Tech entrepreneur Elon Musk mentioned, “I simply formally purchased Amazon.”
A rumor claiming tech entrepreneur Elon Musk mentioned he purchased Amazon — the retail, media and expertise firm based by fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos — circulated on-line in late 2024. In accordance with social media posts and YouTube movies, Musk supposedly mentioned, “I simply formally purchased Amazon.”
For instance, on Nov. 15, 2024, a supervisor of the Elon Musk Rewind YouTube channel — a long-running channel with over 366,000 subscribers regularly publishing content material about Musk — uploaded a video displaying the title, “Elon Musk Simply BOUGHT Amazon & Ends All Competitors!” As of Nov. 18, the clip had acquired numerous shares on X and no less than tens of 1000’s of views, based on data supplied by the Nepal-based Gazette Direct web site.
As of Nov. 21, the link for the video confirmed the message, “This video is not out there as a result of the YouTube account related to this video has been terminated.” Google or YouTube suspended the Elon Musk Rewind channel someday between Nov. 18 and Nov. 21. We contacted Google to ask for extra particulars in regards to the alleged violations of the proprietor or homeowners of the channel and can replace this story if we be taught extra.
A consumer generated the video’s thumbnail picture — one purportedly exhibiting Musk holding a contract for his Amazon deal — with an artificial-intelligence (AI) instrument.
This thumbnail picture didn’t show an genuine image of Musk.
One other YouTube video initially shared on Fb additionally was not out there. That clip’s title confirmed in a Fb post (archived) as, “Elon Musk: ‘I Simply Formally Purchased Amazon!'” The link for that video additionally displayed the identical message about account termination. We inquired with Google in regards to the removing of that yet-unidentified channel, as nicely.
This AI-generated image additionally didn’t present a real picture of Musk.
One consumer asked Musk on X (archived) in regards to the Amazon rumor, “@elonmusk is that this true? Good for you [and] congratulations whether it is.” One other particular person posted (archived), “I am listening to a rumor that Elon Musk simply purchased Amazon.” Fb customers additionally inquired in regards to the matter, together with one one that said (archived), “I am watching a information report that Elon Musk simply purchased AMAZON. Is that this true or is it AI?” Different Fb and YouTube customers also shared the same declare.
Nonetheless, the rumor claiming Musk mentioned he purchased Amazon was false. We positioned no information experiences or different credible data confirming something about Musk shopping for the corporate.
Additional, the customers who created these clips used AI instruments to generate not simply their pretend thumbnail pictures but additionally the audio narration. Moreover, they used AI to handle the clip choice and enhancing. These customers merely entered a textual content immediate as an order to a number of generative-AI instruments to completely create the movies and thumbnail pictures.
For extra studying, we beforehand reported on different rumors claiming Musk purchased numerous corporations, together with McDonald’s, CNN, Ford and others.
