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Comment by jfoster | Hacker News Reader

I haven't seen the filing, but I presume you mean that X filed saying that they own the accounts, right?

I don't get why people conflate Elon Musk with the companies that he runs. I imagine he has controlling stakes in all of them, but for the most part he's probably not even a majority shareholder in most of the companies he's running.

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You bring up a fair point. In my mind, Musk has taken so much control over X that it's more of a direct relationship than Tesla or SpaceX would be.

For this filing, IIRC It was reported that Musk instructed X to step in on Jone's request for help. That feels different to me than GM shutting down a project. It feels politically motivated by Musk's personal beliefs then a decision being made on the company's behalf for the benefit of the company.

But I do accept the criticism that it was X that filed, not Musk and I mis-spoke in my original comment

X does have a vested interested in ensuring its usernames and accounts do not legally become alienable property that can be auctioned in a bankruptcy auction. They don’t technically allow accounts or usernames to be sold at all (or follows, engagement and so forth), although I’m sure this happens quite often under the radar.

X can and has taken any username they want away from a user for any or no reason.

Filing a brief in a bankruptcy auction that “this property is ours, not the debtor’s, and may not be auctioned or also” is an obvious way for them to publicly assert their rights and ownership.

Even the other companies basically just do his bidding. Remember when he 'shared' engineers around between different companies?

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/10/31/elon-musk-has-pulled-more-th...

These are not places you want to invest in if you think there are any sorts of checks and balances on him.

Because X is purely a platform to do whatever Elon wants. It’s so blatantly obvious that this decision came from Musk even if it was delivered indirectly.

Isn't that how all companies operate? For instance, GM reconsidering Cruise is clearly from Mary Barra, but the decision is overall a GM decision. Saying "Mary Barra is shutting down Cruise" would just seem childish.

Privately held companies, yes. Not all.

All of Musk's companies are run in accordance with his whims, so there isn't a meaningful distinction between them.

musk is the majority shareholder at X and posts obsessively

I don't think the full ownership structure is publicly known, but feel free to link me to it if I'm wrong. Capital other than his did come in as part of the acquisition; there's almost 100 shareholders.

https://www.rcfp.org/x-investors-unsealed/

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