Elon Musk now has over 100 million Twitter followers

Illustration by Kristen Radtke / The Verge; Getty Images

Musk is the sixth user on the platform to have a nine-digit follower count. Between June 26th and June 27th, Musk gained over 150k followers. Musk now has over 100 million followers.

It is interesting to hit the milestone. The fact that Musk is in the process of buying a major social media network puts him in the unique position of being the only leader of a major social media network who is good at using their social media network. Mark Zuckerberg has a feed of press releases on his Facebook page, while Adam Mosseri has a similar presence on his platform.

Musk is not the same as other beasts. This is how my colleague Elizabeth Lopatto described his social media persona.

Musk is a Poster for sure. Annoying, obnoxious, late to memes — but definitely a Poster. He uses Twitter as intended: as a direct line to his id. Has he planned to follow up on any of the stuff he tweets? Frequently, no. And that is what makes him so entertaining… Musk engages in name-calling, sometimes so intensely that he winds up with defamation lawsuits on his hands… Shit, one time Musk announced he was taking Tesla private on Twitter, generally to the surprise of Tesla, Tesla’s investors, and the SEC.

It is amazing how different Musk's usage is from the other accounts. Barack Obama's account posts frequent updates, but they're every bit as considered and presidential as you'd expect, while the collective brain of a professionally trained comms team can only come from the accounts of the likes of Britney Spears, Taylor Swift, and Selena Gomez. I believe that his account is managed by the man himself, but he hasn't posted in over a month.

The question of how many of Musk's accounts are real and how many are fake is an interesting one. If the company doesn't provide more proof for its numbers, Musk will walk away from the deal.

There are still questions about whether Musk is actually concerned about the misuse of the micro-messaging service or if he is just using them as a pretext to negotiate a lower price for buying the company. The data was given to Musk in response to his claims. According to The Wall Street Journal, there are doubts that anyone could make meaningful conclusions from such a large amount of information.

pic.twitter.com/YhpHKcCYXz

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 21, 2022

After not posting for almost a week, Musk has reached 100 million followers. The last post that wasn't a reply to someone else was on June 21st, and it showed the price of gas at 7-Eleven. According to Snopes, the image is actually from March 2021 and shows test pricing to promote the opening of a new store rather than being a reflection of soaring gas prices in the future.

Musk posted about his love of cheese.