOJ) warned that his lottery-style giveaway of $1m per day to a registered voter may be illegal, according to US media.

Mr Musk, who is the world's richest man, actively campaigns for Republican Donald Trump in his presidential bid against Kamala Harris.

Over the weekend, the owner of Tesla and X/Twitter began giving away prizes to American voters who signed a petition.

It's unclear when the DOJ letter was sent to Mr Musk's organisation, America PAC. DOJ investigators have declined to comment on the case.

US outlets, including CBS News, the BBC's US partner, reported on Wednesday that the letter informed Musk's team that the giveaway may violate federal election laws.

It was sent by the DOJ's Public Integrity Section following outrage from Democrats over the cash stunt.

Under US law, it is illegal to pay people to register to vote. But it remains unclear whether the sweepstakes breaks any laws.

Mr Musk's contest offers money to signatories of a petition, which the PAC circulated.

“We want to try to get over a million, maybe 2 million voters in the battleground states to sign the petition in support of the First and Second Amendment,” Mr Musk said in Pennsylvania on Saturday when he announced the event.

The contest rules state that winners must be registered to vote, but no party affiliation is required.

“We are going to be awarding $1 million (£770,000) randomly to people who have signed the petition, every day, from now until the election,” he said.

The America PAC website states the goal is getting “1 million registered voters in swing states to sign in support of the Constitution, especially freedom of speech and the right to bear arms”.

It is open to voters in seven swing states - Pennsylvania, Georgia, Nevada, Arizona, Michigan, Wisconsin and North Carolina. US election day is 5 November.

On Tuesday, a group of Republican ex-prosecutors wrote to the DOJ urging officials to investigate the contest.

"We are aware of nothing like this in modern political history," they wrote, pointing to potential federal and state law violations.

"Law enforcement agencies are appropriately reluctant to take action shortly before elections that could affect how people vote. But serious questions arising under laws that directly regulate the voting process must be an exception."

Mr Musk previously dismissed claims that the contest is illegal, saying: "You can be from any or no political party, and you don’t even have to vote."

On Sunday, the contest reframed its rules, describing the money as payment for a job, according to CNN.

America PAC said the winner will be “selected to earn $1M as a spokesperson for America PAC”. Winners have gone on to film pro-Trump videos.

Several legal experts have told the BBC that they believe the contest may be illegal.

"His offer is only open to registered voters, so I think his offer runs afoul of this provision," said Paul Schiff Berman, a law professor at the George Washington University.

He pointed to the US Code on electoral law, which states that anyone who "pays or offers to pay or accepts payment either for registration to vote or for voting" faces a potential $10,000 fine or a five-year prison sentence.

Adav Noti of the non-partisan Campaign Legal Center said Mr Musk's scheme "violates federal law and is subject to civil or criminal enforcement by the Department of Justice".

"It is illegal to give out money on the condition that recipients register as voters," Mr Noti told the BBC.

But Jeremy Paul, who teaches law at Northeastern University, said that Mr Musk may have found a legal loophole.

He said that, while there is an argument that the offer could be illegal, it is “targeted and designed to get around what’s supposed to be the law" and he believes the case would be difficult to make in court.

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US warns Elon Musk that his $1m voter giveaway may be illegal

The Department of Justice is probing whether the prizes violate laws against paying people to vote.
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Musk does not advertise Tesla Vehicles. So by staying in the News, he can get free publicity. News channels will be talking about him and invariably Tesla EV's will be mentioned.

Free advertisements in all major News outlets.
 
Philadelphia sues to halt Musk’s $1m giveaway to voters

The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office has filed a lawsuit seeking to stop a daily $1m giveaway to supporters of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign by billionaire tech mogul Elon Musk, describing it as an ” illegal lottery.”

The lawsuit filed on Monday by District Attorney Larry Krasner comes barely a week before election day in the key battleground state of Pennsylvania, which polls show could determine the outcome.


www.aljazeera.com

Philadelphia sues to halt Musk’s $1m giveaway to voters

Critics say the giveway is an illegal attempt to register voters in swing states that may determine the Nov 5 election.
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Judge declines to block Elon Musk $1 million voter giveaway as billionaire seeks to move case

A Pennsylvania state judge said on Thursday he would not immediately move forward with a lawsuit that seeks to stop Elon Musk's $1 million voter giveaway ahead of the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election.

At a hearing in Pennsylvania, Judge Angelo Foglietta said he would place the lawsuit on hold while a federal court considers whether to take up the case.

Musk's bid to move the case frees him to continue the giveaway, because the matter likely won't be resolved until after Tuesday's election.

The billionaire entrepreneur, who is spending heavily to back Republican Donald Trump, had been ordered to attend the hearing but did not appear.

Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner is seeking to halt the giveaway less than a week before the tightly contested presidential election between Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris.

Krasner, who championed progressive causes when running for district attorney, accuses Tesla (TSLA.O), opens new tab CEO Musk and his political action committee America PAC of hatching an "illegal lottery scheme to influence voters."


 
Elon Musk can keep giving $1m to voters, judge rules

Elon Musk's political group can keep awarding $1m (£722,000) to voters in swing states, a judge has ruled.

The giveaway by Mr Musk's America PAC is set to end on Tuesday, and the final recipient has already been determined, a lawyer for the billionaire said in a court hearing on Monday.

In a surprising turn, the lawyer revealed that people receiving the money have not been chosen randomly in a lottery-style contest, as many believed, but were selected by the group.

Philadelphia District Attorney Lawrence Krasner had sued to stop what he called an "an illegal lottery" after Musk announced he would give the money to one voter in a swing state each day until Election Day.

Pennsylvania Judge Angelo Foglietta did not immediately give a reason for the ruling, made a few hours after the hearing, according to the Associated Press.

“The $1m recipients are not chosen by chance,” the lawyer, Chris Gober, said during the hearing, according to the Associated Press. “We know exactly who will be announced as the $1m recipient today and tomorrow.”

Mr Gober told the court that America PAC has already determined the final recipient will be a voter from Michigan, US media reported.

On Monday, America PAC announced a man named Joshua in Arizona had been awarded the day's sum.

In a post on X, formerly Twitter, which Mr Musk owns, the group added: "Every day until Election Day, a person who signs will be selected to earn $1m as a spokesperson for America PAC."

But when the world's richest man unveiled the giveaway last month, many believed it was a random drawing for registered voters who signed a petition supporting the First and Second Amendments of the US Constitution.

“We are going to be awarding $1m randomly to people who have signed the petition, every day, from now until the election," Musk told a campaign event.

A few days later, the US justice department warned that the group could be breaking election laws, which forbid paying people to register to vote. Krasner's office sued to stop it.

Mr Musk has been aggressively campaigning for Republican White House candidate Donald Trump in swing states across the country, and his committee has been pushing hard in Pennsylvania, where polls suggest Trump is in a tie with his Democratic rival, Vice-President Kamala Harris.

A lawyer in Krasner's office told Reuters that Mr Gober's comments in court were "a complete admission of liability".

During the hearing, prosecutors played a video where Mr Musk, who is also the chief executive of SpaceX, said that "all we ask" is that the winners serve as spokespeople for the group, Reuters reported.

But Chris Young, the director of America PAC, said in court that the recipients are screened and must have values aligned with the group, US media reported.

Those who receive the money sign non-disclosure agreements that block them from publicly discussing the terms of their contracts, according to Reuters.

Mr Musk did not attend Monday's hearing.

Also on Monday, Joe Rogan released an episode of his podcast featuring a nearly three-hour interview with Mr Musk.

In a post promoting the podcast on X, he said he would be endorsing former President Donald Trump.

"He [Musk] makes what I think is the most compelling case for Trump you'll hear, and I agree with him every step of the way," Rogan wrote.

BBC
 
Elon Musk sued over $1m-a-day election giveaway

Elon Musk was sued in a proposed class action on Tuesday by registered voters who signed his petition to support the constitution for a chance to win his $1m-a-day giveaway, and now claim it was a fraud.

The complaint, filed by the Arizona resident Jacqueline McAferty in federal court, said Musk and his America Pac organization falsely induced voters to sign a petition by claiming they would choose winners by chance. In fact, members of the Pac selected the winners, the suit alleges. Musk’s own attorneys said in court that the sweepstakes’ results were not random; they disclosed that the winners were chosen to be spokespeople for the group.

“The $1m recipients are not chosen by chance,” Chris Gober, a lawyer for Musk, said during a hearing in Pennsylvania. “We know exactly who will be announced as the $1m recipient today and tomorrow.” Musk, meanwhile, said at a campaign rally that his Pac would be “awarding $1m randomly to people who have signed the petition”.

McAferty also said the defendants had profited from the giveaway by driving traffic and attention to Musk’s X social media platform, and by collecting personal information such as her name, address and phone number that they could sell. A lawyer for Musk and lawyers for McAferty did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the complaint.

McAferty sued a day after a Philadelphia judge denied a request by that city’s district attorney, Larry Krasner, to end the giveaway, which Krasner called an illegal lottery. That ruling was largely symbolic because Musk has no plans to give out more money following the US presidential election.

The world’s richest person opened the giveaway to voters in seven battleground states who signed a petition to support free speech and gun rights. Tuesday’s lawsuit seeks at least $5m in damages for everyone who signed.

Musk has supported Donald Trump in the presidential race against Kamala Harris and given upwards of $100m via America Pac.

THE GUARDIAN
 

What Musk could gain from a Trump presidency​


Donald Trump’s return to the White House might also prove to be a win for one of his most visible supporters: Elon Musk.

The world’s richest man spent election night in Florida with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort as returns came in.

“The people of America gave @realDonaldTrump a crystal clear mandate for change tonight,” Mr Musk wrote on the social media platform X as Trump’s victory began to appear all but certain.

And at his victory speech at the Palm Beach Convention Center, Trump spent several minutes praising Mr Musk and recounting the successful landing of a rocket manufactured by one of Mr Musk's companies, SpaceX.

Mr Musk threw his support behind the Republican almost immediately after the assassination attempt on Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania in July.

As one of the president-elect's most important backers, the tech billionaire donated more than $119m (£92m) to fund a Super PAC aimed at re-electing Trump.

He also spent the last weeks before election day running a get-out-the-vote effort in the battleground states, which included a daily giveaway of $1m to voters in those states. The giveaway became the subject of a legal challenge, though a judge later ruled they could go ahead.

After throwing his name, money, and platform behind Trump, Mr Musk has plenty to gain from Trump’s re-election.

The president-elect has said that in a second term, he would invite Mr Musk into his administration to eliminate government waste.

Mr Musk has referred to the potential effort as the “Department of Government Efficiency,” or DOGE, the name of a meme and cryptocurrency that he has popularised.

The businessman could also benefit from Trump's presidency through his ownership of SpaceX, which already dominates the business of sending government satellites to space.

With a close ally in the White House, Mr Musk could seek to further capitalise on those government ties.

Mr Musk has criticised rivals including Boeing for the structure of their government contracts, which he says disincentive finishing projects on budget and on time.

SpaceX has also moved into building spy satellites just as the Pentagon and American spy agencies appear poised to invest billions of dollars into them.

Mr Musk’s electric vehicle maker Tesla could meanwhile reap gains from an administration that Trump has said would be defined by “the lowest regulatory burden.”

Just last month, the US agency in charge of regulating road safety revealed it was probing Tesla’s self-driving software systems.

Mr Musk has also come under fire for allegedly seeking to block Tesla workers from unionising. The United Auto Workers filed unfair labour practice charges against both Trump and Musk after the two talked about Musk supposedly firing striking workers during a conversation on X.

Trump has also pledged to lower taxes on corporations and the wealthy.

That’s another promise Mr Musk is likely hoping he will keep.

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What Elon Musk could gain from a Trump presidency

One of the president-elect's most visible supporters, Musk could be given a role in Trump's White House.
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Musk rebuked after siding with Meloni on Italy's foreign migrant centres

It didn't take long for Elon Musk to be accused of meddling in Italy’s domestic affairs.

The tech billionaire’s declaration that “these judges need to go,” splashed across all of Italy's front pages, came amidst increasing tension between Italy’s ruling coalition and the judiciary after a panel of Rome magistrates questioned the legality of a government initiative to detain asylum-seekers in Albania.

Musk prompted a highly unusual statement from Italian President Sergio Mattarella, who told him not to interfere in Italian affairs.

"Italy is a great democratic country and... knows how to take care of itself," said Mattarella. “Anyone, particularly if, as announced, he is about to assume an important government role in a friendly and allied country, must respect its sovereignty and cannot take it upon himself to issue instructions."

Musk, who owns Tesla and X, has recently been picked by Donald Trump to head up his planned new Department of Government Efficiency.

He has also developed close ties with Giorgia Meloni since she was elected over two years ago on the promise of cracking down on illegal migration.

Two processing centres in Albania, built and managed by the Italian government to help manage the migrant flow in the Mediterranean towards Italy, soon became the symbol of her hard stance on migration.

But delays in the project, legal hurdles and human rights concerns, as well as doubts about cost-effectiveness, have undermined its success so far.

Last week a Rome court ordered the transfer of seven Egyptian and Bangladeshi asylum seekers from one of the two centres to Italy.

The court had already ruled last month against the detention of other migrants from the same countries in Albania, a decision that the Italian prime minister had labelled “prejudicial".

The two centres are currently empty, and Italian authorities are scaling back the number of staff on the ground.

Since then, the debate in Italy has become increasingly heated, with Meloni and other members of her government regularly attacking the country’s judiciary, until Musk also weighed in.

The legal controversy revolves around an October ruling by the EU's Court of Justice (ECJ), stating that no country of origin can be deemed safe if any part of it is dangerous.

This poses further challenges to Italy's policy of repatriating migrants without visas.

While the ruling referred to a Czech case, it also applies to the entire EU and complicates Italy's plans for detention centres in Albania meant to fast-track repatriations.

The Rome court has halted these actions pending further clarification from the ECJ.

The project has attracted the attention of several leaders, including UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who are themselves seeking to stem illegal migration.

During an official visit last September, Starmer praised Meloni's “remarkable progress” on tackling irregular arrivals by sea, while Meloni said her counterpart showed “great interest” in her country’s deal with Albania.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has called for the exploration of “return hubs” outside the EU. In a letter to European leaders on irregular migration, she cited the deal between Italy and Albania as a potential model.

Several observers, however, have raised concerns over the actual impact of these centres, should they ever start operating at full capacity.

“Aside from the delays in the implementation of the operation, I view the project as a distraction from more pressing issues that should be on the agenda, such as better allocation of funds and the creation of a functioning asylum system overall,” said Alberto-Horst Neidhardt, a senior policy analyst at the European Policy Centre in Brussels.

“Regardless of whether it works or not, this is just a drop in the ocean.”

Italy's incendiary political discourse shows no sign of dying down.

The judiciary here has been accused of obstructing government before.

Former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, who was charged with violation of antitrust law, money laundering, and tax fraud and faced prosecution for several other crimes over the years, repeatedly attacked judges, calling them “communist”.

Meloni's coalition partner, Matteo Salvini, echoed his words saying judges who twisted Italy's laws should resign and go into politics with the "refounded communists".

“Demonising those whose role is to ensure that the law is upheld could pose a real danger,” Neidhardt warned.

According to Italian reports, Meloni and Musk have since spoken about the controversy. Musk is said to have expressed his respect for the Italian president, a report confirmed by Andrea Stroppa, a close confidant of Musk in Italy.

Stroppa, however, added that Musk also “emphasises that freedom of speech is protected by the First Amendment and the Italian constitution itself; therefore, as a citizen, he will continue to freely express his opinions”.

BBC
 

Brazil first lady uses expletive against Elon Musk at G20 event​


Brazil's first lady has sworn at billionaire Elon Musk at an event ahead of the G20 summit in Rio de Janeiro.

While advocating for tougher social media regulation on a panel about disinformation, Janja Lula da Silva appeared to be startled by a loud noise, joking, "I think it's Elon Musk."

"I'm not afraid of you," she went on to say, then swore at the billionaire, who owns Tesla and social media platform X.

Musk, who was picked to lead the Department of Government Efficiency in incoming US President Donald Trump's administration, has a complicated relationship with Brazil and its left-wing government. X was briefly banned there this year.

He reposted a video of the incident, captioned "lol".

In another post, Musk added two laughing emojis and wrote: "They are going to lose the next election", apparently referring to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva's Workers Party.

Earlier this year, Brazil's Supreme Court ordered a nationwide ban on X, after it failed to name a legal representative in the country and suspend accounts for allegedly spreading disinformation. The ban was lifted after the platform paid a $5.1m (£3.8m) fine more than a month later.

But Musk is also an ally of Brazil's former far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, who was found guilty of discrediting the electoral system after losing in 2022. Despite the eight-year ban stopping him from running in an election, he has declared his intent to run again in the next elections, to be held in 2026.

Bolsonaro, who reposted a screenshot of the video and Musk's response, said, "We now have another diplomatic problem."

Leaders of the G20 nations will be meeting for the summit, which starts on Monday.

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Brazil first lady Janja Lula da Silva uses expletive against Elon Musk

Janja Lula da Silva joked that she was not afraid of the owner of social media platform X.
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"Go Falcon. Go GSAT-20": Elon Musk's SpaceX Successfully Launches Indian Satellite

India's most advanced communications satellite was successfully lifted off into space by Elon Musk's SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket which launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida, USA.

At the stroke of one minute past midnight on Tuesday, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)'s most sophisticated communications satellite, which will provide broadband services in remote areas and in-flight Internet in passenger aircraft, set off for its 34-minute journey into outer space on board Elon Musk-owned SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket on its 396 th flight.

"Launch successful," said Radhakrishnan Durairaj, Chairman and Managing Director of New Space India Limited, the commercial arm of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO). Mr Durairaj who monitored the flight from Cape Canaveral told NDTV, "GSAT 20 got a very precise orbit".

This is the first time that ISRO launched a satellite on a SpaceX rocket through its commercial arm New Space India Limited (NSIL). This is also the first time ISRO has built a satellite that only uses the advanced Ka band frequency - a range of radio frequencies between 27 and 40 gigahertz (GHz), which enables the satellite to have higher bandwidth.

India sought a dedicated launch and that there were no co-passenger satellites on the flight.

For the satellite launch, a standard Falcon 9 B-5 rocket, which is 70 metres long and weighs around 549 tonnes, was used during lift-off. It has been designed as a two-stage rocket - a launch vehicle in which two distinct stages provide propulsion consecutively in order to achieve orbital velocity. The rocket can lift up to 8,300 kg to the geosynchronous transfer orbit and 22,800 kilograms to the low earth orbit. The first stage was successfully recovered at about 8 minutes into the flight and it was the 371st recovery by SpaceX.

Falcon 9 is a partially reusable rocket and SpaceX asserts "this was the 19th flight for the Falcon 9 first stage booster supporting this mission. After stage separation, the first stage landed on a drone ship, which was stationed in the Atlantic Ocean."

Source: NDTV
 
Elon Musk to ‘summon MPs to US to explain threats to American citizens’

Elon Musk has said UK MPs “will be summoned to the United States of America to explain their censorship and threats to American citizens” in a fresh escalation of tensions between the world’s richest man and Labour.

Musk, who has been a fixture at the side of Donald Trump since his re-election as US president, was responding to a Guardian report on Wednesday that the Commons’ science and technology select committee would call him to give evidence in the new year in its inquiry into the spread of harmful content on social media after the August riots.

The committee’s chair, Chi Onwurah, a Labour MP, said she wanted to see how Musk, who owns the X social media platform, “reconciles his promotion of freedom of expression with his promotion of pure disinformation”.

X hosts accounts by figures including Tommy Robinson and Andrew Tate, who were accused of inciting people to join Islamophobic protests.

Musk, who has more than 205 million followers on X, responded by saying the MPs would be summoned to the US. He has previously complained that prison sentences handed down to people who stoked the riots on X are a breach of free speech rights and said: “I don’t think anyone should go to the UK when they’re releasing convicted paedophiles in order to imprison people for social media posts.”

He has labelled the British prime minister “two-tier Kier”, alleging that not all communities were equally protected by police in the UK, while Jess Philips, a government minister, has labelled X “a place of misery”.

Musk weighed in on changes to inheritance tax on farms by saying on Monday that “Britain is going full Stalin”. Peter Mandelson, who is tipped to become the next UK ambassador to Washington, then called for an end to the “feud” between Musk and the UK government, calling him “a sort of technological, industrial, commercial phenomenon” with whom the UK must build bridges.

Related: How Elon Musk became Donald Trump’s shadow vice-president

In an interview with the Guardian on Thursday, Peter Kyle, the secretary of state for science and technology, denied there was a feud and called Musk “an innovator of extraordinary proportions, the like of which our globe, our humanity, very rarely sees”.

He said he was ready to have “a frank conversation where we disagree, but also strive to find common ground”.

However, Kyle added: “The way that he has characterised British society is wrong. I would love to have a conversation with him about how, with his view of free speech, we can keep people safe. Free speech, in my view, doesn’t include the right to sow either misinformation or hatred to a degree that damages either people or communities … as happened in August and that led to arrests because that was criminal activity.”

Kyle said he was “in touch with X” and has had “many conversations with them about the nature of free speech and how it should be applied”. He also said he had “no plans to go off X, simply because I respect so much of the audience that’s there and I do want to communicate with”.

It was not immediately clear to what “threats to American citizens” Musk was referring in his call for British MPs to be summoned to Washington, but one of his US-based online followers claimed, without providing evidence, he was called by British police and threatened with charges if he did not take down certain posts during the riots.

Another follower described the MPs’ wish to call Musk to give evidence as a trap, saying: “They’ll detain him at the border, demand to see the contents of his phone, and charge him under counter-terrorism laws when he refuses.”

Asked about Musk’s response, Onwurah said: “X is one of the most relevant social media platforms to our inquiry. We want to hear from senior figures at the company so that we can gather the best evidence possible. And Mr Musk is the most senior representative of X, with strong views on misinformation as well as freedom of expression, an important subject in its own right.”

Musk has started calling himself “first buddy” in relation to the president-elect and has been given the job of reforming US government efficiency. It appears he will have considerable influence on the regulation of artificial intelligence, especially considering he owns an AI startup, xAI, which has attracted billions of dollars in investment from the Qatar sovereign wealth fund and Silicon Valley private equity giants.

THE GUARDIAN
 
Arguably the most influential man in world right now and his influence has increased multifold since his takeover of Twitter. Hess has a major influence in bringing Donald Trump back to power. I wonder what he’s up to and what his end goal is.
 

Namibia orders Starlink to cease operations over licensing issues​


Namibia’s Communications Regulatory Authority (CRAN) has issued a cease-and-desist order to Starlink, the satellite internet service operated by SpaceX, for running a telecommunications network without the necessary licence.

The order, issued on November 26, requires the company to halt all operations in the country immediately.

CRAN has also warned the public against purchasing or subscribing to Starlink services. It had been stated that such actions are illegal under Namibian law.

In addition to the directive, the regulator revealed that it has already confiscated unlicensed Starlink terminals from consumers and has opened criminal cases with the police to address the violations.

“The enforcement of national telecommunications regulations is paramount to ensuring a fair and legal operating environment,” CRAN stated, reaffirming its commitment to compliance and regulation in the sector

Source: Samaa News
 
Musk's record $56bn pay deal rejected for second time.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk's record-breaking $56bn (£47bn) pay award will not be reinstated, a judge has ruled.

The decision in the Delaware court comes after months of legal wrangling and despite it being approved by shareholders and directors in the summer.

Judge Kathaleen McCormick upheld her previous decision from January, in which she argued that board members were too heavily influenced by Mr Musk.

Reacting to the ruling, Mr Musk wrote on X: "hareholders should control company votes, not judges."

Tesla vowed to appeal the ruling, saying the decision was "wrong".

"This ruling, if not overturned, means that judges and plaintiffs’ lawyers run Delaware companies rather than their rightful owners – the shareholders," the company said in a post on X.

Judge McCormick said the pay package would have been the largest ever for the boss of a listed company.

Tesla failed to prove the pay package, which dates back to 2018, was fair, she said.

A shareholder vote on the payment passed by 75% in June, but the judge did not agree the pay should be so large despite what she called Tesla's lawyers' "creative" arguments.

“Even if a stockholder vote could have a ratifying effect, it could not do so here," she wrote in her opinion.

The judge also ruled the Tesla shareholder who brought the case against Tesla and Mr Musk should receive $345m in fees but not the $5.6bn in Tesla shares they asked for.

Some observers said a ruling in favour of Mr Musk and Tesla would have dealt a blow to conflict of interest laws in Delaware.

"The idea of conflict rules is to protect all investors" not just minority investors, said Charles Elson of the University of Delaware's Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance.

Mr Elson said Judge McCormick's opinion was well-reasoned.

"You had a board that wasn't independent, a process that was dominated by the CEO, and a package that was way out of any sort of reasonable bounds," he said. "It's quite a combo."

Mr Elson said he expects Tesla might try to reconstitute a similar pay package in Texas where the company moved its legal base earlier this year after the pay ruling.

BBC
 
Musk's record $56bn pay deal rejected for second time

Tesla chief executive Elon Musk's record-breaking $56bn (£47bn) pay award will not be reinstated, a judge has ruled.

The decision in the Delaware court comes after months of legal wrangling and despite it being approved by shareholders and directors in the summer.

Judge Kathaleen McCormick upheld her previous decision from January, in which she argued that board members were too heavily influenced by Mr Musk.

Reacting to the ruling, Mr Musk wrote on X: "Shareholders should control company votes, not judges."

Tesla vowed to appeal against the ruling, saying the decision was "wrong".

"This ruling, if not overturned, means that judges and plaintiffs’ lawyers run Delaware companies rather than their rightful owners – the shareholders," the electric car company said in a post on X.

Judge McCormick said the pay package would have been the largest ever for the boss of a listed company.

She said Tesla had failed to prove the fairness of the pay package, which dated to 2018.


www.bbc.com

Elon Musk's record $56bn Tesla pay deal rejected for second time

The judge upheld her previous decision, saying board members who set the pay were too heavily influenced by Mr Musk.
www.bbc.com www.bbc.com
 
Elon Musk shatters records: First person to cross $400 billion net worth as business and politics align

CEO of SpaceX and Tesla Elon Musk has become the first individual in history to surpass a $400 billion net worth, reaching a staggering $439.2 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. A recent insider share sale at SpaceX and the outcome of the US presidential elections played pivotal roles in this milestone.

Musk’s wealth surged by approximately $50 billion following a SpaceX share sale, which valued the privately held aerospace company at $350 billion. The deal included a $1.25 billion purchase of shares by investors and insiders, solidifying SpaceX’s status as the world’s most valuable private startup.



 
Elon Musk says Starlink inactive in India after second device seized

Elon Musk said Starlink satellite internet is inactive in India, his first comments since authorities seized two of the company's devices in recent weeks, one in an armed conflict zone and another in a drug smuggling bust.

Starlink is seeking approval in India to provide satellite broadband services and the Musk-owned company is trying to address any potential security concerns as part of the process.

Musk wrote on X late on Tuesday that "Starlink satellite beams are turned off over India" and were "never on in the first place."

He was responding to a post from the Indian Army about a search operation on Dec. 13 in Manipur state in India's northeast, where a communal conflict has raged since early last year.
The post included photos of seized weapons and a satellite dish and receiver with a Starlink logo.


 
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