Looking at the problems Twitter has, why does anyone think Musk can even solve one?
If one believes Twitter has a free speech problem: Musk shouts about free speech but shut down Teslas PR department, lashes out against any criticism against him, canceled a preorder because he didn't like a journalists' article etc.
Musk is great at self-promotion and this often helps his companies in some sense, but what else does he bring to the table?
> Musk shouts about free speech but shut down Teslas PR department
Kind of a weird example. Musk shutdown Tesla's PR department because Musk believes Tesla can get better organic press. It's unrelated, but if anything, getting rid of a dissembling PR department can only serve to promote better discussion, not suppress it.
Musk has a plausible sounding reason for everything. But when dismantling a PR department leads to the press not being able to ask Tesla any uncomfortable questions, then "organic press is better" is just as much bullshit as "self-driving is coming next year".
I'm not sure I understand this. Corporate PR departments are not the White House Press Office. They don't stand up in the briefing room and take questions from the press, or hold a press gaggle. The entire point of these departments is to deflect uncomfortable questions. It's exactly the opposite.
That's a good point. However, they are the go-to point for anyone wanting to ask a company a question. What does it say if a publicly traded company (or Musk) doesn't even want to do that minimum amount of work to at least pretend to be transparent?
The only thing I can think of is that unlike I would assume most executives, he seems to use Twitter much more like the average user. That said, I think Yishan Wong just about hit the nail on the head as to why Musks approach is likely flawed.
That is a good read, but being a child of the old internet, I agree with his axioms but disagree with his conclusions. I would rather Elon let these so called dangerous ideas fester into bad behavior, letting twitter turn into 4chan, where every day someone successfully advocates for hatred and arguably causes multiple deaths, than see a single 140 character post censored. You can call that naive, but the reality is that many of us have aeen speech turn into physical violence, and still prefer that to nervously polite dialog that avoids ideas that are likely true but might make someone act poorly.
I agree with you in principle, but 4chan doesn't have the reach Twitter has, as soon as those platforms start having a wide enough reach, they are dangerous. I mean, Facebook was used to incite genocide and Twitter nearly toppled but damaged a democracy. Maybe the solution is to prevent social networks to gain too big of a reach.
If the landscape was more granular people would be cross posting stuff and using aggregation services. That was already the case to some extent. I think the answer is to let people be people and watch it all burn. Maybe someday some future society will learn from the mistakes we are making. But I don't think those mistakes include failing to protect ourselves from being exposed to inflammatory ideas. That sort of track record just gives conspiracy theorists more credibility.
The caveat, I think, is that what he describes is quintessentially American. I'm pretty well travelled and have only seen such overt and absolute polarisation in the US. I'm sure there are others but I haven't seen it in Europe, Africa or the far East. It's quite the source of amusement in my circles.
Which part was fascinating? The part he says social media platforms do not care about politics? That is a load of bull crap. They do care and they have a preference. Not because of their political beliefs but because of money.
No, they really don’t care. The difference is that if they did care, they’d care about where the money came from. They do not.
That does mean that it’s biased to what advertisers think is OK, but it’s always going to be biased. It’s just not really a bias based on a deep agenda or underlying conspiracy. I actually believe that. There may be some controversy but nobody has really demonstrated much consistent bias, less anything more sinister.
The mission of Tesla is not free speech, but to accelerate the transition to sustainable energy. Tesla seems to be doing just fine without a PR department, so it seems he was right to shut it down.
The mission of SpaceX is to make life multi-planetary. So of course there is no right to free speech for the employees.
But the mission of twitter should be free speech within the bounds of the law, at least according to Elon.
Currently it seems to be to move the Overton window so much to the left that you can be banned for giving the definition of what a woman is that was commonly accepted by everybody in 2010.
> But the mission of twitter should be free speech within the bounds of the law, at least according to Elon.
The problem is, his past actions don't inspire any confidence in that being the truth.
> Currently it seems to be to move the Overton window so much to the left that you can be banned for giving the definition of what a woman is that was commonly accepted by everybody in 2010.
That's the right-wing view and there are countless examples of the left-wing getting banned, and they are angry as well. I don't thing it's cut and dry.
> there are countless examples of the left-wing getting banned
Can you name some that weren't due to the poster threatening someone, doxing or otherwise something illegal? I honestly can't think of any off the top of my head where a left wing post/user was banned for something legal but I can think of tons from the other side.
Don't get me wrong: I'm sure more right-wing/conservatives users are getting blocked than their counterparts, but only because they are more extreme (right now) on those platforms.
It seems that of those, the only one that had anything to do with suspensions / bans was the Occupy accounts and those (according to the article) seem to have been tripping the "might be a bot" thresholds because of how they don't post for a long time and then all of a sudden all blast the same content from the same protests.
While they shouldn't be banned (and I'm assuming that was fixed after that article came out if in fact they were not bots), I haven't seen any examples of specific left wing accounts getting banned for posting content as many on the right have (examples: Hunter Biden stories and the NYP, anyone posting Wuhan Lab leak theory in 2020-2021, The Babylon Bee for the Rachel Levine satire posts, etc).
> Looking at the problems Twitter has, why does anyone think Musk can even solve one?
And twitter knows they're getting a great deal!
I like twitter -- I can get in and out fast. In 15 minutes I can see a lot of new, interesting things, or just see what everyhing thinks is cool today.
And many of the things people complain about I don't see. I follow people around my specific interests: tech, electronics, jazz, and classical music -- and rarely see anything else. Judicious use of "block" and filters makes it rare that I see anything I don't want to see.
But I recently tried another social media plaltform: TikTok. I was surprised as a 59-year-old that I'd even understand it, but I followed people in the same categories I follow on Twitter, limit viewing to those I follow (I don't try the suggested feed) and it's nice and I'm having fun. Haven't posted yet, because I can't just type a few words or post a link and hit "send", but I'll figure that out, too.
> If one believes Twitter has a free speech problem
Twitter HAS a free speech problem. This is not controversial. Now you may not agree that Twitter SHOULD allow free speech, but you can not deny that censorship exists on Twitter and it is serving the political agenda of some people.
Twitter does not have a free speech problem. Twitter is not the US government, it's a private organization, and has no obligation to allow any speech it does not want on its platform. If it serves the political agenda of some people, that is entirely within it's own free speech right and we should celebrate its ability to, or found new organizations to compete its free speech.
If you keep getting in arguments about something, it's pretty silly to claim there is no controversy.
> Now you may not agree that Twitter SHOULD allow free speech
If you don't agree that Twitter should do something that it currently isn't, you by definition don't see it as having a problem in that behavioral domain.
> but you can not deny that censorship exists on Twitter and it is serving the political agenda of some people.
Private actors controlling the use of their private resources to select which ideas they will and will not promote with them is called “free speech”. So, you seem to think Twitter’s problem is that they exercise free speech.
> Private actors controlling the use of their private resources to select which ideas they will and will not promote with them is called “free speech”.
I have to admit that this makes sense. But still kinda disturbing in this case. Because when the private resource we're talking about is Twitter, the actors behind can exercise their right of free speech for mass manipulation. That's too much power. I guess this is the problematic part.
It's not exactly the same thing as the right to free speech of a single individual or a small company.
Your logic is sound, but sometimes scale changes the rules. Especially in this very special case where Twitter has become the digital equivalent of a global town square. That's the catch.
Anyway maybe my quick arguments weren't very good after all.
But do you really not see any problems with Twitter lately? Is everything okay?
Ok, fair point. So let's not say that "Twitter has a free speech problem".
But let's also not say that "Twitter has limitations on free speech" because it feels like a misleading euphemism. Free speech is not a spectrum. You either have it or not.
How about we just say that "Twitter doesn't have free speech".
And yes, "it's totally debatable if that's a problem or not". That I agree.
Why is Twitters position on what type of content it allows a ‘problem’ given it’s a private company? The companies that run social media can legally censor and remove publicly, and privately, posted content. They can also ban, suspend, or limit users, for pretty much any reason.
Have we become so delusional that we can’t recognize this simple fact?
Why is it a problem if Uber drivers have to roll a 1D20 when they pick you up, and drive away laughing "owned!" every time they roll 1? They're a private company. It adds a little harmless fun and excitement. There's no law saying they have to have you as a passenger. Therefore, nobody should complain or get upset?
Tech misinformation is interesting because a Chinese government account gets a flag and an American government account doesn't. A company pr account doesn't get a bias flag, but it is wholly designed around spreading misinformation. Misinformation seems to be used as an argument against not only free speech, but only leaning towards very specific directions politically.
What makes you think that all the censored stuff is about hate speech, misinformation and threats of violence? To think that you must be either very naive or benefiting from that political agenda yourself.
There are hundreds of records of censored content which doesn't have anything to do with all that. This is a fact whether you agree with it or not.
He doesn't have to solve any problems, if he buys it, it's his to do whatever he wants with, together with the rest of the up to 2000 private investors. And users are free to leave if they wish as well.
Very easy to solve the only problems I've had with twitter. Stop hiding content behind login prompts. Serverside render direct links to tweets (no infinite loaders/generic errors).
I don't think these anti free speech "examples" have the effect that people who cite them expect. Yet they are used a lot which points to a striking disconnect in communication.
May I ask why do you think that? If someone touts that free speech is important, but tries to suppress or penalize it, if it is directed against them. One natural conclusion would be, that their commitment is at least questionable.
>Looking at the problems Twitter has, why does anyone think Musk can even solve one?
Transparency about moderation is the easiest to fix. All everyone wants out of Twitter is to know why posts are moderated, promoted, shadow-banned, etc. It doesn't have to be super specific, in terms of moderation, but giving everyone an overall sense of how and why things are moderated the way they are, would help to restore a sense of fairness.
If he does well with Twitter in that regard, all the other platforms aren't hard to replicate if you've got the servers and money.
OR
He loses most of his wealth selling off stock to try to do this, and we learn the difference between paper and real wealth.
I'm not defending Musk's shutting down of Tesla's PR department or cancelling a preorder because he didn't like a journalist's article — and point well taken that those events might indicate his behavior/orientation — but these are hardly comparable in the sense that Twitter is fundamentally a speech platform - that's what it enables its users to do - whereas Tesla is not. To extrapolate from his behavior re Tesla to the way he views Twitter or would operate it seems like a stretch to me. It's possible for a person to bifurcate.
It seems extremely comparable. If Elon purports to believe that free, unmoderated speech is intrinsically valuable in society, why would he suddenly do an about face for his own companies? Isn't the point of being an absolutist that your belief in free speech is, well, absolute?
I'd argue that journalism relies on freedom of speech and Elon punished someone for expressing their opinion. If journalism doesn't require freedom of speech why would twitter?
I don't think you should be looking at this as a "solution" to any problems other than this: Elon Musk has built his net worth of $250 billion by saying things to people, and his primary bullhorn has been Twitter. Spending $43 billion to secure his access to the engine that got him to $250 billion is reasonable. Combine that with the fact that he can now put his thumb on the scale and get his tweets in front of more eyeballs, and that may increase TSLA enough to offset the cost of buying Twitter.
As usual for Musk, this is a business decision that is meant to benefit him that he is trying to sell as benefitting other people.
Edit - Musk's other companies, SpaceX, Boring, and Tesla, rely heavily on government subsidies and contracts. The access he gets to politicians by controlling their newsfeeds on the social network they pay attention to is also very valuable. Not valuable for Twitter, valuable for Musk.
> Musk shouts about free speech but shut down Teslas PR department
What has Tesla PR got to do with free speech?
Or cancelling a pre-order?
Journalists and "the media" have little to do with free speech in general, and maybe even a negative effect on free speech if it is though that media representation is an alternative.
It's also notable that freedom to express an opinion, and freedom to express something as factual as somewhat different. Twitter generally deals with opinion (and does a poor job of dealing with facts/fact-checking).
If someone touts that free speech is important, but tries to suppress or penalize it, if it is directed against them. One natural conclusion would be, that their commitment is at least questionable.
> to make it harder for the press to ask questions
entirely different from censorship or suppression of speech - in fact this is the right not to speech. Free speech implies to right to information.
> The next reviewer
Same issue with paid reviews, these motivating examples are not much of a challenge to free speech.
> how is refusing service to right-wing users on Twitter censorship?
Because twitter is a platform for speech, buying a Tesla isn't the same. That said, if there weren't a few large corps monopolising social networking (and usually via shady methods) it wouldn't be so much of a free speech issue either - There would be an issue if Teslas was one of a few car manufacturers also.
> The first 90 percent of the code accounts for the first 90 percent of the development time. The remaining 10 percent of the code accounts for the other 90 percent of the development time.
It’s bad for multinational conglomerate owners to run Twitter for obvious reasons. Will the Chinese government force Musk to turn over DMs of dissidents as a condition of approving Shanghai Gigafactory Phase II? Will President DeSantis coerce him to censor “left wing misinformation” in exchange for an extension of EV tax credits or a SpaceX contract? Unlike Bezos and WaPo, Elon has already said he’s purchasing Twitter for the express purpose of exerting editorial control.
This is a very important and under-appreciated risk. It makes Musk perhaps a uniquely unsuitable owner Twitter, when measured specifically along the "free speech" and related concerns he expresses. A more free Twitter would be owned by a person or group with very few other interests that could be used as leverage.
A possibility doesn't mean it's going to happen - and baseless fear mongering at this point. And I don't have the feeling he'd do such a thing - he's very empathetic and would understand the harm/violence that would allow.
Likewise what's to say China doesn't already have agents at Twitter and access to that data? It's far easier, and better, to do that in an incognito way - no?
Another example is Reddit's last round had Tencent contributing 50% of the round or $150 million; how much influence or access do they have because of that?
I was afraid of that, too. All I've seen so far are disclaimers about Bezo's ownership of the WP. Plenty of negative articles about Amazon is published by WP.
Ya and also it’s clear Elon cares a lot more about Twitter than Bezos does about WaPo. He’s paying 100x more and publicly obsesses about content moderation policies daily. If some government regulating Amazon tried seriously to coerce Bezos into doing something at WaPo, he probably just would have sold it to someone else
Honestly, I'm surprised when it comes to Bezos and the WP. Bezos, for all he achieved, is class-A hole when it come to labor rights an how employees are treated. Heck, the guy bought a second yacht to land his chopper on because his primary yacht, being a sail ship and all, doesn't have place for a heli pad. He's prime capitalism excess. And there he is, having bought WP to prevent it from falling into hard times and, as of now, he did not interfere with WPs reporting.
Disclaimer: I'm an ex-Amazonian, and I think it is great company to work at (blue collar jobs excluded, but that's true for all warehouse and delivery jobs). Amazon managed to get rid of the middle population of a Gauss distribution regarding performance, Amazon is relentless (I like that drive for efficiency). By taking out the middle, so, the very top and the very bottom are left unchecked and un-moderated. Which breeds all kinds of problems.
"he did not interfere with WPs reporting."--this just means, Bezos doesn't directly deal with the editorial staff and reporters. In other words, you don't see legally admissible evidence for his interference. Next time, work with c-level execs, and see how they create the impression of 'non-interference' and yet interfere.
I read, occasionally, the WP, the NYT, Le Monde and Spiegel (don't ask about the latter, it is the major "free" online paper in Germany). So far I have yet to see a difference between those when it comes to Bezos or Amazon (excluding differences between European and US reporting), nor do I see any major bias differences between NYT and WP.
And that's all the interference I care about when it comes to reporting.
The timelines here are pretty long. Facebook has been around for 18 years, Twitter for 16. That's more than a "fad". These companies are lasting as long or longer than other tech companies, certainly longer than your average start-up.
Except that Facebook is nearly irrelevant these days. Facebook is relevant only because of its acquisitions of apps like Instagram, WhatsApp, Oculus, etc. Twitter doesn't have that.
They all fall! It used to be quicker, but they all do. It's clear Facebook is fading. And it's a separate issue from anything "wrong" the platform does. The userbase simply ages, and kids don't want to be where their parents are. I have a facebook account that I only use for high school reuinons. My classmates post photos of their grandchildren, etc.
Although I generally agree that most social media platforms are fads. I am not sure about Twitter. At least I know that it will stay around for a long time. It did so despite all it's problems so far.
If one believes Twitter has a free speech problem: Musk shouts about free speech but shut down Teslas PR department, lashes out against any criticism against him, canceled a preorder because he didn't like a journalists' article etc.
Musk is great at self-promotion and this often helps his companies in some sense, but what else does he bring to the table?