David covered the latest short video from Tucker Carlson last night where the recently fired commentator indicated that his show was coming back on Elon Musk’s social media platform. It’s never flattering to say “I told you so,” but let’s face it. I told you so. I didn’t have any sort of insider information when I sketched out a paragraph describing how Carlson could use his own studio to produce his usual show and then simply embed it in a tweet every evening, but it seemed like a natural fit. And the AP has already jumped on the story with a seemingly cynical take.

Carlson made his announcement in a three-minute video posted on the social media site, as part of a denunciation of media. He called Twitter that last big remaining platform that allows free speech.

“We’ll be bringing a new version of the show we’ve been doing for the last six and a half years to Twitter,” he said. “We’ll bring some other things, too, which we’ll tell you about. But for now we’re just grateful to be here.”

He offered no other details, and a message to his lawyer, Bryan Freedman, was not immediately returned.

As of last night, Elon Musk was responding to Carlson’s tweet by noting that he and Tucker “haven’t signed a deal of any kind” yet. He pointed out that Tucker will be subject to the same “rules and rewards” as any other user. He went on in the extended tweet to specify that “rewards” refers to “subscriptions and advertising revenue share.”

On this platform, unlike the one-way street of broadcast, people are able to interact, critique and refute whatever is said.

And, of course, anything misleading will get @CommunityNotes.

I also want to be clear that we have not signed a deal of any kind whatsoever. Tucker is… https://t.co/0TMjuYnKUp

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 9, 2023

Last night, Musk also responded to a tweet from Don Lemon that was several weeks old. He suggested that Lemon might want to follow Tucker Carlson and do his own show on Twitter. He managed to get in a dig at CNN, saying that Lemon’s potential audience on Twitter would be “much bigger.”

Have you considered doing your show on this platform? Maybe worth a try. Audience is much bigger.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 10, 2023

How much advertising revenue could Tucker bring in from a tweet and a subscription service on Twitter? The subscription service hasn’t even been launched yet, so we don’t really know how it’s going to work. I suppose if there was a paid version of it, only subscribers would be able to see the full video. (That would be very similar to how Rumble operates.) If Tucker charged a few dollars per month and landed a few hundred thousand subscribers, he would probably be bringing in a decent income. And all of the people who have canceled their Fox Nation subscriptions since Tucker left would wind up basically breaking even. So Elon Musk might not have to pay Carlson anything and he would gain a huge amount of ad revenue and new subscribers.

But what about Carlson’s contract with Fox News? That was the major holdup until now. He has a “no compete” clause. Would a show embedded in a tweet every week qualify as “competition” as opposed to a regular broadcast show on Newsmax or any other network? It would be interesting to hear some attorneys weigh in on that question. Alternately, he could just thumb his nose at Fox and dare them to take him to court. He could probably afford the resultant fine if he lost.

Tucker updated his website last night and it now simply features last night’s tweeted video without additional comment. We should know soon enough.