Elon Musk bought Twitter to save free speech. He sells 22.9 million dollars of Tesla to finance it, making him one of the most in-debt CEOs on the planet. However, he did it because he was convinced that Twitter and the world needed him.
Elon said it is imperative to have an “inclusive arena for free speech.” Since he took over the company, hate has increased by 300%, and it appears that people are using paid, verified accounts to pose as fake accounts and scam the naive with cryptocurrencies and fake public announcements.
Where did it all go wrong?
Were Elon’s intentions initially positive, or was this kind of plan in place? Can Twitter be saved? We spent much time researching this by watching his videos and interviews and listening to lawyers to understand the issue. Elon talks a lot about free speech and the mission of Twitter, and we also encounter many people who heavily criticize him to get a balanced view. This is a fascinating topic and should be one of the biggest stories in tech in 2023. So, without further ado, let’s look at this closely.
Pre-Elon Twitter (Twitter’s Big Problem)
It’s easy to see that Twitter’s user base is significantly smaller than other social media giants like Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube. However, Twitter’s user base is super influential because it has a lot of public figures, journalists, and people at the top of their field. This makes Twitter a great networking tool, but it is often where news breaks because it is text-based.
So, even though Twitter didn’t have a massive user base of average users, it greatly influenced culture. However, not having a lot of average users using the application made it difficult to monetize the platform. When Elon saw this company, he may have thought there was an opportunity and decided to buy 10% of the company because he believed in it. This gave him a minority stake in the company. However, he realized he could need more of a difference in the company by owning 10%, so he offered to buy Twitter.
Elon Buys Twitter (The 7 Big Problems and Questions That Arise)
First, there is misaligned company culture, and many would like to change how Elon took over the company. As a result, many employees want to avoid working with him. There is also a bot problem, where many inactive users spread misinformation and bog down the servers with extra accounts.
Twitter has always had a revenue problem, but it is only getting worse now that Elon has taken over. Elon Musk posts many controversial content daily that many advertisers disagree with. He is also launching new services and firing people in real-time, which makes advertisers unsure of the future of Twitter and causes them to pull their advertising dollars. As a result, 50% of advertisers no longer spend on Twitter, exacerbating the revenue problem.
Elon Musk also launched a $8-a-month verification system that allows anyone to get a blue checkmark as long as they pay $8 monthly. He did this to increase the revenue model and make the company less reliant on advertisers. Theoretically, stabilizes revenue by getting the user base to pay on a recurring model.
However, the verification checkmark is the wrong thing to offer because it has led to many impersonations, with people impersonating not only Elon Musk but also companies, potentially affecting their stock. The increase in hate speech has also been a problem, as there are now verified accounts posting hate speech, which is a terrible combination.
Elon Musk has publicly acknowledged many of these issues, saying they will make many mistakes but learn in real time because they care so much about free speech. However, whether they care about free speech and what the term means is still being determined. The term “free speech” is used all over the internet, with people claiming that specific platforms are censoring them and that free speech is only available on particular platforms.
Elon says that he spent all this money and became CEO because of free speech. I wanted to find out what free speech means and what is protected on a platform, as it feels like that will inform the rest of the story.
What is free speech? “The Prohibition from the Government of Censoring Speech”
In the common vernacular, free speech means different things. In the legal context, free speech means the prohibition by the government of censoring people’s speech. When talking about private companies like Twitter, YouTube, the New York Times, or others, these are private citizens. They have the right to free speech and the right to free association, and if they want to kick people off their platform, they can do so.
Some may call this censorship, but it is simply the platform exercising their free speech. When Elon Musk says he bought Twitter for free speech, he does not use the term legally. He merely disagreed with the editorial decisions that the prior administration of Twitter made and wanted to allow different kinds of speech and other creators on the platform. Now that he owns the Twitter platform, he is welcome to make those decisions, but it is no more or less free speech than what everyone else was doing beforehand.
It’s easy to get tied up in what Elon Musk says in all the footage about Twitter being the digital courtyard for everyone to convene. Twitter is where information spreads in many ways, but it only becomes free with him owning it. It’s just that the content allowed is different. There is still moderation, but when he took over, the hate speech increased exponentially overnight. Is there any role that the government plays in moderating it, or since it’s a private company in multiple countries, is there no moderation by the government on free speech?
Generally, Twitter’s moderation decisions, whether they allow more or less hate speech or how they define hate speech, do not implicate the US government in any way. There is no prohibition against hate speech, and the First Amendment does not have an exception for hate speech. Many people get this wrong, thinking that the First Amendment does not apply to certain kinds of speech and that hate speech is one of those kinds of speech that can be moderated. This is just an absurd chain of logic.
The First Amendment
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
Generally, hate speech is protected—at least as protected as everything else. If a platform wants to say they don’t want people espousing hate speech, they can decide to do that because they don’t want to be associated with those people. If they say they have no problem with hate speech, it’s good for advertisers and the bottom line, and if they want to bring on more hate speech, they can do that, too.
The government will not step in and say they are not allowed to promote hate speech because they are protected. It gets more complicated when you talk about countries like the EU with different rules, or India in particular, which has some nasty rules regarding platform moderation. Elon needed help understanding when he purchased Twitter but realized that the rules he makes for one country may not be allowed in another country. He will have to make some trade-offs.
Suppose Twitter appeals to people who want to sensationalize hate speech. In that case, they may get a very dedicated user base, as we’ve seen with other social media platforms that give these extremists a platform. However, the general public wants something else. Hate speech is allowed to a certain extent, depending on the type of hate speech. If it’s threatening, where do you think the line gets drawn legally between what is allowed to be posted on Twitter and what is not?
Regarding speech that is punishable while still adhering to the First Amendment, you generally have two categories: genuine threats and defamation. An actual threat is usually considered to be running up to someone with a knife in hand and saying you are going to kill them, even if you don’t bring the knife down. If you point a gun at someone in real life and say you are going to shoot them, you will be arrested. Defamation is an untrue, specific factual assertion that impugns someone’s reputation. There is a third category, incitement-related speech, which is so inflammatory that it incites imminent lawless action. This is an incredibly high standard to meet, and it is rarely met.
Regarding what the law says, Twitter has to take down and moderate only a few categories of things. It’s mostly just an editorial decision about what they want their community to look like. This changed when Elon took over, as the line drawn for what is allowed on the platform shifted. However, it’s important to remember that free speech is a government right, not a platform right. Suppose a platform wants to create a community that is good for conversation. In that case, it can decide what content is allowed on its platform if it falls outside the categories of speech that are punishable by law.
Currently, there are many issues behind the scenes at Twitter, such as employees feeling overworked and lacking a clear vision. If Elon truly cares about Twitter and has good intentions for the platform, he could help it resurface by increasing support for creators and creating features that the general public cares about, which could help improve the user base and address the advertiser problem.