Musk in control of Twitter but where will he go from here?

Elon Musk has taken control of Twitter after a protracted legal battle and months of uncertainty. The question now is what the billionaire Tesla CEO will actually do with the social media platform.

Musk ousted three top Twitter executives on Thursday, according to two people familiar with the deal who said he was in charge. Such a shakeup was widely expected, but Musk has otherwise made contradictory statements about his vision for the company — and shared few concrete plans for how he will run it.

The people wouldn’t say if all the paperwork for the deal, originally valued at $44 billion, had been signed or if the deal had closed. A Delaware judge had ordered that the deal be finalized by Friday.

Late Thursday, Musk tweeted, “the bird has been freed,” a reference to Twitter’s logo.

Twitter's users, advertisers and employees are parsing Musk's every move in an effort to guess where he might take the company — but the mercurial tech executive has not made the job easy.

He has criticized Twitter's dependence on advertisers, but made a statement Thursday that seemed aimed at soothing their fears. He has complained about restrictions on speech on the platform — but then vowed he wouldn't let it become a "hellscape.” And for months it wasn't even clear if he wanted to control the company at all.

After Musk signed a deal to acquire Twitter in April, he tried to back out of it, leading the company to sue him to force him to go through with the acquisition.

Friday’s deadline to close the deal was ordered by the Delaware Chancery Court in early October. The New York Stock Exchange notified investors that it will suspend trading in shares of Twitter before the opening bell Friday in anticipation of the company going private under Musk.

Musk has been signaling more recently...