How ‘free speech absolutist’ Elon Musk would transform Twitter

It turns out he wasn’t in “goblin mode” after all. Last week Elon Musk, in his characteristically antic manner, tweeted a series of suggestions for improving Twitter after he was revealed to have become its largest individual shareholder. They ranged from asking if the site’s HQ should be turned into a homeless shelter to whether advertising should be removed from the platform’s premium service.

Many of these tweets were subsequently deleted, including one sharing a meme depicting the attorney Saul Goodman from the series Breaking Bad with the words: “In all fairness your honor, my client was in ‘goblin mode.’”

Whether Musk was being mischievous or not at the time – it’s hard to tell with the world’s richest person – we have to take those tweets very seriously now that he has offered $43bn (£33bn) to buy the microblogging site.