Elon Musk – is he still buying Twitter?
by Victoria Benjafield
Elon Musk is the name on everybody’s lips right now in social media. Last week, he announced that he’d reverse Donald Trump’s Twitter ban if his offer to buy the channel goes through.
He said the ban was “a morally bad decision, to be clear, and foolish in the extreme” whilst at a Financial Times conference. The reason why Donald Trump got banned by the platform? After his supporters stormed the US Capitol on the 6th Jan 2021, Twitter said that Trump had incited violence and broken its rules, and that removing him was because of “the risk of further incitement of violence” – a move that Facebook and Youtube followed.
Free speech on Twitter
“Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated,” Musk said. Elon Musk has said that Donald Trump lost the right to free speech on the platform and that even with the ban, he still had a voice. Whilst I agree with free speech, if somebody is in a position of power and uses social platforms to incite violence, then this needs to be called out and acted upon. We are constantly hearing in the media about bullying, hate and violence being spread through social platforms far faster than they have been in the past, yet what are the likes of Twitter and Facebook doing about it? Elon Musk and Twitter co-founder and former chief executive Jack Dorsey also shares the belief that Twitter shouldn’t have permanent bans because they “undermine trust”. I believe that whilst trust is important, there should also be trust from the users of the platform that they are given a safe space to use the platform way from violent calls to action from those abusing their power and spreading misinformation.
What is next for Elon Musk and Twitter?
In early April Elon Musk revealed he had become the largest individual shareholder of Twitter and since then he has become increasingly critical of the company in regards to its ethos – “Twitter needs to be much more even-handed. It currently has a strong left bias because it’s based in San Francisco”. Despite having an offer of $44 Billion accepted, things are going a little south but he’s clear to some extent on his plans.
At a TED talk when he announced his bid to buy Twitter, he said that he wants to make Twitter’s algorithm and code open source. This would mean that absolutely anybody would be able to access the code and integrate on it. Whilst social media users are shouting out for more transparency when it comes to platform’s algorithms, there are also security issues that would come into play. When discussing this, he stated “The top priority I would have is eliminating the spam and scam bots and the bot armies that are on Twitter. They’re making the product much worse.” To try and combat this, he proposed “authenticating all humans” and whilst at a glance, this seems like a logical solution, it brings up another issue that the Electronic Frontier Foundation wrote about, saying “Pseudonymity and anonymity are essential to protecting users who may have opinions, identities or interests that do not align with those in power. For example, policies that require real names on Facebook have been used to push out Native Americans; people using traditional Irish, Indonesian and Scottish names; Catholic clergy; transgender people; drag queens; and sex workers. Political dissidents may be in grave danger if those in power are able to discover their true identities.”
Is Elon Musk still buying Twitter?
Elon Musk has assessed the spam bots situation as he sees it and is putting the deal on hold. His reasoning? “How do advertisers know what they are getting for their money? This is fundamental to the financial health of Twitter.” Advertisers on the other hand are not concerned as they do take bots into account and have done for years. Despite this, his statement about putting the deal on hold caused Twitter stock to drop by 25%. We then have to ask the question, can you really put a deal like this on hold? According to Twitter’s top lawyer, he has a contractual obligation to go through with the deal and can’t just drop out because of 5% of users being bots. We shall have to see what he does next but I imagine it will go on for some time before we see any change for users, but the topic of free speech will remain a headline.
