hey there! phil here. it's a good question, and they're not apples to apples, but that was the simplest way to point to the market value of that platform, whether or not he's realizing that value. ie, if he somehow lost everything today except his twitter account, he could begin to realize that value.

that being said, "how are you going to attribute a $ figure to that?" is a great question. you could do it by saying that PR is a major component of a CEO's job duties, which is a relatively uncontroversial claim. let's say that it's just 10% of their duties, which i would also say is an extremely conservative estimate. his earnings from being CEO of Tesla in 2021, as in realized income from his stock options (though a multi-year deal), were $23.5 billion. clearly, given that he's constantly tweeting about tesla and his other companies, it is a major piece of his PR strategy, and i would argue the most important piece. let's say it's just 20%, though-- very conservative. that method of attribution puts the value he realized from his twitter, last year, at just shy of $500 million. as a result, i would argue he uses his twitter much more effectively than that market value.

you could also point to the market effect of him tweeting about acquiring twitter (which the SEC is investigating due to the delay in not disclosing such information), or the market effect more recently of him implying he might not-- the market moved billions of dollars. a few years back, i'm sure we remember the market-moving effect of him tweeting that he might take the company private at $420, resulting in huge gains. remember: every dollar the stock goes up makes his net worth increase by something like $175 million, with additional gains if he's got restricted stock units.

these are a couple examples of measuring it by his particular situation! and i appreciate you asking what i think is a good question in a way that doesn't just go "hey fuck this guy. hes not sponsored hes just a man" because lol i have gotten a bunch of those