Elon Musk is reportedly planning to build his own town in Texas, and has consulted both Grimes and Kanye West.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Musk has acquired at least 3,500 acres of land outside Austin, and is planning to construct “a sort of Texas utopia along the Colorado River, where his employees could live and work.”
Reportedly, officials at Musk’s tunneling company Boring Co. are looking to incorporate the town in Bastrop County, which is near planned SpaceX and Boring facilities, meaning the entrepreneur and CEO would be able to set some of the regulations in his town in order to expedite his plans.
Per WSJ, Musk had several meetings in 2022 with Grimes, who he shares two children with, Kanye and Kanye’s architectural designer to discuss ideas for the town. No plans, however, have seemingly come into fruition yet.
The WSJ, who spoke to local residents and officials for the story, add that plans are being kept under wraps, though Musk has sought approval from local governments and asked people to sign non-disclosure agreements.
In other Elon Musk news, he reportedly had Twitter’s algorithm altered to ensure his personal tweets would reach more users’ homepages, after a tweet about the Super Bowl – posted by current US President Joe Biden – outperformed his own.
As per The Verge, Biden tweeted on February 12 that he’d be rooting for the Philadelphia Eagles in this year’s big game, racking up close to 30million impressions. Musk also posted in support of the Eagles (who ultimately lost to the Kansas City Chiefs), but his tweet only earned around 9million views. Musk eventually deleted his tweet, reportedly as a result of its low engagement.
It’s reported that Twitter’s engineers later received an “urgent message” from James Musk (a cousin of the platform’s recently appointed billionaire CEO) which alerted them that his team would be “debugging an issue with engagement across the platform”.
In an anonymous statement given to The Verge, a current employee of Twitter said: “He bought the company, made a point of showcasing what he believed was broken and manipulated under previous management, then turns around and manipulates the platform to force engagement on all users to hear only his voice. I think we’re past the point of believing that he actually wants what’s best for everyone here.”