Employees saved Musk from himself over Twitter Files Longtime Twitter staffers saved Elon Musk from himself, according to a letter from the US Federal Trade Commission chair. When Twitter was Twitter and not X, several journalists published documents regarding the company's activities before it was acquired by Musk, including the workings of the company's moderation and policy …
“ which include Twitter's agreement not to lie to consumers”
The order I found was in 2010:
https://www.ftc.gov/sites/default/files/documents/cases/2011/03/110311twitterdo.pdf
It reads Like a SOX requirement except a rider that you will protect CUSTOMERS privacy. Not Twitters internal policies. I would love to see the internal twitter policy that was required by the FTC
In theory, I think Elon was probably trying to do what he thought was right. After all, he proudly touts free speech*. The best way to at least appear to support that concept is stop blocking anything.
The problem is that some of the info Twitter held is private, and needs to remain so. For legal reasons, and in some cases, safety. We don't (and can't) have totally free speech. We have free speech with restrictions. That applies in the UK, and it applies in the US as well (try posting something classified in America, and see how far the 1st amendment gets you).
*I know he touts it, but his own actions suggest he doesn't really believe in it because although he says he will allow people to post even if he disagrees with them (a laudable aim and something I try and do when in a moderating role), a surprising number of people he doesn't agree with have been banned from X.
"In theory, I think Elon was probably trying to do what he thought was right."
No Stuart. Musk has some passing familiarity with commercial contracts and negotiations between companies, that must be kept secret to safe guard whatever proposed deal or vendor / supplier relationship.
He is also certainly aware of the concept of "regulatory compliance" as evidenced by his numerous court cases in that area.
He did what he thought would generate headlines.
Pretty sure that "leftists" is now the conservative/hard-right's preferred bogeyman term for anyone to the left of Genghis Khan and Ayn Rand.
Of course, let's remember that Musk is a self-proclaimed "Free speech absolutist", and it's great to see him uphold that principle.... except when it comes to those he disagrees with, apparently.
Your mistake lies in assuming that the Rabid Right is interested in even pretending that they're consistent, making sense or not contradicting themselves any more than they care about telling the truth.
They're not- that much has been obvious for a long time. The only question is whether they're doing so deliberately as a tactic- it's pretty effective when you're arguing against people who care about that sort of thing and get bogged pointing it out while you ignore it and smugly move on to the next (contradictory) accusation or lie- or whether they'll tell themselves and others whatever they want to hear or believe at the moment.
The answer is, I suspect, "why not both?"
It does all stink very much of the influence of Russia and Russian-driven-propaganda which isn't much interested in the tedious overheads of truth and consistency, because it doesn't need to be.
Quite the opposite- all that matters is that discord is sown and that Western society is undermined and dragged down to Russia's squalid level- and having people argue about obvious lies is just another way to achieve that.
There was an excellent Britcom in the 90s called Brittas Empire. If you haven't seen it, you should absolutely try to find a way to do so, but it's basically about a well-meaning manager of a leisure center (public gym/rec center) who always ends up making things worse. That describes Xitler, minus the well-meaning part. He's like the proverbial bull in a China shop. He never really stops to think anything through, he just acts purely on impulse. Which is why Telsa and SpaceX have people whose whole job is to babysit him and keep him as far away from the actual day-to-day as possible.
There was a hilarious story some former SpaceX employee told. Xitler's SpaceX secretary sends out some kind of message about a surprise birthday party. Of course this is done via an inbox Xitler shares with the person, so either he was directing his own "surprise" party or he doesn't even bother checking his SpaceX email. Given he's created at least two Xitter accounts to fluff his own ego, my money would be on the former. It might well be the first conspiracy theory Alex Jones was ever right about, when he started wondering if it was Xitler commenting under a fake name during some Xitter Spaces thing about how people in government are really lizard people or something. And incidentally, listening to a conversation about government officials being lizard people is apparently more important than running the multiple business interests Xitler is involved in, yet he seems to think that he is owed one of the most generous compensation packages in the corporate world at Tesla, and is all butt-hurt that the judge in Delaware blocked it.
《There was an excellent Britcom in the 90s called Brittas Empire.》
Arnold Rimmer's retirement job. :)
Excellent series.
In this case more like halfarse empire.
I imagine a fool winning some mega-lottery and buying a Nimitz class carrier without thinking what he actually was going do with it, or indeed be allowed to do with it, except in Musk's case it would be a Ford class vessel.
The Twitter Files were evidence that the FBI and others had unfettered access into peoples private messages and could suppress stories. Such as the Hunter Biden Laptop Story.
How Twitter suppressed the Hunter Biden laptop story
Latest Twitter Files shows CIA, FBI have spent years meddling in content moderation
Twitter Files Part 6 reveals FBI's ties to tech giant: 'As if it were a subsidiary'
Hate to make an ad hominem, but an AC posting links to a bunch of right-wing sites more interested in pushing propaganda than factual news... Russia's efforts at electron interference are getting considerably less sophisticated. Maybe they can't afford high quality trolls after all those sanctions?
This post has been deleted by its author
So, we should only believe news from left-wing sites? The Guardian is the ultimate source of truth, and they don't push any propaganda?
The thing to bear in mind here is the Hunter laptop story was true. It might well have swung the election had it not been suppressed or ignored by almost all the media. Social media sites all suppressed it. It was a BIG public interest story. The Bidens have got their fingers into all kinds of shady deals, including El Presidento.
Of course "The Russians" would like to draw attention to all the illegal interference by the FBI, because it makes the west look bad. We all know that Russia is way way more corrupt, but it helps them to be able to say "Look, those bastards are all at it too!".
Isn't it possible that yes, it helps Russia... and also yes, the FBI and the Bidens are also up to illegal stuff which is in the public interest?
Should we just ignore this because it helps Russia? Because we're all good patriots, we should turn a blind eye? Should we just let them get up to whatever the hell they like, because we all hate Trump so much? Perhaps social media sites should damp down anything from The Spectator or The New York Post, and amplify anything from The New York Times or The Guardian? Can you see where that leads?
There are people at SpaceX and Tesla who are part of secret teams dedicated just to keeping Elmo from doing too much damage by trying to manage because he's a complete dumbass. The only thing positive thing he has is money to fund cool stuff, which is great, but the more you let him actually make decisions, the more you get Twitter or the Cybertruck.
He's been too busy with effing up other things to do much damage to SpaceX recently, and because of that they've been doing amazingly well.
So yeah, anyhow, any sane, non-spiteful decisions are coming from someone who's not Elmo.
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