Musk’s ‘Bird Is Freed,’ Twitter Pledge Gets Cool Reception In EU, Where ‘The Bird Will Fly By Our Rules’

Elon Musk's Twitter profile on a smartphone placed on printed Twitter logos on April 28, 2022. Dado Ruvic/Illustration/Reuters

The European Commission has warned Tesla CEO Elon Musk that he must comply with EU rules after the billionaire acquired the social media platform, Twitter.

“In Europe, the bird will fly by our rules,” Thierry Breton, the EU Commissioner for the Internal Market, wrote on Twitter on Friday morning, just hours after Musk posted that the “bird has been freed,” in reference to Twitter’s iconic logo.

Musk’s completion of the deal came just hours before a Delaware judge’s deadline to finalize the move on Friday following months of legal back-and-forth between the Tesla CEO and Twitter executives. The deal was set to go to trial if the two sides hasn’t reached an agreement by then.

The platform will be delisted from the New York Stock Exchange starting on Oct. 28, according to a recent delisting notice.

Back in May, Musk and Breton met to discuss key issues, including the Digital Services Act (DSA), an EU regulation aimed at stemming the spread of illegal content and disinformation online while simultaneously making advertising more transparent.

In a video posted on Twitter of the meeting, Musk said the DSA was “exactly aligned with my thinking” and that he and Breton were “very much of the same mind.”

“Anything my companies can do that will be beneficial to Europe, we want to do that,” Musk said.

‘I Did It to Try to Help Humanity’

There has yet to be an official announcement of Musk’s takeover of Twitter but the businessman shared a video of himself on Wednesday walking into Twitter headquarters while carrying a sink, tweeting, “let that sink in.”

He has also changed his Twitter bio to read: “Chief Twit: with a location tag stating ”Twitter HQ.”

Late on Thursday, Musk wrote a post addressed to Twitter advertisers in which he explained his reasoning behind the purchase of the platform, stating that it is “important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner, without resorting to violence.”

“There is currently great danger that social media will splinter into far right wing and far left wing echo chambers that generate more hate and divide our society,” Musk wrote. “That is why I bought Twitter. I didn’t do it because it would be easy. I didn’t do it to make more money. I did it to try to help humanity, whom I love.”

However, the businessman cautioned that the social media platform “obviously cannot become a free-for-all hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences.”

“In addition to adhering to the laws of the land, our platform must be warm and welcoming to all, where you can choose your desired experience according to your preferences, just as you can choose, for example, to see movies or play video games ranging from all ages to mature,” Musk said.

Elsewhere, multiple reports state that Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal and CFO Ned Segal are no longer working in their roles, although neither has yet to make official statements regarding the matter.

Andrew Moran contributed to this report.