Shareholders own the company. Which is why people care what they think.
I have preferences for how my neighbors manage and maintain their properties, but since I don’t actually own those properties, my preferences don’t mean a lot.
As a customer of a company, I can decide whether I’m getting my money’s worth. As a general observer I might have an opinion about whether the company makes the world a better place. So shareholders shouldn’t be the only story. But I don’t think it’s strange to focus on what the shareholders think, or for the company’s owners to decide on corporate direction.
But it's nuts - why would 'most people' who are likely Twitter 'users' and not 'shareholders' care about someone else's benefit over their own?
Twitter could very well jam up with more ads - as a sure fire way to make more money.
But not I / We are stuck with a crappier product, possibly very crappy i.e. a value transfer from our pockets, to investors.
Shareholders technically 'control' the company, they can do what they want, but what we should want them to do is 'lose money' and give the surpluses to us.
And I want world peace, people to start using their turn signals, and a pony.
We can want whatever we like. Doesn’t mean the world is going to, or even capable of delivering it.
There is value on the table, Musk is going to try to take some away, probably in a zero-sum way.
Musk could very well jam Twitter full of ads, making it sheite for us, but more money for him.
Nobody should want that but literally a single person: Elon Musk. Everyone else, who uses Twitter, should be against it.
Changing a few features here and there otherwise, will not somehow magically engender a ton more users.
So the 'low hanging fruit' for investors to 'unlock value' is really about ads.
More ads generally makes the product worse for users.
I feel this is unrealistic. What other services are good, free and ad-free? Very few. Someone has to pay for the development cost and the upkeep, and that someone will be calling the shots.
I much prefer a "democratic" system where as a customer I pay certain amount of money for using Twitter (say, 5 dollars a month) and get a vote on future changes to a system where I am a free "user / consumer" (and a product at the same time) and some shadowy entity manipulates everything it can to its own non-public purposes.
In order to turn just a little bit more civil, Twitter needs citizens, not users/consumers. And citizens usually have to pay some tax for the system to be sustainable.
The 'short answer' to the question of 'why no poison pill' is simply because the Board reached some kind of agreement with Musk.
I like Musk when he's in his lane, I don't see any good coming from this.
Everyone is nuts to talk about 'shareholders' - who cares? As a 'consumer' - I want a good service and cheap (i.e. free) with no ads. I have zero interest in 'shareholders' of a company I'm not a shareholder in, other than legal protections.
Caring about 'shareholder value' while not a shareholder, is like caring about some rich guys bank account - when often it's a zero sum game.
Every dollar in an investors pocket should be a dollar on your pocket in term of reduced price etc..
So aside from some things he may be able to do t bring the share price up ... I'm wary that much at all will actually benefit Twitter, and he could ruin it.
I don't personally care about it, but it's an important media tool - it's how a lot of information gets out.