Elon Musk teases his own social media site X.com amid Twitter rivalry

Elon Musk is known for his frequent cryptic Twitter posts that force his fans to scratch their heads. He has done it again; this time, the Tesla CEO hinted at building a new social media platform amid a bitter legal battle with Twitter. This isn't the first time Musk has teased something similar. In early March, a fan asked Musk if he would consider creating a social networking site with an open algorithm, to which he replied, "seriously thinking about it." A few weeks later, he proposed to buy Twitter for $44 billion, which he has now backed down on.

But just a few days ago (Aug 10), another fan (@teslaownersSV) asked Musk, "Have you thought about creating your own social platform? If [the] Twitter deal doesn't come through?" The billionaire gave a one-word answer, "X.com." He did not provide further details about the website or what he meant by sharing the link.

The X.com domain was associated with a financial service, which eventually merged with PayPal. Musk reacquired the domain name from PayPal in 2017. Currently, the website is in use, and visitors will only see the letter 'x' in the top left.

The same day, Musk responded to another fan's tweets, announcing his plans to buy back his sold Tesla shares once the legal battle with Twitter is over. The fan asked him if he had finished selling his Tesla shares. He responded by saying, "Yes. In the (hopefully unlikely) event that Twitter forces this deal to close *and* some equity partners don't come through, it is important to avoid an emergency sale of Tesla stock."

Twitter has sued Elon Musk for backing out of a deal to buy the platform for $44 billion. He countersued the company for unknown reasons, as the matter is confidential in court. The billionaire turned down the deal, alleging foul play by Twitter. He claims that Twitter did not disclose the precise figures about bots and spam profiles on the platform. Twitter maintains that bot profiles make up just 5 per cent.