Elon Musk is in talks with Italy’s government about hosting his proposed
cage fight with Mark Zuckerberg at a historic site in the country, but the Colosseum has been ruled out as a venue.
He and the chief executive of Meta first discussed the idea of a one-on-one scrap back in June after Zuckerberg’s launch of Threads, a rival microblogging site to Musk’s
Twitter platform.
The Italian culture minister, Gennaro Sangiuliano, said he was discussing holding the bout “in full respect of the sites” where it might be staged, but that it would not be held in Rome.
“I had a long and friendly phone conversation with
Elon Musk,” he said. “We talked about the common passion for the history of ancient Rome. We are discussing how to organise a great charity and historical evocation event, in full respect of the sites. It will not be held in Rome.”
This week the president of the cage-fighting promotion company Ultimate Fighting Championship, Dana White, said he had spoken to the culture ministry about staging the fight between the two billionaires in the Colosseum.
Musk added to the speculation on Friday when he posted on Twitter,
now renamed as X, that the fight would be livestreamed on his and Zuckerberg’s social media networks, saying: “Everything in camera frame will be ancient Rome, so nothing modern at all.”
He said he had spoken to the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, and the culture ministry and had “agreed on an epic location”. Earlier on Friday, Musk had posted the word “gladiators” next to two crossed-sword emojis.
www.theguardian.com
