I Am Supposed to Believe This Man Is a Genius? | 2
发布时间 2023-05-01 15:02:00 来源
摘要
Elon Musk makes the Twitter board an offer they can’t refuse — a $44 billion offer, to be exact. But this won’t be an easy marriage. No sooner does Twitter accept than Elon starts raising doubts. Publicly, Elon can’t help taking shots at Twitter and its leaders, sending their stock into a spiral. And it’s the everyday employees of Twitter who are stuck in the blast radius. Please support us by supporting our sponsors.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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嘿，Prime会员，你可以在Amazon Music上免费收听添加广告的Flipping the Bird，Elon vs. Twitter节目。今天就下载应用程序吧。
Brett Taylor's Day was already going sideways. The chair of the Twitter board had just gotten off the phone with Twitter's CEO, Paragogra Wall. Just minutes earlier, Elon Musk had sent Paragogra series of panic-inducing texts. Elon was rejecting a seat on the board. Instead, he was going to make an offer to buy the company outright and take it private. Not even two weeks earlier, Brett and Paragog had sat down with Elon for dinner, and it seemed like everything was going smoothly. Now, Brett needed to talk to Elon. He sent off a text.
布雷特·泰勒的一天已经开始走向糟糕的方向了。Twitter董事会主席刚刚与Twitter首席执行官帕拉格拉·沃尔通了电话。就在几分钟前，埃隆·马斯克向帕拉格拉发送了一系列引发恐慌的短信。埃隆拒绝了加入董事会的提议。相反，他打算收购公司并将其私有化。就在不到两周前，布雷特和帕拉格拉与埃隆共进晚餐，一切似乎都顺利。现在，布雷特需要跟埃隆谈一谈。他发了一条短信。
Paragog just called me and mentioned your text conversation. Can you talk? Elon's reply did not leave much room for discussion. Please expect to take private offer. I saw the text thread. Do you have five minutes so I can understand the context? Fixing Twitter by chatting with Paragogra won't work. Drastig action is needed. This is Jack's opinion, too. Can you take ten minutes to talk this through with me? But Elon blew him off. I'm about to take off but can talk tomorrow.
Paragog刚刚给我打电话，提到了你们的短信对话。你现在有时间吗？埃隆的回复没有留下太多讨论的余地。请准备接受私人报价。我看到了这个短信记录。你有五分钟时间让我了解背景吗？通过与Paragogra聊天来解决Twitter的问题行不通。需要采取激进的行动。杰克也持有这样的观点。你能抽出十分钟与我谈论一下吗？但埃隆把他搪塞了。我即将起飞但可以明天再说。
The next time Brett heard from Elon was four days later, and it wasn't a text or a phone call, it was a filing with the SEC, doing exactly what he'd promised to. I'm offering to buy 100% of Twitter for $54.20 per share in cash. My offer is my best and final offer. He was offering to buy Twitter for more than $43 billion. That was considerably more than it had been worth when he started buying up shares in January. At that time, it had only been trading at around $40 a share. If this offer was real, shareholders stood to make out far better than they could have hoped for. But this sweet offer came with a threat.
下一次布雷特从埃隆那里听到消息已经过去了四天，这不是一条短信或一个电话，而是提交给证监会的文件，完全符合了他的承诺。我愿意以每股54.20美元的现金收购Twitter的100%股权。此次报价是我最好的和最后的报价。他提供的价格超过了430亿美元。这比他在一月份开始收购股票时的市值高得多。当时它只交易约40美元一股。如果这个报价是真实的，股东们将获得比他们所希望的更好的收益。但这个甜蜜的报价也伴随着威胁。
If it is not accepted, I would need to reconsider my position as a shareholder. In other words, if the board didn't say yes, he could sell off his shares. All 9.2% of his stock, flooding the market and sending Twitter stock into freefall, shareholders would be enraged at the board, and the board members themselves would see millions of dollars in wealth disappear overnight. Brett Taylor knew that Elon was backing the board into a corner with this offer.
如果这个提议没有被接受，我将需要重新考虑作为股东的立场。换句话说，如果董事会没有同意，他可以抛售他所持有的全部9.2%的股票，使Twitter的股价暴跌，股东会对董事会感到愤怒，董事会成员们自己也会看到数百万美元的财富在一夜之间消失。布雷特·泰勒知道埃隆这个提议将让董事会进退两难。
The board is in receipt of your letter, and is evaluating your proposal to determine the course of action that it believes is in the best interest of Twitter and all of its stockholders. We will be back in touch with you when we have completed that work. He gathered his forces to respond. He arranged for the Twitter board to meet and brought in high-powered lawyers from two major law firms, as well as Goldman Sachs advisors. An appeasement strategy of giving Elon a board seat hadn't worked to slow him down. Now both sides had to prepare for war.
董事会已经收到了您的信，正在评估您的提案，以确定采取哪种行动是最符合Twitter及其所有股东的利益。当我们完成此项工作时，我们会与您联系。他调集了自己的力量作出回应。他安排了Twitter董事会的会议，并邀请了两家主要律师事务所的高级律师以及高盛顾问参与。给埃隆一个董事会席位的缓和策略没有减缓他的步伐。现在，双方都必须为战争做好准备。
From Wondry, I'm David Brown, the host of BusinessWord, and this is Flipping the Bird, Elon versus Twitter. This is Episode 2. I am supposed to believe this man is a genius. I must confess I've made a mistake. I should be as small a success. But I'd like to read the least I've tried my very best I guess.
大家好，我是Wondry的主持人David Brown，欢迎收听《商业风云汇》。今天我们要谈的是《打破惯例，马斯克对决推特》的第二集。
我不得不承认，我曾经觉得这个人是个天才。但现在我意识到我是错的。我应该去追求更小的成功，但我会努力做到最好的。
From the other medicine, I'll only just be 40 years. Tell me all my steps, you know I promise to be 40 years.
从另一种药物来看，我只会活到40岁。告诉我所有的步骤，你知道我答应会活到40岁。
New York City was just waking up early on the morning of April 14th. The New York Times Business Reporter Lauren Hirsch was already hard at work. Lauren likes to get up before the sun even rises. She's a business reporter who deals in deals. She'd work for CNBC and Reuters before joining the Times. And until recently she hadn't paid much attention to Elon Musk. And then all of a sudden he kind of crashed into my life to be honest. You know I wasn't even following him on Twitter before this all happened.
在4月14日早晨，纽约市刚刚开始苏醒。《纽约时报》的商业记者劳伦·赫希已经开始工作了。劳伦喜欢在太阳升起之前起床。她是一位专注于交易的商业记者。之前她曾在CNBC和路透社工作，最近才开始关注埃隆·马斯克。突然间，他进入了我的生活，老实说。在这之前，我甚至没有关注他的推特。
Another day is earlier news broke that Elon Musk was no longer joining the Twitter board and everyone in the media was waiting to see what happened next. So we were all kind of going down this rabbit hole like did they find something? Was there some kind of big surprise lurking? Now the others shoe dropped in the form of a tweet from Elon Musk. I made an offer. He included a link to the SEC filing. Lauren clicked on it right away and couldn't believe what she was reading.
早些时候，有消息传出Elon Musk不再加入Twitter董事会，所有媒体都在等待下一步发展。我们都像掉进了兔子洞，想知道是否发现了什么？是否有一种大的惊喜正在潜伏？现在，另一个鞋落下了，是Elon Musk发的一条推文。我提出了一个提议。他附上了SEC文件的链接。劳伦立即点击了链接，不敢相信自己所看到的内容。
Elon Musk was going to buy Twitter. Everything about the offer was surprising. The fact that it came from nowhere, the fact that it had zero financing and there was no plan. We didn't know why he wanted to buy Twitter. We didn't know what he wanted to do with it. How he was going to do it. Lauren texted three letters to her editor.
埃隆·马斯克曾计划购买推特。这次收购计划的一切都让人感到意外。首先，它源自无从得知的地方，其次，其资金来源一无所知，也没有任何计划。我们不知道他想要购买推特的原因，也不知道他打算怎么处理这个平台。洛伦向编辑发送了三个字母的短信。
At first, Lauren wondered if Musk's offer was even serious. You know, Elon Musk has found it in a lot of companies. He has never bought a public company. It left her and a lot of other business reporters dumbfounded. Soon Elon would provide some answers. Sort of. The reporters after news of his offer went public, the head of Ted Chris Anderson.
一开始，劳伦怀疑马斯克的提议是否真实有效。你知道的，埃隆·马斯克已经创办了很多公司，但他从来没有收购过一家上市公司。这让她和其他很多商业记者感到不可思议。不久，马斯克就会提供一些答案。不过，这些答案似乎有些含糊不清。在他的收购提议公开后，泰德公司的负责人克里斯·安德森也开始接受记者的采访。
Welcome to Elon to the Ted Theater stage in Vancouver, British Columbia. And now arguably the biggest business of them all. Elon Musk. Elon scrolled onto the stage dressed in dark pants, a white button down shirt and a mid-length black jacket. It was giving off both tech entrepreneur chic and mad scientist vibes. Elon, welcome.
欢迎大家来到温哥华Ted剧院，欢迎大家向我们的嘉宾——可能是业界最大的商业巨头之一的埃隆·马斯克致敬。埃隆身穿黑色裤子，白色衬衫和中等长度的黑色外套，在舞台上走来走去，既散发出科技企业家的气质，又带着疯狂科学家的感觉。欢迎你，埃隆。
He shook hands with Chris and took a seat in one of the armchairs at the front of the stage. So, Elon, a few hours ago, you made an offer to buy Twitter. Why? Elon grand like the Cheshire cat. I do know. Little bird tweeted in my ear or something. I don't know. Why make that offer? Well, I think it's very important for that to be an inclusive arena for free speech.
他和克里斯握手，坐在舞台前面的一张扶手椅上。所以，埃隆，几个小时前，你提出要购买 Twitter。为什么？埃隆像猫一样露出了灿烂的微笑。我知道。好像有只小鸟在我耳边叽喳什么。我不知道。为什么要做出这个提议？嗯，我认为这非常重要，因为它需要成为言论自由的包容性场所。
Oh, yeah. So, yeah. This coming from a guy who announced he was joining Twitter's board with a meme. Twitter's next board meeting is going to be lit, featuring Elon as Joe Rogan sitting behind a microphone, exhaling a whole lot of smoke. A tweet he sent out at 4.22 in the morning. From a guy who just days earlier had tweeted, 69.420% of statistics are false, which is of course a 420 joke and a 69 joke rolled into one.
噢，对。这话是一个宣布加入Twitter董事会的家伙说的，他用一个梗来宣布这个消息。接下来的Twitter董事会会非常惊艳，因为伊隆·马斯克将像乔·罗根那样坐在麦克风后面，吐出大量的烟雾。这是他在凌晨4:22发出的推文。几天前，这个家伙还发了一条推文，说69.420%的统计数据是错误的，这当然是420笑话和69笑话的结合体。
But now, Elon was getting exescentially serious. But it's just that my strong intuitive sense is that having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilization. So there it was. Nothing more or less than the future of civilization was on the line. And all it cost was $44 billion.
但现在，埃隆变得异常认真。但我强烈的直觉是拥有公众信任和广泛包容性的公共平台对于未来文明的重要性极高。这就是问题所在。无非是文明的未来置于危机之中，而代价仅为440亿美元。
Last week when we spoke Elon, you said no way. I do not want to own Twitter. It is a recipe for misery. Everyone will blame me for everything. What on earth changed? I think everyone will still blame me for everything. But Elon goes on to explain why he is willing to take that blame and that risk.
上周我们和埃隆谈话的时候，你说“绝不可能”。我不想拥有推特，这样很容易惹上麻烦。所有人会因为种种问题指责我。到底发生了什么改变吗？我认为每个人仍然会因为各种事情指责我。但埃隆解释了为什么他愿意承担这些责任和风险。
You know, I love humanity and I think that we should fight for a good future for humanity and I think we should be optimistic about the future and fight to make that optimistic future happen. And it might be Elon Musk, it might be Cookie, but it's real.
你知道的，我热爱人类，认为我们应该为人类的美好未来奋斗，应该对未来持乐观态度，并为实现这种乐观的未来而奋斗。也许这将由伊隆·马斯克或Cookie实现，但这是真实的。
Lauren Hirsch was following every twist and turn of the deal. And for the Twitter board, they couldn't say what was driving Elon Musk, whether he was making this offer to save humanity or boost his own ego. But they knew they had a fiduciary responsibility to take the offer seriously.
Lauren Hirsch密切关注该交易的每一个转折。至于Twitter董事会，则无法确定Elon Musk出于拯救人类或提升自我利益而提出这一要约的动机。但他们知道自己有责任认真考虑该要约。
So what the board did was they hired bankers and they asked those bankers, what are we worth? Elon Musk once said buy us for $44 billion. Can we truly say no to that offer and tell our shareholders we will be worth more than $44 billion in the future and therefore it's okay if we say no.
董事会做的是聘请银行家，询问他们公司的真实价值，埃隆·马斯克曾经提出以440亿美元的价格收购我们，我们能真的拒绝这份出价，然后告诉股东我们未来的价值会超过440亿美元，因此拒绝这份出价是可以的吗？
But the board also had every reason to be wary of Elon and this too good to be true offer. The man had amassed almost 10% of their stock in secret. He then accepted and promptly rejected a seat on their board. Elon had clearly proven that he could and would do wild unexpected things. The board needed to slow him down to try and take back control of the process.
但董事会也有足够的理由对伊隆提出的看起来太好而难以置信的建议保持警惕。这位男子秘密地积累了他们近10%的股份。然后，他接受了他们的董事会职位，并迅速拒绝了。伊隆显然已经证明他可以并且会做出疯狂而意想不到的事情。董事会需要减缓他的步伐，试图重新掌控这个过程。
So they adopted what they formerly called a shareholder rights plan, more commonly known as a poison pill. A poison pill is kind of a tried and true tactic in corporate America. The way it works, you put something in place whereby after a certain number of shares are bought, all of this sudden tons of shares are created and basically that dilutes the person that just bought those shares.
因此，他们采用了以前称为股东权益计划的东西，更常被称为毒丸。毒丸是在美国企业圈里一种被认为既可靠又行之有效的策略。毒丸的运作方式是，你采取一些措施，在某种程度上购买一定数量的股份后，突然创建大量股份，基本上会稀释刚刚购买这些股份的人所拥有的股权。
The poison pill could buy the board a little time to weigh their options. But their impulsive perspective buyer wasn't about to sit around and twiddle his thumbs. Back home in Texas, Elon decided to rattle the cages of the Twitter leadership. Where else? But on Twitter.
毒丸策略可以为董事会赢得一点时间来权衡自己的选择。但是，他们冲动的潜在买家并不会闲着无聊地坐在那里等待。回到德克萨斯州，埃隆决定在Twitter上震动Twitter的领导人。还有哪里呢？当然是在Twitter上。
When a Silicon Valley personality tweeted the ownership percentage of each board member, Elon responded with a cutting observation. Wow, with Jack departing, the Twitter board collectively owns almost no shares. Objectively, their economic interests are simply not aligned with shareholders. By tweeting this out about the board, Elon was basically trying to get the average Twitter shareholder on his site.
当一位硅谷名人在推特上发布每个董事会成员的所有权比例时，埃隆回应了一个深刻的观察。哇，杰克离开后，Twitter董事会集体拥有的股份几乎为零。客观而言，他们的经济利益根本不符合股东的利益。通过在推特上发布董事会的情况，埃隆基本上试图让普通Twitter股东站在他这一边。
He followed that up with another subversive tweet. Love Me Tender. The words were surrounded by musical notemogies. Love Me Tender is of course a famous health expressly song, but it's also what is very likely a reference to a tender offer, which is effectively a hostile deal. And it means going to shareholders with your offer.
他随后又发了一条颠覆性的推文，内容是“爱我温柔地”。推文中用了音乐符号。当然，“爱我温柔地”是一首著名的健康指导歌曲，但这也很可能是指“温柔要约”，这实际上是一项不友好的交易。这意味着需要向股东提出要约。
So instead of trying to get the board to agree with you, you go to shareholders at the company and say, hey, I'm on for you 50 for 20. Don't you think this is a good deal? And you try to get enough shareholders on board to effectively owe your rule whatever decision the board might say.
因此，你可以不必试图说服董事会同意你的想法，而是直接向公司的股东提出建议，说：嘿，我可以为你们做50％的工作，只需要20％的报酬，你们认为这个交易如何？你可以试着获得足够的股东支持，从而有效地让董事会做出合乎规则的决定。
A tender offer wouldn't solve all of Elon's problems because of the poison pill the board had enacted. But he could still use the threat of it to apply pressure to the board. If he's getting support from other shareholders who are all saying to him, I'm voting in favor of this deal. It's hard for a board to justify keeping that poison pill in place. The next day on April 17th, board chair Brett Taylor sent Elon a text.
一项温柔收购不会解决埃隆公司所有问题，因为董事会实施的毒丸措施。但他仍然可以利用威胁来向董事会施加压力。如果他得到其他股东的支持，所有人都告诉他，我会支持这笔交易。对于董事会来说，很难证明保留那个毒丸措施的合理性。第二天，4月17日，董事会主席布雷特·泰勒向埃隆发送了一条短信。
I'm just checking in to reiterate that the board is seriously reviewing the proposal in your letter. We're working on a formal response as quickly as we can consistent with our fiduciary duties. Feel free to reach out any time. Elon acknowledged Brett's text by liking it, but he didn't slow down. He knew he had the upper hand that the high value he had offered for the company effectively forced the board to sell to him. He knew the bankers Twitter was talking to would eventually come back and tell them just that. And so he kept moving ahead as though he was going to get his way.
我只是想确认一下，董事会严肃地审查了你信中的建议。我们正在尽快根据我们的受托人责任做出正式回应。随时欢迎联系我们。埃隆收到了布雷特的短信，点了个赞，但他并没有放慢脚步。他知道他占了优势，他提供的高价有效地迫使董事会卖给他。他知道推特上那些银行家最终会回来告诉他们这个消息。因此，他继续前进，仿佛他将得到自己想要的东西。
Which led to the next challenge for Elon. Where was he going to get $44 billion? Yes, he was the world's richest man worth about $200 billion, but most of that was tied up in Tesla stock and other assets. He didn't have $44 billion on hand, and he had made his offer so quickly that he hadn't gotten banks or any other investors lined up yet to finance his offer either. He needed to pull $44 billion together. Fast.
接下来，埃隆面临着另一个挑战。他该从哪里获得440亿美元？是的，他是世界上最富有的人，身价约为2000亿美元，但其中大部分都被投资在特斯拉股票和其他资产上。他手上没有440亿美元，而他的出价来得如此之快，以至于他还没有找到银行或其他投资者来资助他的出价。他需要迅速筹集440亿美元。
So there were a couple of things that were going on all at the same time. The one there was Elon Musk trying to cobble together at the cash. And if you look at a lot of the texts that came out in discovery, they're putting hilarious. He reached out to Larry Ellison, the founder of the software company Oracle, and the fourth wealthiest man in the world. Any interest in participating in the Twitter deal? Yes, of course. He added a thumbs up emoji at the end. Cool. Roughly what dollar size? A billion or whatever you recommend. You have Larry Ellison just kind of tazily agreeing to put in two billion. Elon also started reaching out to people he might want to run Twitter with him, including venture capitalist Jason Callicanis. Want to be a strategic advisor to Twitter if this works out? Or a member advisor? Whatever. You have my sword. When started suggesting new CEOs, people already seemed certain that Parag was not going to be the CEO of an Elon own Twitter. Elon was growing impatient. He wanted this deal done.
当时有几件事情同时进行着。其中一件是埃隆·马斯克（Elon Musk）试图筹集资金。如果你看一下在发现中公布的大量文本，你会发现其中一些非常有趣。他联系了软件公司Oracle的创始人、世界第四富有的人拉里·埃里森（Larry Ellison），询问对参与推特（Twitter）交易的兴趣。“是的，当然。”他在最后还加了一个大拇指表情。很酷。大概需要多少钱？10亿还是你建议？你看到拉里·埃里森轻松地同意了注资20亿美元。埃隆还开始联系自己希望和他一起经营Twitter的人，包括风险投资家杰森·卡利坎尼斯（Jason Callicanis）。如果这个项目成功了，想成为Twitter的战略顾问，还是成为成员顾问？无论怎样，我的剑都在这里。当他开始建议新的CEO时，人们已经确定帕拉格（Parag）不会成为埃隆拥有的Twitter的CEO。埃隆变得不耐烦了。他想要完成这笔交易。
So as goodness' offer already was, he now offered them something the board truly could not refuse. Elon Musk said, I want this deal by tomorrow. In order to make that happen, I won't do any due diligence. Do you diligence the business equivalent of doing a home inspection before you buy a house? A $44 billion house. Looking to the company, you look kind of underneath the carpet in the cracks to find out, how does this business really work? And Elon was just going to go without that. It's effectively never done, certainly not for a $44 billion deal. The board had already come to the conclusion that Elon was overvaluing the company, and they were unlikely to get a better offer.
好心的提议已经出现了，现在他提供了一些董事会真的无法拒绝的东西。埃隆·马斯克说，我希望明天完成这笔交易。为了实现这一目标，我不会进行任何尽职调查。尽职调查相当于在购买一所房子之前做家庭检查吗？一幢价值440亿美元的房子。如果你看看公司，你会发现在缝隙里面，了解这家公司是如何运作的？埃隆却没有这样做。这实际上从来没有做过，尤其是对于一笔440亿美元的交易。董事会已经得出结论，认为埃隆对公司的估值过高，他们不太可能得到更好的报价。
And now there would be no due diligence. The board, which was already kind of planning to hand it over to Elon for $44 billion, said, sure, I guess we can do that if you really want. Four days later, the deal was done. Elon Musk would buy Twitter for nearly $44 billion. Twitter would officially change hands in six months at the end of October. Brett tweeted out the news. The Twitter board has reached an agreement with Elon Musk. Elon had won. Twitter was his.
现在已经没有尽职调查了。董事会本来已经有点计划把Twitter卖给埃隆，售价为440亿美元。他们说，如果你真的想要，我们可以这么做。四天后，交易就完成了。埃隆·马斯克将以将近440亿美元的价格购买Twitter。Twitter将在六个月后于10月底正式易主。布雷特发布了这一消息。Twitter董事会与埃隆·马斯克达成了协议。埃隆胜利了，Twitter成为了他的。
There was one Twitter user in particular who weighed in to applaud the deal. The man who sent the first tweet ever. The man who founded the company and not long ago was its CEO. Starting a thread with a link to Radiohead's song Everything in its right place, Jack Dorsi wrote, Elon is the singular solution I trust. But Jack's former employees weren't so sure. Sasha Solomon, a software engineer for Twitter, was working from home in Portland, Oregon when the news came through. Her stomach sank.
有一个推特用户特别赞赏这项协议，这个人是发出第一条推特的人、创办了公司并不久前担任过其首席执行官的杰克·多西。他通过发布一条链接到Radiohead的歌曲Everything in its right place 的推文来开始了一条线索，写道，伊隆是我信任的唯一解决方案。但是，杰克的前雇员并不这样想。推特的软件工程师莎莎·所罗门在俄勒冈州波特兰工作时得知这个消息，她的胃口沉了下去。
Sasha loved her job in no small part because she loved Twitter's culture. There were very few assholes. It was like we had an asshole filter at Twitter. So there weren't any and that was like pretty special compared to like other companies I'd worked at. Based on how Elon Musk tweeted, at least, he didn't seem like someone who would fit in with a company culture. It just seems like he really wants to be liked by people and so he'll kind of tweet anything. And some of that anything, the derogatory, transphobic, using his platform to punch down, well it made Sasha worry.
Sasha热爱自己的工作，其中一个原因是她喜欢Twitter公司的文化。那里极少有令人讨厌的人，仿佛Twitter内置了一个“渣渣过滤器”。相比她曾经工作过的其他公司，这里的情况真的很特别。然而根据埃隆•马斯克（Elon Musk）的推特内容来看，他似乎并不适应公司文化。他似乎很渴望别人喜欢他，因此会发表各种言论。其中一些言论是贬损、恶意攻击跨性别者，甚至滥用平台权利打压他人。这让Sasha感到担忧。
Was Twitter about to be run by an asshole? Sasha and other Twitter employees had been in the dark the whole time, getting details about the sale the same way as everyone else, from the news. They wanted answers. Twitter scheduled an emergency all hands meeting for the same day that the deal was announced. Meeting where Twitter employees would get to ask CEO Parag Agrawal and board chair Brett Taylor questions.
Twitter 是否即将落入一个混蛋手中？Sasha 和其它 Twitter 员工一直处于黑暗中，在销售细节方面，他们和其他人一样，通过新闻获取信息。他们想要答案。Twitter 安排了一场紧急全员会议，在宣布交易的同一天举行。在这次会议上，Twitter 员工将有机会问 CEO Parag Agrawal 和董事会主席 Brett Taylor 问题。
And the Twitter employees, they had questions all right. Parag, can you clarify if there will be layoffs or not? There are no plans for any layoffs. At this time. Right, another question for you, are any projections for a possible merger with Elon's other company, Starlink and Tesla phone AI and Twitter apps? Not sure I can speak on Elon's behalf on that.
Twitter公司员工有问题。Parag，你能否澄清是否会进行裁员？目前没有任何裁员计划。还有，你们是否正在考虑与Elon的其他公司Starlink和Tesla phone AI以及Twitter应用程序进行合并？我无法代表Elon发表评论。
There is general sentiment just looking at the Slack questions around uncertainty about what happens after the deal closes. Yeah, I think that is a fair question and there is a need uncertainty about what happens after the deal closes. But there are ways where we will learn more as time goes on. We will directly hear from Elon. I and the management team and the board members of the board will continue to spend time with Elon to learn more. And as we learn more, we'll share with you. So while there is a lot of uncertainty about what happens after the deal closes today, over time, that will decrease.
在Slack上观察到，人们普遍对交易结束后会发生什么感到不确定。我认为这是一个公正的问题，并且对交易结束后会发生什么感到不确定是有必要的。但是，随着时间的推移，我们会找到更多的方法来了解情况。我们将直接听到Elon的意见。我和管理团队以及董事会成员会继续花时间与Elon分享，我们所学到的也会分享给大家。因此，今天关于交易结束后会发生什么仍存在很多不确定性，但随着时间的推移，这种不确定性会减少。
But Brett and Parag were pretty short on answers. Turns out they didn't know a whole lot more about Musk's plans than anyone else. Parag promised that employees would get the chance to ask Elon their questions. He was arranging for Elon to come and speak to them soon. But not yet.
布雷特和帕拉格不怎么知道答案。事实证明他们对于马斯克的计划并没有比任何人多知道多少。帕拉格保证员工们有机会问马斯克问题，他正在安排马斯克很快来和他们交流。但目前还不确定。
The Dow has tumbled over 1000 points. The S&P Evan Aztec are off about 4% or more. Seems the markets are still looking for the bottom. Tesla down 12% during Tuesday's session. That's the biggest drop since September 2020. You can't even imagine it's horrific, this witness says.
道琼斯指数已下跌逾1000点。标普500指数和纳斯达克指数下跌约4%或更多。似乎市场仍在寻找底部。特斯拉在周二的交易中下跌了12%。这是自2020年9月以来的最大跌幅。这位目击者说，你甚至无法想象这是多么可怕。
Russia intensifying its assaults on Eastern Ukraine. Less than two weeks after he'd victorious sign the deal to buy Twitter, Elon discovered he might have a problem. The war in Ukraine had blown up, contributing to a tumbling stock market. Elon was worth over $200 billion on paper, but that was mostly from Tesla's stock. The more the stock value shrank, the less Elon would have in his work chest to buy Twitter. And now, it looked like Russian President Vladimir Putin might send the whole world and its economy into further chaos.
俄罗斯加强对乌克兰东部的攻击。在获得购买 Twitter 的胜利合同不到两周之后，埃隆发现他可能会遇到问题。乌克兰的战争爆发导致股市暴跌。埃隆纸上身价超过2000亿美元，但大部分来自特斯拉的股票。股价下跌得越多，埃隆在购买 Twitter 上就会有更少的工作资本。而现在，俄罗斯总统弗拉基米尔·普京可能会使整个世界和经济陷入更大的混乱中。
Putin was set to deliver a speech on May 9 that pundits everywhere said would indicate if he was ready to turn the invasion of Ukraine into the next world war. There was no clever tweet to get out of this one. Elon texted Morgan Stanley banker Michael Grimes with his concerns. Let's slow down just a few days. Putin's speech tomorrow is extremely important. It won't make sense to buy Twitter if we're headed into World War 3, just saying. Michael agreed. Understood, we'll pause for May 9, Vladimir and hope for the best there. He can take stock of where things look after that.
普京原计划在5月9日发表演讲，评论员们普遍认为这将表明他是否准备将乌克兰入侵升级为下一次世界大战。这一次没有聪明的推特可以解决。埃隆向摩根士丹利银行家迈克尔·格雷姆斯发短信表达他的担忧。让我们慢下来几天。普京明天的演讲非常重要。如果我们将迎来第三次世界大战，购买Twitter就没有意义了。米高尔同意了。明白了，我们会在5月9日停顿，希望普京那里一切顺利。他可以在那之后了解情况。
Elon was trapped. He'd legally signed a contract to purchase Twitter. He couldn't just change his mind. He'd fought ruthlessly to buy Twitter, but he'd given himself no way to back out or find a loophole. Originally, it had been Twitter's board backed into a corner until they had to accept his deal. But now with the stock market tumbling and war looming, the tables returned. Elon was the one in the corner, looking for a way out.
伊隆陷入了困境。他已经合法签订了购买 Twitter 的合同。他不能改变主意。他曾经为购买 Twitter 进行了残酷的斗争，但他没有给自己找到任何可退缩或找到漏洞的方式。最初，是 Twitter 的董事会被逼入了一个墙角，他们不得不接受他的交易。但现在，随着股市暴跌和战争的迫近，情况已经逆转了。现在，伊隆是被困在角落里正在寻找出路的那个人。
Hey, if you want to get up to speed on Elon's other business ventures, check out our business war season Tesla versus Detroit. As the electric vehicle market goes from zero to 60, old school car makers are ditching the gas and creating their own EV models. But do they have what it takes to outperform Elon Musk?
嘿，如果你想了解埃隆的其他商业 venture，请关注我们的商业战争赛季，特斯拉 vs底特律。随着电动汽车市场从零加速到60，老派汽车制造商放弃汽油，创建自己的电动汽车模型。但他们是否有能力超越埃隆·马斯克呢？
Elon was wrapped tightly in a spider's web. Only this was one that he had spun himself. He personally crafted a deal that waved due diligence, meaning that even if he found something objectionable with Twitter, he couldn't just walk away. Of course, he knew this. But he probably figured with enough bluster and a credible complaint, he just might wiggle out of this trap. So he accused Twitter of harboring too many spam accounts and bots. And then went public with this possible deal breaker.
埃隆被一个蜘蛛网紧紧包裹着。但这个蜘蛛网是他自己编织的。他亲自谋划了一份豁免尽职调查的交易，意味着即使他发现Twitter有什么不可接受的地方，他也不能就此放弃。当然，他知道这一点。但他可能认为只要够有决心并且有可信的投诉，他就能从这个陷阱中挣脱出来。于是他指责Twitter收容了太多的垃圾账户和机器人，然后公开表达了这个可能摧毁交易的问题。
Twitter deal temporarily on hold, pending details supporting calculation that spam fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of users. Like, what does that mean? Can he legally do that? Where is this coming from? Lauren Hirsch had been covering the Elon Twitter deal for the New York Times in this tweet of his raised a lot of questions.
Twitter暂停了交易，等待支持计算的细节，以证明垃圾邮件和虚假账户确实不到用户总数的5％。这意味着什么？他能合法地这样做吗？这是从哪里得来的？劳伦·赫什（Lauren Hirsch）在推特上涉及伊隆·马斯克（Elon）的交易，引发了很多问题。
You can't break off a deal. Be a tweet. This tweet landed like a bomb in the business world. Twitter's stock plunged 25% in pre-market trading. Lauren and other reporters were pretty sure Elon was trying to plant the seeds to reneg.
你不能毁约。这条推文就像一枚炸弹在商业界引起了轰动。Twitter的股价在盘前交易中暴跌了25%。劳伦和其他记者相信埃隆正在试图借此种下毁约的种子。
He was kind of raising this question as to whether or not the existence of bots on Twitter made it less valuable. And so you could kind of see the pieces he was looking to put in play, which was Bill the case to see if he could walk away from the deal. No one could tell if Elon really just wanted out of the deal, or if he was using this as a way to reopen negotiations to lower the price. Or if it was just a passing thought he'd shared while he was on the toilet, a place he'd once said he composed many of his tweets.
他提出了一个问题，即Twitter上存在机器人是否会降低其价值。你可以看到他想要发挥的部分，其中一个是将案件提交给比尔，看他能否退出交易。没有人知道埃隆是否真的想退出交易，还是使用这个机会重新开启谈判，降低价格。或者这只是他在厕所上分享的一时冲动，一个他曾经说过很多推特是在那里写出来的地方。
To make things even more awkward, Elon had a pre-plan meeting that morning with Twitter executives. He tweeted again, presumably to reassure the faltering market and his concern lawyers to clarify that he was still committed to the deal. Twitter stock rebounded. But the roller coaster was just getting started. Elon kept needling Twitter.
更让事情尴尬的是，埃隆当天早上与推特高管有预定会议。他再次发推文，可能是为了向动摇的市场和担忧的律师们保证，他仍然致力于这项交易。推特股票反弹了。但过山车刚刚开始。埃隆继续挑衅推特。
He accused Twitter of having lacked spam detection and tried to go the SEC into investigating Twitter's legal disclosures. He suggested he would unilaterally reverse the ban on former President Trump. He claimed with no evidence that up to 90% of Twitter users might be fake. It was like Elon couldn't stop slashing the tires of a car he was about to drive off the lot.
他指责Twitter缺乏垃圾信息检测，并试图让证券交易委员会调查Twitter的法律披露。他建议他会单方面撤销前总统特朗普的禁令。他没有证据地声称，Twitter用户中可能有高达90%是虚假的。就像埃隆不能停止削减他即将离开经销商的车轮。
Employees inside Twitter didn't know what to make of it all. And they had yet to hear a word directly from Elon. Finally, on June 16th, they thought they were going to get some answers. Elon was scheduled to hold on all hands meeting with Twitter's employees.
Twitter内部的员工对此一切都感到茫然，而且他们还没有直接听到过埃隆的话。最后，在6月16日，他们认为他们将得到一些答案。埃隆计划与Twitter的员工进行一次全体会议。
We were like, okay, it's finally happy. Nia were using only her first name to protect her identity. Had joined Twitter just a year and a half earlier. She worked remotely from South Carolina in ad sales. And even though she'd had reservations about getting a job in tech, she'd come to love Twitter.
我们觉得很开心，因为Nia只使用了自己的名字来保护身份。她只在一年半之前加入了Twitter。她从南卡罗来纳州远程工作，在广告销售方面工作。尽管她曾对在科技行业找工作有所顾虑，但她已经爱上了Twitter。
I had never worked at a place where everyone genuinely liked each other. Working at Twitter, you see the way some of your co-workers tweet and you see how they show up online, offline at work. And you're able to kind of unclench a little bit. You're able to just relax your shoulders. It felt like a culture where, for me, as a black woman, I didn't feel like I had to coat switch. I didn't feel like I had to hide who I was or not show up as my full self.
我从来没有在一个每个人都真心喜欢彼此的地方工作过。在Twitter工作，你会看到一些同事发布的推文，以及他们在工作场所在线下展示的方式。你能够放松一点，放松你的肩膀。对我来说，这感觉像是一种文化，作为一个黑人女性，我不觉得我需要切换角色。我不觉得我需要隐藏自己，或者不是以完整的自我出现。
But the recent drama and lack of answers had been making her nervous. She wondered what exactly was going to happen to her company and her job. So she was excited to finally be having this meeting. We were like, okay, it's finally happening. We'll get to hear from him. Get to understand, you know, why this man wants to buy a Twitter. What his plans are for Twitter to make it better to improve the app.
但最近的争议和缺少答案让她感到紧张。她想知道她的公司和工作到底会发生什么。所以她很兴奋终于有这个会议了。我们都在想，好了，终于要发表言论了。我们将能从他那里听到，知道这个人为什么想要购买Twitter。他是如何计划让Twitter变得更好，改进这个应用的。
I a sat in front of her computer. A livestream of the meeting it started. But Elon wasn't there. She and thousands of other employees just sat and waited. And waited. We had a 45 minute window. And I think we started 10 minutes late. Finally, Elon arrived. He was on his phone in what looked like a kitchen. Leslie Berlin moderated. She was Twitter's chief marketing officer.
我坐在她的电脑前，直播会议已经开始了，但埃隆没有出现。她和成千上万的员工只能坐着等待，等待。我们有45分钟的时间，但似乎晚了10分钟才开始。最终，埃隆到了，他在一个看起来像是厨房的地方用手机通话。莱斯利·柏林担任主持人，她是推特的首席营销官。
I love Twitter. In fact, I literally have tweeted. I love Twitter. You have. So say more. Why do you love Twitter and also why did you and do you want to buy Twitter? I learned a lot from what I read on Twitter and what I see in the pictures, videos, text and memes that people create. I also find it's a great way to get a message out of it. If I want to say something, make an announcement. I think Twitter is the best way to do that.
我喜欢Twitter。实际上，我经常在Twitter上发推。我非常热爱Twitter，你也是。所以请多说一些。为什么你喜欢Twitter，为什么你想要买下Twitter？我从Twitter上读到的东西，以及人们创造的图片、视频、文字和表情包，我学到了很多。我也觉得这是一个很好的传达信息的方式。如果我想说些什么，做个公告。我认为Twitter是最好的方式。
This was the most predictable question in the world. And Elon's answer was rambling and unfocused. He just kind of keeps going on and on about how he utilizes Twitter and how he's seen others use it. Some people use their hair to express themselves. I use Twitter. Nia had one eye on the internal Twitter Slack channel where employees were not holding back.
这是世界上最容易预测的问题。埃隆的回答很散漫且不集中。他只是有点继续谈论如何利用Twitter和他见过其他人如何使用它。有些人用他们的头发来表达自己，我用Twitter。Nia的一只眼睛盯着内部Twitter Slack频道，员工们不再掩饰。
Everyone in Slack in the all-hands chat is saying, Leslie, please tell him to move to the next question. Leslie, it's been 10 minutes. Leslie do something. Someone jump in. But Elon made it hard for Leslie to get control of the conversation. He dodged direct questions on the topic's employees really wanted answers on, like remote work and layoffs. Instead, he droned on about the nature of trust.
在整个会议聊天中，Slack中的每个人都在说，莱斯利，请告诉他换下一个问题。莱斯利，已经10分钟了，你得有所行动。有人请跳进来。但是伊隆让莱斯利难以掌控谈话。他回避了员工真正想要回答的话题，例如远程工作和裁员。相反，他继续多说了一些关于信任的本质的话题。
I don't trust it. Is that trust? A misguided purchase he made. I bought this thing on the YouTube ad and it doesn't work. His dream number of Twitter users. So I think you really want to have at least a billion people on Twitter, maybe more, as many people as you're not sure. At one point, he even brought up aliens. I mean, he applied for things going when we come from, can we travel to other star systems and see if there are any alien civilizations that there might be a whole bunch of long.
我不信任这个。这还叫信任吗？他曾经做过一个错误购买。我通过YouTube广告购买了这个东西，但它不工作。他梦想有超多的Twitter用户。所以我认为你真的希望至少在Twitter上拥有十亿人，甚至更多，就像你不确定的人一样。他甚至提到了外星人。我的意思是，他就像是在谈论我们来自哪里、我们能否前往其他恒星系并查看是否有任何外星文明那样。可能存在一大群外星人文明。
I do remember people just being like, what the f***? What is going on? What is the point of this? You could feel the morale just drop. You could feel it get lower and lower. And I just remember thinking, but why him? As a woman and then like as a woman of color, you always question why you are in that room and then you get in the room and you hear those people talk and you realize those people aren't that smart. They just had the advantage of having wealth and having people that could give them access and resources that you aren't able to get. That was the moment where I was just like, I am supposed to believe that I was going to believe this man as a genius. She posted that exact question in the Slack channel. It was a sarcastic question, but the emotions behind it were deep. Nia loved working at Twitter, loved the culture of the place, but she felt betrayed by the top level executives and the board.
我记得当时一些人会说：到底怎么回事？这是干嘛呢？怎么就是这么才干平平的人了呢？工作气氛明显下降，情绪越来越低落。我不禁想问：为什么是他？作为一个女性，特别是一个有色女性，你总会怀疑自己为什么能够进入这个房间，而当你听到他们说话时，你会发现他们并不是那么聪明的人，他们只是拥有财富和可以为他们提供资源的人比你更多一些。那一刻，我不禁问自己：我该相信这个人是个天才吗？她在Slack频道里发了这个问题，是一种讽刺的问题，但背后的情感却是深挚的。Nia喜欢在推特工作，喜欢这里的文化，但她感到了高层管理人员和董事会的背叛。
We would ask Perog why he, why did you guys move along with this in a matter of weeks when we were told this could take up to months? Again, we were told a million times as fiduciary duty, we have a duty to our shareholders. And I just remember thinking, so this outweighs the humanity of it. Less than a month later, the Twitter board would possibly be asking themselves the same question. We start getting phone calls and texts from sources being like, so Elon just walked into the building and he's carrying a sink.
我们会问Perog，为什么你们在几周内就进行了这一行动，而当时我们被告知这可能需要数月时间？再次强调，我们被告知数百万次，作为信托责任，我们有责任对股东负责。我记得当时在想，这个责任是否超过了人道主义关怀。不到一个月后，Twitter的董事会可能也会问自己同样的问题。我们开始接到电话和信息，有人说，埃隆刚刚走进建筑物，拎着一个水槽。
That's on the next episode of Flipping the Bird. Hey Prime members, you can listen to episodes of Flipping the Bird, Elon vs Twitter, head free on Amazon Music, download the Amazon Music app today, or you can listen ad free with Wondery Plus in Apple Podcasts. Before you go, tell us about yourself by completing a short survey at Wondery.com-survey.
这将在《Flipping the Bird》下一期节目中讲述。嘿，Prime的会员们，你可以在Amazon Music上免费收听《Flipping the Bird》、《Elon vs Twitter》等一系列节目，下载Amazon Music应用程序，或在苹果播客中使用Wondery Plus，免费收听。在离开之前，请通过Wondery.com-survey参加短暂的调查，告诉我们有关你的信息。
From Wondery, this is episode two of six, Flipping the Bird, Elon vs Twitter. I'm your host David Brown, Austin Racklis wrote this story. Our producers are Nica Sing and Dave Schilling. Julia Lowry Henderson and Karen Low are our senior producers. Reporting by Emily Corwin, production assistants by Emily Locke and Mariah Dennis, fact checking by Noelle Anjani. Consultant is Kurt Wagner, Bloomberg journalist and author of an upcoming book about Twitter and Elon Musk. Sound Design by Kyle Randall. Music supervisor is Scott Velasquez for Friesson Sink. Senior managing producer is Latha Pontja, managing producer is Olivia Weber, coordinating producer is Heather Baloga. Executive producers are Jenny Lauer Beckman, George Lavender, Marshall Louis and Jen Sargent for Wondery.
来自Wondery的第二集六集系列《Flipping the Bird，Elon vs Twitter》。我是主持人David Brown，本集由Austin Racklis撰写。我们的制片人是Nica Sing和Dave Schilling。Julia Lowry Henderson和Karen Low是我们的高级制片人。Emily Corwin报道，Emily Locke和Mariah Dennis担任制作助手，Noelle Anjani进行事实核查。顾问是Kurt Wagner，彭博新闻记者，即将出版一本关于Twitter和Elon Musk的书。由Kyle Randall进行声音设计。Friesson Sink的音乐监制是Scott Velasquez。高级执行制片人是Latha Pontja，执行制片人是Olivia Weber，协调制片人是Heather Baloga。Wondery的执行制片人是Jenny Lauer Beckman，George Lavender，Marshall Louis和Jen Sargent。
We're about to hear a preview of business wars, Tesla vs Detroit, while you're listening follow business wars wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, prime members, you can listen ad-free on Amazon Music, download the Amazon Music app today.
我们即将听到《商业战争：特斯拉 vs 底特律》的预览，在您听的同时，请在任何您能获取播客的地方关注商业战争。嘿，Prime会员，您可以在Amazon Music上无广告听取，今天下载Amazon Music应用程序。
In the 1990s, the government leaned on automakers to make low emission vehicles. Ford, Chrysler, Honda, General Motors, Nissan and Toyota all introduced electric vehicles. But what they delivered and what consumers wanted were two different things. Motors wanted an electric car with the feel, look and roar of gas-guzzling trucks and SUVs. But the sharply scaled back odd-looking offerings left consumers cold. So Detroit came to an inevitable conclusion. Why build cars that people won't buy when what they're already making is so profitable?
在1990年代，政府向汽车制造商施压生产低排放的车辆。福特、克莱斯勒、本田、通用汽车、日产和丰田都推出了电动汽车。但他们生产的电动汽车与消费者想要的完全不同。制造商希望生产一辆具有热气腾腾的卡车和SUV的感觉、外观和声音的电动汽车。但是这些外形奇怪的电动车却让消费者冷若冰霜。所以底特律不得不做出一个必然的决定。为什么要制造人们不会购买的汽车，当他们已经在生产极具盈利性的商品时呢？
In 2002, Elon Musk's Tesla Motors arrived on the scene to challenge that premise, with environmentally friendly, affordable, high-performance cars that people actually want. Motors' city smirked as Musk piloted Tesla through crushing financial crises, spectacular quality control disasters, and his own shocking public displays of bad behavior. But eventually, he got some things right. And in the process, Musk didn't just disrupt the industry. He redefined it. So much so, that virtually every carmaker is trying to wedge to the front of the EV pack. But before all this comes to pass, before Elon Musk is even on the scene, there are just two engineering nerds noodling with the idea of improving electric vehicles.
2002年，埃隆·马斯克的特斯拉汽车挑战了这个前提，生产出环保、价格实惠、性能出众的汽车，受到人们的青睐。特斯拉汽车公司在金融危机、产品质量控制灾难和马斯克本人的公开行为失态中闯出自己的一席之地，让他的竞争者垂涎三尺。但最终，他做对了一些事情。在这个过程中，马斯克不仅仅是颠覆了这个行业，他重新定义了它。事实上，几乎每家汽车制造商都在试图领先进入电动汽车市场。但在马斯克出现之前，在这一切发生之前，只有两个工程迷在琢磨着提高电动汽车的想法。
This is Episode 1. Accelerate. Faster. Hey, Prime members, don't forget you can listen to business wars at Free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app today.
这是第一集《加速》。更快地前进。嘿，Prime会员们，别忘了你们可以在Amazon Music上免费收听商业之战。立即下载Amazon Music应用程序。