On Friday, X, formerly known as Twitter, erected their new logo on
the roof of their San Francisco Market Street headquarters, and
it enraged local residents.
Luckily, the sign's existence was, in fact, short lived, we'll get to the sign's
fate in just a moment, but first, let's give you the backstory.
So according to videos posted on the site, the X headquarters, by the way, formerly
known as Twitter, which I think I'm probably gonna keep calling it Twitter.
But nonetheless, apparently faces an apartment building, and the residents
were not too happy about it because of the fact that that sign was blinking and
was insanely bright.
So Christopher Beale, who lives across from the headquarters and
posted this video to Twitter, said this it's hard to describe how
bright it made this intersection, but it's way up off the street.
And it was still just like a flash of lightning going off, we came home and
tried to watch a movie, and
it was flashing through this window so bright, and even with the shades down.
It was so distracting that we had to leave the room and
go to the side of the apartment that doesn't face their building.
So residents who live near the headquarters say that they received
absolutely no warning or notice about the flashing light installation from Twitter.
And resident Patricia Wallinga told CBS News the following I thought
it was lightning, and I was very confused, I went to my window, I looked around,
I didn't see anything.
I thought it was maybe a police siren, this building,
it's largely rent controlled, there are a lot of seniors who live there, I'm sure,
I'm absolutely sure that this is a danger, especially to them.
So what does she mean when she says danger?
Well, for some people who suffer from epilepsy, flashing bright lights like
that could trigger an epileptic episode, so she was concerned about that.
And the city has officially opened a complaint and
launched an investigation into this.
Twitter did not have the proper permits to erect that, so and
there were other issues, including the fact that some evidence
provided seems to show that the sign was being weighed down by sandbags.
Which doesn't seem very secure, so the city was concerned about that as just
look, the sense of entitlement irritates me the most when it comes to Elon Musk.
Like, he's above the law, he's above anything,
he doesn't have to follow the rules, he gets to do what he wants, and part of me
thinks that he does this specifically to garner more and more attention.
I don't think he believes that there's such thing as bad publicity,
but I'm curious what, you think.
>> The thing that I find most refreshing about this, Anna,
is that even though Elon Musk is this gazillionaire
basically living above us, mere plebes here on the ground.
He too has had his brain completely rotted out by Twitter.
>> [LAUGH]. >> The guy is obsessed with attention
online, he's so obviously addicted to his own product, and
I think a lot of his decisions are based on the attention that he gets,
both negative and good.
Cuz he does have a very loyal sort of stand cultist following on the internet,
and I think it's driven some of these awful, awful decisions, right?
And I think, you know, Elon tends to drive a lot of people on the left a bit crazy,
and I think to the extent that I think is a little bit, like, too much, honestly.
And it's okay to say that the guy started a successful car company,
he's making rocket ships that go out of space when they're not failing.
Honestly.
[LAUGH].
Look, we can say the car company is a success.
>> Sure. >> Speaker 2: There's no two ways about
it, the charging system that they developed has now
become universalized because a bunch of companies have tried and failed.
And everybody accepted that what Tesla developed is the best way to go,
they just struck that deal like he's got some legitimate accomplishments.
>> Speaker 1: Who invited this guy on the show to go through a list of Elon Musk's
accomplishments?
Okay, this is an anti-Elon Musk program, sir.
>> Speaker 2: I'm anti Elon-Musk as well.
>> Speaker 1: You're fair, you're being fair, and you're right.
>> Speaker 2: He's accomplished some legitimate things, it's just the internet
has turned him into a kook, it's crazy, it's happening right before our eyes,
like, this guy is so obsessed with the response that he gets online.
A lot of his behaviors, specifically his behaviors in his management of Twitter,
which he overpaid for because he thought it was more important than it was.
>> [LAUGH].
>> It's because Twitter has rotted his brain man, it's so
funny to watch in real time.
>> Speaker 1: It's sad to watch, but I think there's something to what you're
saying, if I spend any time on Twitter, let's say I spend 30 minutes on Twitter,
on any given day, I will feel less emotionally stable on that day.
>> Speaker 1: Yeah. >> There's something about Twitter,
I don't know what it is, it's just this place for toxicity and anger.
>> Yeah. >> And rage, and it gives you a very
skewed view of humanity, so I totally see some credibility to what you're saying.
Now, Twitter also signed a lease for
that building back in 2011 that specifically banned rooftop and
exterior signs, aside from the blade sign that said Twitter.
And so that sign also caused problems when workers tried to remove it last Monday.
Removal was done without a permit because, of course, Elon Musk above the law.
A crane posed a hazard to traffic and pedestrians,
because who cares about people in the community, right?
Screw them, and the notice of violation also said that the at
symbol was dangling and could harm pedestrians if it had fallen.
>> Speaker 1: Yeah.
>> Now, representatives of Shorenstein, which owns the property with Morgan Chase,
didn't respond to a request for comment last week.
X's lease states that it needs permission from its landlord to
modify its original @twitter sign.
And the landlords also sued X back in January over allegations
of millions of dollars in unpaid rent at the headquarters.
And it's also not clear what penalties Twitter could potentially be subjected
to for just going forward with doing what they wanted to do with the sign,
even without the permit.
But jokes aside, Musk was making jokes aside,
it seems like the city of San Francisco won this round because this morning,
they decided to take the sign down.
So if you take a look at this tweet, you'll notice that the sign is no more,
it's the final tweet, there we go.
>> Speaker 1: [LAUGH]. >> They took it down.
But congratulations, Elon, we talked about you, you got the attention you so
desperately crave.
>> Speaker 2: God, this is just a great story and
I'm glad that they got this sorted out and nobody got hurt, and I'm like,
yeah, his landlord is absolutely not gonna come down against him.
If you own commercial real estate and the way people are not even going into offices
anymore, the idea that you're gonna bully your tenant, it's not gonna happen.
[LAUGH] >> Speaker 1: True, very true, so
maybe he just knows he's above the law, we'll see.
And besides, I mean, if he's willing to overpay to the tune of $20 billion to
purchase Twitter, I mean, would any fine really bother him?
It's a drop in the bucket for this guy, so of course he's gonna do it,
it's publicity, he loves it, he can't get enough of it.
And who cares about the local community and
how they might have been harmed by what he did?