[FrenchAmerican]

1/ Political power: allowing Trump back or not give him a huge leverage. On Democrats, on Trump, on Republicans still loyal to the Constitution (therefore anti-Trump). That decision will be more influential in the 2024 election than any of Putin's pro-Trump propaganda in the last two elections.

2/ God's eye on one of the main place of discussions on Earth. He could basically monitor the evolution of the opinions in many countries. It's an huge intelligence hedge on an infinity of subjects.

3/ Being in position to say whatever he wants without risking being banned like Trump. He'll still have to respect the law, but he doesn't care paying millions in fines in a worst case scenario (except if the SEC considers it a market manipulation).

4/ Decide what is free speech and what is not. Here again, he and Twitter can be sued. But a court decision often takes time. Furthermore, Musk will use his top lawyers to make his decision to allow speech A and forbid speech B. The same for ads.

[jfengel]

Has Musk ever gotten in trouble with Twitter?

He certainly gets in trouble with the SEC for what he says on Twitter, but buying Twitter won't fix that.

Perhaps he's been self-censoring, though it seems unlikely to me. I can't imagine what he feels he can't say without getting banned, but is nonetheless legal. He doesn't seem to think all that much before he opens his virtual mouth and inserts his virtual foot.

[FrenchAmerican]

I don't know, really. You may be right but he's smart and very familiar with Twitter practices so despite the apparent no self-restraint, maybe he knows how to stay on the edge?

So I guess we'll see if the tone of his tweets changes when he's really in possession of Twitter. We'll know then for sure.