Tesla famously doesn't have a PR department. Instead, Musk is the company's Chief PR Officer, as well as CEO. His main communication tool is Twitter, which he uses to make all his announcements related to Tesla, SpaceX, and his other companies.
Since 2009, Musk has tweeted over 16,000 times and accumulated over 68 million followers. Many of his tweets have been normal, others have been funny. Once in a while, however, Musk tweets something downright bizarre that confuses people, annoys them, or hurts his own interests.
Let us check out his most bizarre tweets of 2021.
1. Free Speech Advocate?
Musk created some Twitter chaos in January when he cryptically tweeted "Legalize comedy" and then failed to offer any context. Was he standing up against the cancel culture that many comedians complain about? Was he criticizing Twitter for deleting Donald Trump's account and limiting his right to freedom of speech?
Nobody truly knows because Musk moved on without explaining himself.
2. To Russia With Love
Musk used Twitter to invite Russian President Vladimir Putin to join him for a discussion on Clubhouse, the invite-only audio chat app. In a follow-up tweet written in Russian, Musk added "It would be a great honor to talk to you." As usual, Musk did not offer any clues on what he wanted to talk to Putin about, leaving the internet to speculate.
The Kremlin actually responded warmly to Musk, saying that "It's undoubtedly a very interesting offer." Unfortunately, Musk did not follow up on their response. It appears as if he ghosted them, leaving an exasperated Kremlin rep to say, "Most likely, this matter is exhausted."
3. Tone Deaf
Musk posted a seemingly insensitive tweet in February, when the pandemic was nearing its first anniversary. It seemed to make fun of people in hospital at a time when thousands of people actually were inpatients due to COVID, with many of them dying. Musk caught a bit of flak for this one.
4. A University That's NSFW?
Musk posted a tweet teasing the idea of setting up a university called Texas Institute of Technology and Science. Unfortunately, the acronym for the proposed school had many people calling Musk out for immaturity and sexism.
Musk wasn't fazed though. In follow-up tweets, he said his university would be universally admired and "Tuition is in Dogecoin & u get a discount if u have a dog". Someone tried to get Musk to reorganize the names so that S for science comes before T for technology, but Musk responded "Nope, T is def first".
5. Porcelain Throne Tweets
Musk revealed that he's written at least half of his tweets while sitting on the toilet. A not very amused Neil deGrasse Tyson responded, "That comes to more than 8,000 tweets over 12.5 years. If you do the math, it means you poop twice a day. Did you really want to tell people that?"
6. Bye Bye Mars, Hello Kim Kardashian
Musk has previously said that he expects to be the CEO of Tesla for several years. So he raised a few eyebrows on Twitter when he posted about quitting all his jobs and becoming a full-time influencer. As usual, he did not elaborate or follow up, so we must assume that the bizarre tweet was not serious.
However, his shareholders were probably not amused.
7. Inviting Trouble
Tesla created a limited edition Cybertruck-inspired whistle called the Cyberwhistle. Promoting the item, Musk told followers to blow the whistle on Tesla, just after a federal court in California had ordered the company to pay almost $137 million in damages. The payment was to a black former employee who said he had endured racial abuse while working at the company.
It was clearly another tongue-in-cheek tweet but, again, his shareholders were probably not pleased.
8. Sell! Sell! Sell!
Musk tweeted a poll in November about selling his Tesla shares:
This particular tweet caused the value of Tesla stock to fall by billions of dollars, and may just be the most expensive tweet in history. However, Musk didn't care. He had a lot of fun interacting with his followers over the issue.
Musk Won't Stop Tweeting
Elon Musk will likely continue to shock and entertain us all with his bizarre tweets throughout 2022. His fans will continue to relish them. His shareholders? Not so much. However, the shareholders will probably grit their teeth and bear it.
After all, Musk has created a lot of wealth for them and is irreplaceable.