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Elon Musk shares insights on jet tracker ban, Twitter’s privacy info policy updates

Credit: Ministério Das Comunicações [CC BY:2.0]

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Twitter officially banned the account of jet tracker Jack Sweeney on Wednesday, together with his other accounts that track notable people such as Elon Musk. Sweeney’s ban has been linked to an incident involving Elon Musk’s Baby X, his youngest son with record producer and musician Grimes. Twitter also updated its privacy information policy.

Jack Sweeney’s POV

Jack Sweeney’s Twitter account @ElonJet tracks the routes of the Tesla CEO’s private jet using air traffic data and posts it to the public via the social media platform. On Wednesday, Sweeney stated that his @ElonJet account, his personal account @JxckSweeney, and his other jet trackers were suspended as well. The University of Central Florida college student noted that he would continue tracking Elon Musk’s plane and sharing the information via alternative social media platforms such as Mastodon. 

Before his Twitter accounts were suspended, Sweeney’s Musk jet tracker was reportedly shadowbanned. A shadowban makes it difficult for other Twitter users to find an account. 

Elon Musk’s POV

Elon Musk shares some insights on why Sweeney’s jet trackers were banned through Twitter recently. 

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“Any account doxxing real-time location info of anyone will be suspended, as it is a physical safety violation. This includes posting links to sites with real-time location info. Posting locations someone traveled to on a slightly delayed basis isn’t a safety problem, so is ok.

“Last night, car carrying lil X in LA was followed by crazy stalker (thinking it was me), who later blocked car from moving & climbed onto the hood. Legal action is being taken against Sweeney & organizations who supported harm to my family,” Musk wrote. 

Twitter’s Private Information Policy

Amidst news of Sweeney’s jet trackers’ suspensions, Twitter updated its Private Information Policy, prohibiting anyone from sharing another person’s “live” location “in most cases.”

“When someone shares an individual’s live location on Twitter, there is an increased risk of physical harm. Moving forward, we’ll remove Tweets that share this information, and accounts dedicated to sharing someone else’s live location will be suspended,” Twitter explained. 

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Twitter users can share their own live location. They can also share the location information of other users as long as it is not on the same day. Twitter permits users to share the location of public gatherings, such as concerts or political events—although it did not clarify if “live” locations are permitted for these types of events.

The updated privacy policy also includes private media images or videos of private individuals without their consent. Although, this part of the policy seems to have leeway since Twitter recognizes that “there are instances where users may share images or videos of private individuals, who are not public figures, as part of a newsworthy event.”

The Main Issues

  • What is freedom of speech?
  • Does freedom of speech have limits? 
  • What is privacy for public figures?
  • Does affiliation with a public figure affect a person’s right to privacy?

Before acquiring Twitter, Elon Musk claimed that he wanted the platform to be a space that promotes freedom of speech. The billionaire used Sweeney’s @ElonJet account to highlight that he was committed to free speech on Twitter. At the time, Musk acknowledged that @ElonJet was a “direct personal safety risk.” 

While Musk may have accepted the risk to his own safety by keeping Sweeney’s account live, his family might be a different matter. The same may go for the other people who Sweeney kept tabs on through his Twitter accounts.

However, Musk was not the only one at fault here. Sweeney’s jet tracker supposedly provides the potential locations of public figures. However, it is not always clear-cut. In the Baby X incident, for example, the alleged perpetrator may have thought that the @ElonJet account was making Musk’s potential location public, not his son’s.

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The information Sweeney dispenses might be too ambiguous, and may lead to many misunderstandings. For instance, earlier this year, Taylor Swift made headlines after Yard calculated that her flight emissions were 1,184.8 times more than the average person’s. Yard based its calculations on Sweeney’s @CelebJets account. While the figure might seem shocking, a spokesperson for Swift explained that the pop star loans her jet out regularly, so Yard’s findings were argued as “blatantly incorrect.” 

I’d like to hear from you. Contact me at maria@teslarati.com or via Twitter @Writer_01001101.

Maria--aka "M"-- is an experienced writer and book editor. She's written about several topics including health, tech, and politics. As a book editor, she's worked with authors who write Sci-Fi, Romance, and Dark Fantasy. M loves hearing from TESLARATI readers. If you have any tips or article ideas, contact her at maria@teslarati.com or via X, @Writer_01001101.

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Elon Musk

Tesla Optimus project fires up as Musk sees production line progress

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Credit: Elon Musk | X

Tesla CEO Elon Musk posted a photo of himself standing with the Optimus production team inside Tesla’s Fremont factory, arms crossed amid workers in hard hats and safety vests. The image captures a pivotal industrial shift: the same facility space once dedicated to building Tesla’s flagship Model S sedan and Model X SUV is now home to the company’s humanoid robot manufacturing line.

Tesla’s Fremont Factory, acquired in 2010 from the former NUMMI joint venture between Toyota and GM, has been the company’s original U.S. manufacturing hub since Model S production began in 2012.

The Model X followed soon thereafter. These premium vehicles offered lower annual volumes, recently around 30,000 combined, compared to the high-volume Model 3 and Model Y lines that continue around the site. Over their combined run, the S and X accounted for roughly 610,000 units.

In late January 2026, during Tesla’s Q4 2025 earnings call, Elon Musk announced the end of Model S and Model X production in Q2 2026. The final vehicles rolled off the line in early May. Rather than retooling for another vehicle, Tesla chose to convert the dedicated S/X assembly area into a dedicated Optimus Gen 3 production line.

Model 3 and Y manufacturing remains unaffected. Tesla’s official Fremont Factory page now lists Optimus alongside the 3 and Y as core products.

The conversion was executed with remarkable speed. After production stopped, crews dismantled the existing vehicle line and installed entirely new modular equipment—including lines sourced from Germany and dozens of sub-lines for actuators, batteries, and other components—in roughly four months.

Musk described the timeline as “insanely fast,” noting it would be unprecedented for any other manufacturer. Initial Optimus output is expected to ramp slowly due to the robot’s roughly 10,000 unique parts and the brand-new production processes involved. The Fremont line targets an eventual capacity of 1 million Optimus units per year.

Tesla isn’t joking about building Optimus at an industrial scale: Here we go

Optimus Development Timeline

  • August 19, 2021: Optimus (then called Tesla Bot) formally announced at Tesla’s first AI Day. A concept video showed a person in a suit demonstrating the vision for a general-purpose humanoid capable of dangerous, repetitive, or boring tasks using the same AI architecture as Full Self-Driving.
  • 2022: Early prototypes displayed. At the second AI Day in September, semi-functional units demonstrated walking across a stage and basic arm movements
  • 2023: September videos showed improved capabilities, including sorting colored blocks, precise limb awareness, and holding a Yoda pose.
  • 2024-early 2025: Factory integration videos showed Optimus navigating workspaces and handling objects like battery cells.
  • January 2026: Gen 3 mass-production activities began at Fremont, with reports of over 1,000 Gen 3 units already operating inside the factory for real-world learning and AI training
  • April 2026: Musk confirms Optimus production on converted Fremont line would begin in late July or August 2026. The Gen 3 reveal, originally eyed for Q1, was pushed closer to production start. A second, much larger Optimus factory at Giga Texas is under construction, with volume production targeted for Summer 2027 and long-term capacity of 10 million units annually
  • July 1, 2026: Musk’s on-site visit and team photo confirm the Optimus line is operational and the transition is actively progressing

Tesla positions Optimus as potentially its largest project ever, leveraging vertical integration, AI expertise, and car-like manufacturing know-how to scale humanoid robots first for its own factories and later for broader industrial and consumer use.

The Fremont conversion serves as a critical proving ground for this ambitious new chapter in Tesla’s already-rich history.

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Investor's Corner

Tesla gets its latest short from Michael Burry: ‘Happy it jumped back to this level’

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Credit: MarcoRP | X

Tesla short seller Michael Burry, the subject of the film “The Big Short,” where he was portrayed by Steve Carell, has revealed he has opened a new bet against the stock.

In a new update to his Substack newsletter in a post titled “Trading Post June 30, 2026,” Burry revealed a new set of bets against Tesla, Caterpillar, NVIDIA, Applied Materials Inc., and the iShares Semiconductor ETF.

In regard to Tesla, Burry wrote:

“And finally I shorted Tesla at 416.22. Happy it jumped back to this level.”

This means Burry likely opened his new short position after the company’s recent rally on Wall Street, which saw Tesla shares sink in mid-May, only to recover to well over the $400 mark. Currently, shares trade at around $427.

The company saw a big Tuesday as shares climbed considerably, over 10 percent. The size of the Tesla short was not provided, nor did Burry give any information on the position’s structure, the number of shares, dollar value, or whether options were used in the short.

The Tesla and SpaceX merger everyone is talking about is quietly building

Over the years, Burry has been one of the more vocal critics of Tesla, calling its share price “media inflated,” and saying it was “ridiculously overvalued” as recently as December.

The company has largely transitioned away from being known as an automotive company and instead is much more widely regarded as an AI play, mostly due to its Full Self-Driving efforts, Optimus robot development, and data collection related to both.

This has not pulled those skeptics away from being vocal about their distaste for how Tesla is valued, but there’s no denying that the company is a global force in many things, including sustainable energy, automotive, and AI.

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Investor's Corner

SpaceX gets initial stock coverage from Tesla’s biggest bull

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SpaceX Starship V3 flight 12
SpaceX Starship V3 flight 12 (Credit: SpaceX)

Wedbush Securities is initiating stock coverage on SpaceX (NASDAQ: SPCX), marking the first comments on the company since it went public several weeks ago. Wedbush and its analyst handling coverage, Dan Ives, are widely bullish on fellow Musk company Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA).

Ives wrote his first note initiating coverage of SpaceX shares on Wednesday with a $190 price target and an ‘Outperform’ rating. The firm believes the company is well positioned off of its IPO because of its wide array of projects, including AI compute power and infrastructure, connectivity projects, and launches.

“We view SpaceX as one of the most differentiated assets within the tech market with a strong footprint across its three core markets, with Starlink driving success with connectivity,” Ives wrote, “Starship launches leading to a demand flywheel and increasing deal flow for its Colossus clusters.”

Elon Musk called it Epic: The full story of SpaceX’s Starship Flight 12

Wedbush leans heavily on Starlink, which they say is the “profitability driver given the strength of its recurring revenue base of ~12 million subscribers as of June 5th.” Ives believes Starlink is still in the “early innings” of penetrating the global telecommunications and broadband market, as it only holds less than a 1 percent share. However, this number is sure to increase over time.

It also highlights the importance of Starship, which it says is an “essential layer” of SpaceX’s overall success. SpaceX developing and displaying the ability to reuse rockets is a major cost and reliability advantage “as it reduces the necessary hardware launch costs while generating a feedback loop for future flights to improve their launch flight rate without accelerating capex spend.”

Finally, SpaceX’s recent AI/Compute projects are also very elementary, Ives writes. It is worth mentioning Wedbush said its $190 price target is derived from a valuation forecast that sees the company yielding roughly $2.48 trillion of implied enterprise value.

There are also some factors that Wedbush did not take into account with its initial coverage. The firm wrote in the note:

“We note that there is optional value coming from Starship’s accelerating scale towards sub-$200/kg unit economics, orbital data centers, and enterprise AI monetization as these factors could drive meaningful upside but these face major hurdles, so we do not take that into account with our valuation.”

SpaceX shares are down just over 2 percent today, trading at around $167 at the time of publication.

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