In the red corner, the world’s richest person, and in the blue corner, the world’s richest millennial: Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg have agreed to a cage match, after Musk jokingly suggested the bout in response to efforts by Meta to launch a Twitter competitor.
“I’m sure Earth can’t wait to be exclusively under Zuck’s thumb,” Musk tweeted on Wednesday in response to a post about Meta’s rumoured Threads app. The app, previously known inside Instagram as Project 92 and Barcelona, has been pitched to celebrities and influencers as a “stable place to build and grow” their audiences.
“At least it will be ‘sane’,” Musk added. “Was worried there for a moment.”
When a follower warned that the Twitter boss should watch his words around Zuckerberg, Musk responded: “I’m up for a cage match if he is lol.”
What could have been one of many half-thought-out tweets dashed off by Musk – whose itchy posting finger has already brought him a libel suit from a British diver he labelled a “pedo” and an SEC demand for a lawyer to vet his missives after he falsely claimed to have “funding secured” to take Tesla private – became rather more significant when Zuckerberg responded.
In a post on his verified Instagram account, the Meta chief executive shared a screenshot of Musk’s challenge with the caption: “Send Me Location”.
The danger for Musk is that Zuckerberg is, apparently, quite good at fighting. Both men seem to have limitless reserves of energy, but where Musk applies that to running five separate companies at the same time, Zuckerberg prefers to get really, really serious about hobbies.
In the past he has spent periods learning Mandarin, touring America (in what was widely seen as a dry run for an abortive presidential campaign) and only eating meat he killed with a bow and arrow. Recently, though, his hobby has been Brazilian jiu-jitsu, and when he made his competitive debut last month he won two out of three bouts.
“Zuck’s been training,” said Elena Cresci, a former Guardian journalist and professional muay thai champion, “whereas Elon Musk has been tweeting that he doesn’t train beyond throwing his kids up in the air. So on paper it’s Zuck. He’s been having a good time doing his little BJJ competitions.’’
One wrinkle is the combatants’ sizes. At an estimated 1.87 metres (6ft 1in) and about 85kg (13st 5lb), Musk is several weight classes above Zuckerberg, who measures 1.71 metres (5ft 7ins) and less than 70kg (11st). All else being equal, that would put Musk at an advantage, even after taking account of the 12-year age gap between the two.
“Elon Musk is just a lot bigger than him, so he could just lie on top of him and hope for the best,” Cresci said. That’s not far off Musk’s actual fight plan. “I have this great move that I call ‘The Walrus’, where I just lie on top of my opponent & do nothing,” he tweeted.
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The ultimate question for the fight, if it does occur, is whether Musk takes it seriously or treats the whole thing as a joke. “I’ve coached a couple of white-collar fights and how it usually goes is when it’s their first fight, they get overexcited and gas themselves out in the first round,” Cresci said. “But these are two men with a lot of money at their disposal, so they can pay for as much training as they want. Look at YouTubers like Logan Paul, who are actually decent boxers now because they can afford to train with the best.”
Musk v Zuckerberg: tale of the tape
Elon Musk
Age: 51.
Net worth: $236bn.
Place of birth: Pretoria, South Africa.
Education: University of Pennsylvania (BA, BS).
Children: at least 10.
Monthly active users: 330m (Twitter).
Congressional hearings: one (national security in space launches).
Money lost last year on flights of fancy: $30bn on buying Twitter and running it into the ground.
Mark Zuckerberg
Age: 39.
Net worth: $99.9bn.
Place of birth: White Plains, New York.
Education: Harvard University (unfinished).
Children: three.
Monthly active users: 2.9bn (Facebook).
Congressional hearings: two (Cambridge Analytica and Libra cryptocurrency).
Money lost last year on flights of fancy: $13.7bn on the metaverse.