Elon Musk has deleted Facebook pages of Tesla and SpaceX’s after being challenged by some of his followers on Twitter. One of the guys specifically replied, “Delete SpaceX page if you are the man?”. Musk replied that he didn’t realize there was one. The pages of both SpaceX and Tesla are now deactivated (It takes 14 days for Facebook pages to get permanently removed). Both pages were verified Facebook pages and each of them had around 2.6 Million Followers.
I didn’t realize there was one. Will do.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 23, 2018
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Why Did Musk Remove Tesla and SpaceX’s Facebook page?
On March 21st, Brian Acton (WhatsApp Co-founder) tweeted out “It is time. #deletefacebook”. The tweet went viral with around 13.5K likes and 30K retweets on Twitter. Many people responded positively to his hashtag delete facebook campaign but musk annoyingly replied: “What’s Facebook?”.
What’s Facebook?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 23, 2018
After the reply, one of his followers asked him to delete SpaceX facebook page to which he replied he didn’t realize there was one and he’ll delete it. When he was asked if he’d delete the Tesla page as well, Musk replied: “Definitely. Looks lame anyway.”
Definitely. Looks lame anyway.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 23, 2018
It didn’t stop there, Martina Pennisi asked if musk will delete the Instagram account as well (Instagram is a Facebook-owned company). But Strangely, Musk replied: “it’s probably ok imo, so long as it stays fairly independent”.
Instagram’s probably ok imo, so long as it stays fairly independent. I don’t use FB & never have, so don’t think I’m some kind of martyr or my companies are taking a huge blow. Also, we don’t advertise or pay for endorsements, so … don’t care.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 23, 2018
It’s clear that musk was never impressed by Zuckerberg’s company and his ideas. Remember, last year when Zuck said that Musk over-hypes the potential dangers of artificial intelligence. To which Musk responded by tweeting that Zuckerberg’s “understanding of the subject is limited.”
But, Why #deletefacebook?
The hashtag gained popularity after Facebook upset users by mishandling their data, which ended up in the hands of Cambridge Analytica, a data firm which had tied with President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign. It is accused of accessing 50 million Facebook user’s information without their knowledge.
Mark Zuckerberg apologized for the issue via a Facebook post and a CNN Interview
How will it affect Facebook?
It’s not a first time when Facebook is being accused of mishandling user data. The social media giant is known for such behavior. This time many big companies are protesting against the Facebook in some way. It is clear that Facebook isn’t going to get away with this so easily.
