The blogosphere lit up yesterday with a mix of anger, incredulity and suspicion at news that a Saudi Royal Prince had bought a $300 million stake in Twitter.
How dare a regime built on restriction and control buy into one of the web’s most potent symbols of freedom, cried comments from around the world.
The prince in question was Alwaleed bin Talal, a US-educated billionaire and businessman with a history of buying stakes in companies... and not just any companies, but media and tech companies, having already put money into Apple and News Corp.
Despite Alwaleed’s known interest in similar blue chip communications firms, the irony of the Twitter stake purchase was not lost on commentators, with Roger Cohen of the New York Times catching the mood:
“The Arab world, of course, knows full well the value of Twitter,” Bernhard Warner, co-founder of analysis and advisory firm Social Media Influence, told the Times of India, adding: “In the past year, it has been a force in politics, in regime change, so there is not a single person in that region in a position of influence who is not following the increasing power of Twitter.”
However, as TechCruch points out, the sale is not new, only the identity of the buyer, with the deal “part of the previously announced $800 million financing Twitter closed last September.”
What’s more, the purchase was made up of secondary shares bought from employees of Twitter, according to Fortune’s Dan Primack, which have still to be approved by Twitter.