Silence is golden ...

 

Tim Cook and Elon Musk. Photos: Getty Images

Silence is golden ... in this case, Cook not responding to a troll remark by Musk. As stated before in BRT, respect for Musk's prowess as an engineer goes unquestioned but his inability to control himself regarding tweets is marginal at best. He made a huge mistake in buying Twitter as his knowledge space in tech outside his sphere of competency is most telling as he lurches from crisis to crisis in trying to wring profit out of a gossip machine lacking in any real significant tech of any consequence.

This week, Elon Musk turned his attention away from reviewing code just long enough to pick a fight with, of all companies, Apple. Musk, it appears, recently discovered that his plans to turn Twitter into a subscription business is at the mercy of both Apple's App Store commission and its app review process.

Not only that, but Musk says Apple is threatening to boot Twitter from the iOS App Store, without giving him a reason. It's not clear whether that's true--Musk wouldn't answer follow-up questions on Twitter. But if it is true, it seems likely that Apple has flagged the Twitter app during app review because it is worried that Twitter's content moderation policies are lacking.

My colleague Bill Murphy Jr. has a great rundown of the tweets (and the problem with the way Musk is picking this particular fight). The part I want to focus on is what Tim Cook did in response, because it's a valuable lesson in dealing with a troll.

What did Cook do? Nothing. He didn't respond at all. He didn't tweet anything. He didn't quote tweet Musk or reply--even when Musk specifically tagged Cook in a tweet. At least, not in the 36 hours since Musk mentioned Cook. I mean, 36 hours was a long time in Twitter time even before Musk took over. Now, it's almost an eternity. 

As Dirty Harry once said, One must know one's limitations.