SBF fumbles in his first Twitter interview, while Elon Musk and Ye drama ensues
Twitter has proven to be quite interesting in the last couple of days. Two of the most talked about people in recent times found new ways of getting themselves ridiculed and laughed at in equal measure.
On one end, former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried was a guest on a Twitter Space hosted by Mario Nawfal, founder and CEO of consulting firm IBC Group. On the other end, narcissistic rapper-turned-business-mogul Kanye West, or Ye, as he’s known nowadays, got himself kicked off the popular social media platform, again.
SBF chucked after investigators showing
Bankman-Fried, better known as SBF, came into the public limelight in an interview that he described as “the polite thing to do” following the collapse of FTX. The hosts threw many questions in the interview, but he failed to answer conclusively. It might be because of the unstructured manner they were put to him, or maybe he was omitting details for reasons best known to him. Regardless of his motives, the interview looked like something out of a TV drama because Sam’s answers were full of self-incrimination.
SBF stood up for himself with what seemed like rehearsed lines and affirmed several times that he screwed up and was responsible as the CEO. However, he reiterated that he didn’t ever try to defraud the FTX investors.
“I’m telling the truth“
Additionally, the repentant businessman didn’t deny anything that happened.
“Look, I screwed up. I was the CEO of FTX, that means I was responsible,” he said. “We messed up big time.”
Bankman-Fried played the “remorseful” card so often during the interview, apologizing no less than ten times in the period he was on air. The Ex-CEO was asked to answer several questions on the collapse of the now-defunct crypto exchange. A few people believe that his answers could be potentially used against him in court.
Before filing for bankruptcy, the former CEO, through his Twitter account, had sent reassuring tweets to his customers, telling them that everything was under control and they didn’t have to worry about anything.
Asked whether he had been lying in that thread of tweets, Sam Bankman-Fried responded by saying:
“I don’t know of times when I lied. I was truthful as I am and knowledgeable to be.”
I donated to both political parties
As people try to understand what happened to Sam Bankman-Fried and all the money under the FTX project, many people deduce that all this may have happened due to his political donations. During the last election cycle, Sam Bankman-Fried made the largest donation to the Democratic Party. This is per the data compiled by Open Secrets.
“I wasn’t viewing it as a partisan exercise. It was not, you know, this was not looking at donating to one party to beat the other one in the general elections here.” Sam Bankman-Fried clarified.
He was recklessly overconfident
Many FTX customers and regular Twitter users listening to the interview weren’t impressed. Jesse Powell, via his official Twitter account, thought Sam Bankman-Fried didn’t care and was actually gambling with his client’s money.
Powell refused to be convinced by the responses given by Sam Bankman-Fried concerning the collapse of FTX.
“You are a pro-F1 driver. You take your race car off the track and drive it at 200mph through a farmers market in a residential neighbourhood killing 20 people. Is “I wasn’t paying attention to the signs, speed limit, the RISKS.” exonerating? No, as a pro, you should even be more culpable”, read one of his tweets
Another Twitter user, Alan Rosca, said, “SBF’S body language looks awful. Interesting to think how a jury of his peers would see his truthfulness.”
In another incident, a letter, written by an FTX customer who had lost $2 million after the collapse of the crypto exchange, was presented to Sam Bankman-Fried. The letter prompted an apology from Bankman-Fried who responded by saying that he was sincerely sorry for the horrible occurrence.
Meanwhile, Elon and Ye’s bareKnuckle fight unfolds
On Friday, Elon Musk was forced to suspend Ye’s account, citing a breach of rules. The new Twitter owner indicated that Ye had made an inciting post that went contrary to the rules of the platform. The infamous entertainer received the suspension after posting an image of a swastika entwined with a Star of David.
The Star of David denotes Judaism and Jewish traditions, while the swastika is an ancient symbol that was coopted by Hitler’s Nazi party, which is responsible for the murder of more than 6 million Jews.
Ye subsequently deleted the image from his account, but that did not stop Twitter from locking it a few hours later after receiving numerous complaints. Ye’s image was so offensive, even Elon Musk, revered for his laissez-faire attitude towards expression on the microblogging website, admitted the rapper had gone too far.
Ye prone to incitement
These new controversies come only weeks after the gifted music maker had his Twitter restored following suspension after yet another infringement.
Prior to posting the swastika image, Ye had posted a photo apparently body-shaming Musk and William Morris CEO Ari Emmanuel. Musk was however quick to confirm that Ye’s suspension was the result of “incitement to violence,” caused by the swastika image, rather than the unflattering photo of Musk and Emanuel.
In a tweet, the Tesla CEO said:
“Just clarifying that his account is being suspended for incitement to violence, not an unflattering pic of me being hosed by Ari. Frankly, I found those pics helpful as motivation to lose weight.”
Contrary to the explanation by Elon, Kanye posted screenshots where he alleges having a chat with Musk showing Musk saying the rapper had gone too far with the post.
Restoring of accounts
After his Twitter takeover, Elon Musk reinstated most accounts of controversial people. Some of the people reinstated were Ye, Donald Trump, The Babylon Bee, Jordan Peterson, and many others.
The decision to reinstate the suspended accounts made by Elon was geared towards making twitter open and friendly, but the rules and regulations continued to apply. Twitter is the biggest platform used for cryptocurrency, and its robustness in the social structure is essential to the growth of crypto.
