Elon Musk has formally taken ownership of Twitter, immediately firing Parag Agrawal, who had succeeded co-founder Jack Dorsey as Twitter chief executive officer (CEO). 

Following the US$44 billion acquisition on Thursday, Musk tweeted “The Bird is freed”, suggesting that the platform will now have fewer limits on content, which is what Musk has imagined for some time now. However, he did add that he wants to prevent the platform from becoming an echo chamber for hate and division, Reuters reported.

Musk also fired chief financial officer Ned Segal, Vijaya Gadde, the company’s policy chief, Sean Edgett, the general counsel, and chief customer officer Sarah Personette.

According to The Verge, the execs received significant payouts: Agrawal got US$38.7 million, Segal was given US$25.4 million, Gadde received US$12.5 million, and Personette, who tweeted yesterday about how excited she was for Musk’s takeover, got US$11.2 million.

When it comes to revamping the platform, Musk said he wants to “defeat” spam bots on Twitter, and to make the algorithms that determine how content is presented to its users publicly available. However, the Tesla CEO has offered little detail on how he will achieve all this, or who will run the company. He has said he plans to cut jobs.

Musk also said that he did not buy Twitter to make more money, but “to try to help humanity, whom I love.” But he has reportedly raised ideas for cost-cutting and increasing revenue. Governments and corporations could be charged a minimal amount to use the platform, and there could be job cuts on the table to improve the company’s bottom line.

Some of Twitter’s current employees have criticized Musk’s plans for the platform as “incoherent” and lacking in detail.

Musk is expected to share more about his plans for Twitter with employees on Friday.

This story will be updated.

The post Elon Musk officially completes Twitter deal first appeared on IT World Canada.