Twitter vs. Musk -- who is lying in battle over social media company's future?

SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk no longer wants to buy Twitter. He claims the company is not telling the truth about its business

By Liz Peek | Fox News

Elon Musk wants out of his deal to buy Twitter. The world’s richest man claims that Twitter’s management is in "material breach" of various provisions in the purchase agreement and that the company has made "false and misleading representations" about its business. Management denies Musk’s complaints.

埃隆·马斯克希望从收购推特的交易中解脱出来。这位世界首富声称，推特的管理层“严重违反”了收购协议中的多项条款，该公司对其业务做出了“虚假和误导性陈述”。推特管理层否认了马斯克的投诉。

want out of：v. 想要不再属于……

material breach：重大违约；实质违约

Provision n. 提供，供应；准备，预备；（尤指为旅行准备的）食物，必需品（provisions）；条款，规定；赡养，供养；（机构账户上为已知负债，尤指坏账或资产价值缩减，从利润中留出的）准备金；<史>神职委任（尤指教皇对尚未缺额神职的预先委任）v.为……提供所需物品（尤指食物）；（为已知债务）留出准备金

Musk wants to know how many active daily users on Twitter are actually "bots" – or fake accounts. He says management refuses to turn over information that could accurately determine the number. Since 90% of the firm’s revenues come from advertising, the information is critical to advertisers, and to valuing the company.

马斯克想知道推特上每天有多少活跃用户实际上是机器人—或假账户。他说，管理层拒绝提供能够准确确定数字的信息。由于该公司90%的收入来自广告，这些信息对广告商至关重要，对公司的估值也至关重要。

bot /bɒt/ n. (计) 网上机器人；自动程序；机器人程式

Management says only 5% of its ADU (average daily users) are spam, and claims it kicks one million bots off the site each day; as recently as May, CEO Parag Agrawal claimed the number of fake accounts ejected was half a million. The lack of consistency is not reassuring.

管理层表示，只有5%的ADU(平均每日用户)是垃圾邮件，并声称他们每天将100万个机器人踢出网站；就在今年5月，该公司首席执行官帕拉格·阿格拉瓦尔还声称，被删除的虚假账户数量为50万个。缺乏一致性并不令人放心。

Spam n. /spæm/ 1.（斯帕姆）午餐肉。2.滥发的电邮；垃圾电邮

consistency /kənˈsɪstənsi/ n. 1.一致性；连贯性•She has played with great consistency all season. 她整个赛季表现相当稳定。2.黏稠度；密实度；平滑度；坚实度 •Beat the ingredients together to a creamy consistency. 把配料搅拌成乳脂状。

reassuring /ˌriːəˈʃʊərɪŋ/ /‑ˈʃɔːr‑/ adj. 令人感到宽慰的；令人放心 • a reassuring smile 使人信心倍增的微笑

Who is telling the truth? My bet is on Musk.

After all, who has more to lose? If Twitter’s management is found to have fudged its numbers, heads will roll and the stock will collapse. If Musk’s charges turns out to be a phony excuse to bow out of an overpriced deal, the billionaire’s reputation will take a hit, for sure. But the brilliant Tesla and SpaceX founder is already considered erratic; few will be surprised by his about-face. Yes, there is that pesky billion-dollar fee that either side may owe for torching the transaction; Musk can afford it.

毕竟，谁的损失更大？如果推特管理层被发现篡改数据，将会有人被炒鱿鱼，股价也会暴跌。如果马斯克的指控被证明是退出一笔定价过高交易的虚假借口，这位亿万富翁的声誉肯定会受到打击。但这位才华横溢的特斯拉和SpaceX创始人已经被认为是不稳定的；很少有人会对他的转变感到惊讶。是的，烧毁交易的任何一方都可能要支付令人讨厌的10亿美元费用；马斯克负担得起。

fudge /fʌdʒ/ ~ (on) 含糊其辞；回避 •I asked how long he was staying, but he fudged the answer. 我问他要待多久，但他含糊其辞。

a phony excuse ：不实的借口

bow out 退出

take a hit：遭受打击

erratic /ɪˈrætɪk/ 1.不规则的; 不稳定的• Argentina's erratic inflation rate threatens to upset the plans.

阿根廷动荡不定的通货膨胀率有打乱这些计划的危险。

about-face 彻底改变 • Few observers believe the president will do an about-face and start spending more. 没有几个观察家认为总统将做出彻底改变并开始增加支出。

pesky adj. /ˈpeski/ 恼人的；讨厌的 • pesky insects 讨厌的昆虫

Make no mistake. When, on April 25, Elon Musk agreed to pay $44 billion for a social media company even in the midst of a giant sell-off of tech stocks, it was a risky bet. The $54.20 per share offer constituted a hefty 38% premium over the stock price prior to Musk divulging his significant ownership position – too much in hindsight. Nonetheless, Musk had a vision and was willing to roll the dice.

毫无疑问。4月25日，埃隆·马斯克同意以440亿美元收购一家社交媒体公司，当时科技股正遭遇大规模抛售，这是一个高风险的押注。每股54.20美元的出价比马斯克透露他的重要所有权之前的股价溢出了38%—这在事后看来太过了。尽管如此，马斯克还是有远见，愿意孤注一掷。

divulge /daɪˈvʌldʒ/ 泄露 • Officials refuse to divulge details of the negotiations. 官员们拒绝透露谈判的细节。

hindsight /ˈhaɪndsaɪt/ n. 事后聪明；事后的领悟 • It's easy to criticize with the benefit of hindsight . 事后明白了再评价，这自然容易。

roll the dice：掷骰子，引申为孤注一掷

Our country will be divided over the merits of Musk’s claims. Liberals will judge Musk to be welching on a reckless and overpriced bid for the social media giant. Conservatives will believe Musk. After all, they have distrusted the social media firm for years, for good reason.

我们国家会对马斯克的说法的是非曲直产生分歧。自由派人士会认为，马斯克对这家社交媒体巨头的收购是不计后果的、定价过高的。保守派会相信马斯克。毕竟，多年来，他们一直有充分的理由不信任这家社交媒体公司。

welsh v. /welʃ/ ( also welch ) [ V] ~ (on sb/sth) 说话不算数；赖账；耍赖皮 • ‘I'm not in the habit of welshing on deals,’ said Don. 唐说：“我做生意没有说话不算数的习惯。”

reckless adj. /ˈrekləs/ 鲁莽的；不计后果的；无所顾忌的

Ultimately, the dispute will probably be hashed out in court. But there is a lot on the line – not just for Musk and for Twitter shareholders, but also for the millions of Americans hopeful that Musk would indeed create, as he pledged to do, a "virtual town square" where all voices would be welcome. A promise that terrifies liberals accustomed to shutting down divergent views – "misinformation" -- on climate change or COVID-19, for instance.

最终，这一争端可能会在法庭上得到解决。但这牵涉到很多事情——不仅仅是马斯克和推特的股东，还有数百万美国人，他们希望马斯克真的像他承诺的那样，创造一个“虚拟城市广场”，在那里所有的声音都将受到欢迎。这一承诺吓坏了那些习惯于封锁不同观点的自由派人士，比如关于气候变化或新冠病毒的“错误信息”。

hash out 消除，经过长时间讨论解决一个问题

on the line：处于危险中；模棱两可

Musk’s disdain for the censorship imposed by social media companies, and in particular by Twitter, has earned him the wrath of the Left. It has also earned him the admiration of those incensed by the political bias evident on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

马斯克对社交媒体公司(尤其是推特)实施的审查制度的蔑视，让他招致了左派的愤怒。这也为他赢得了那些被推特、脸书和油管上明显的政治偏见激怒的人的钦佩。

Wrath /rɒθ/ n. 盛怒；震怒；怒火

Incense /ˈɪnsens/ 激怒；使大怒

Unfortunately for Twitter, there is plenty of evidence to suggest that, contrary to claims made by former CEO Jack Dorsey and other members of management, the company operates with a profound left-wing bias. In 2018, in prepared remarks for Congress, Dorsey claimed, "Twitter does not use political ideology to make any decisions, whether related to ranking content on our service or how we enforce our rules."

不幸的是，有大量证据表明，与前首席执行官杰克•多尔西和其他管理层成员的说法相反，该公司的运营存在严重的左翼偏见。2018年，多尔西在为国会准备的发言中声称，“推特没有使用政治意识形态来做任何决定，无论是我们服务上的内容排名，还是我们如何实施我们的规则。”

And yet, there was Twitter, in the weeks leading up to the 2020 election, refusing to allow the New York Post to tweet materials found on Hunter Biden’s laptop that appeared to compromise candidate Joe Biden. Not only did they suppress information about Joe Biden’s involvement in his son’s controversial business transactions, they also banned the Post, a leading newspaper.

然而，在2020年大选前的几周，推特拒绝《纽约邮报》在该平台上发布亨特·拜登笔记本电脑上的内容材料，该材料似乎有损候选人乔·拜登利益。他们不仅压制了乔·拜登参与其子有争议的商业交易的信息，还封杀了主流报纸《华盛顿邮报》的推特。

In the aftermath of Musk’s deal to buy Twitter, suspicions about "shadow-banning" and giving preferences to voices on the Left appeared confirmed. Numerous conservatives found their follower count suddenly increase…substantially.

在马斯克收购推特的交易之后，有关“影子禁令”和给予左翼声音优先权的怀疑似乎得到了证实。许多保守派发现他们的粉丝数量突然大幅增加。

aftermath /ˈɑːftəmæθ/ /‑mɑːθ/ n. （战争、事故、不快的事情的）后果，创伤 • A lot of rebuilding took place in the aftermath of the war. 战后进行了大量的重建工作。

Donald Trump Jr, for instance, acquired more than 100,000 new followers in just a few days; Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis also saw an overnight jump in his numbers, as did others. It appeared that whatever tools Twitter used to minimize the presence of right-wing opinion had suddenly been lifted, maybe by a management trying to hide those practices from the new boss.

例如，小唐纳德·特朗普在短短几天内就获得了10万多名新粉丝；佛罗里达州州长罗恩·德桑蒂斯的支持率也在一夜之间飙升，其他人也是如此。推特用来将右翼观点最小化的工具似乎突然被取消了，可能是管理层试图向新老板隐瞒这些做法。

Musk’s lawyers state in a filing that Twitter has not divulged how they audit the spam accounts, what kinds of samples are used and how they determine the suspension of bots. Musk has requested the information on daily active users that is provided to Twitter’s board; the company has not divulged it.

马斯克的律师在一份文件中表示，推特尚未透露他们如何审计垃圾邮件账户，使用了什么类型的样本，以及他们如何决定暂停机器人。马斯克要求公司提供一份向推特董事会提供每日活跃用户的信息；该公司尚未给马斯克透露这一消息。

In addition, Musk has pressed for board materials, "including a working, bottoms-up financial model for 2022, a budget for 2022, an updated draft plan or budget, and a working copy of Goldman Sachs’ valuation model underlying its fairness opinion. Twitter has provided only a pdf copy of Goldman Sachs’ final Board presentation."

此外，马斯克还缺少董事会材料，“包括2022年的有效自下而上的财务模型、2022年的预算、更新的计划或预算草案，以及高盛在其公平意见基础上的估值模型的工作副本。”推特只提供了高盛最终董事会报告的pdf副本。”

If Twitter has misstated its audience by undercounting bots and is covering that up, Musk has an excellent rationale for exiting his purchase agreement. The company is going to have to become more transparent; its refusal to do so – arguing that some of the necessary information is private -- does not inspire confidence.

如果推特少估计了机器人的数量，并掩盖了这一点，那么马斯克有一个很好的理由退出他的收购协议。公司将不得不变得更加透明，若它以这些必要信息是私人性质的理由拒绝这样做并不能激发用户对它的信心。

This battle is far from over. It is possible that Musk will attempt to negotiate a lower price for Twitter. If management is not being truthful about the number of real people active on its site, it will likely embrace another go at a deal.

这场战斗还远未结束。马斯克可能会试图为推特谈判一个更低的价格。如果管理层对其网站上活跃的真实人数不诚实，它可能会接受另一笔交易。

Either way, the millions hoping for an open and honest social media platform may have to wait a while longer.

无论如何，数百万希望有一个开放、诚实的社交媒体平台的人可能需要再等一段时间。

That’s a shame. With our country bitterly polarized and trust in media at a record low, a neutral town square is critical.

这是一个耻辱。我们的国家两极分化严重并且对媒体的信任度创历史新低，一个中立的虚拟社交城市广场至关重要。

英语链接：
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/twitter-musk-lying-battle-social-media-company-future