3 ms·

> His reputation has been completely destroyed. I take it you mean "...with you." I, for one, find more and more respect for him. Somebody has to protect the f

> His reputation has been completely destroyed. I take it you mean "...with you." I, for one, find more and more respect for him. Somebody has to protect the free speech. What he did was very courageous and very difficult (I mean purchasing of Twitter, not the layoffs, obviously). Just look at the amount of vitriol that has been thrown at him for daring to stand for the free speech.

dkersten 4y ago
Where exactly is he protecting free speech? He’s banned people for saying things that hurt his ego.
xkqd 4y ago
While I agree the notion is noble, I believe it’s simpler to assume he incorrectly saw value in owning the town hall, and allowed his own hubris to suppress any of his own doubts. I genuinely don’t believe this was originally about free speech. I think he noted that as a compelling argument for owning the cheapest social media network. If this was truly about free speech, I’d imagine there’s more effective ways of doing so. He could have funded journalism programs. He could have been established decentralized communication platforms that can’t be tampered with. None of those require betting the farm, and all of those directly promote free dialogue.
gorgoiler 4y ago
You might be able to see some way on which Musk’s Twitter purchase had virtue, but there is still the objective fact that he bought the company as part of a pre-trial settlement agreement to avoid a Delaware court case. It’s hard to spin that as anything other than hugely damaging to his business reputation.
crummy 4y ago
What do you think Twitter's stance on free speech is now vs before?
- g42gregory 4y ago
  I think it's much better now. It's not a "free speech absolutist" place, nor should it be. Elon Musk never subscribed to this, as far as I could recall. It's basically rejecting things that are illegal and that are very offensive. "Very offensive" is subjective, of course, but if you move the line far enough, it becomes less of an issue. There are occasional things that fall outside of this category (aptly described in this thread), but, on the balance, it is nothing like a censorship that it was before.

dkersten 4y ago

Where exactly is he protecting free speech? He’s banned people for saying things that hurt his ego.

xkqd 4y ago

While I agree the notion is noble, I believe it’s simpler to assume he incorrectly saw value in owning the town hall, and allowed his own hubris to suppress any of his own doubts. I genuinely don’t believe this was originally about free speech. I think he noted that as a compelling argument for owning the cheapest social media network. If this was truly about free speech, I’d imagine there’s more effective ways of doing so. He could have funded journalism programs. He could have been established decentralized communication platforms that can’t be tampered with. None of those require betting the farm, and all of those directly promote free dialogue.

gorgoiler 4y ago

You might be able to see some way on which Musk’s Twitter purchase had virtue, but there is still the objective fact that he bought the company as part of a pre-trial settlement agreement to avoid a Delaware court case. It’s hard to spin that as anything other than hugely damaging to his business reputation.

crummy 4y ago

What do you think Twitter's stance on free speech is now vs before?

g42gregory 4y ago
I think it's much better now. It's not a "free speech absolutist" place, nor should it be. Elon Musk never subscribed to this, as far as I could recall. It's basically rejecting things that are illegal and that are very offensive. "Very offensive" is subjective, of course, but if you move the line far enough, it becomes less of an issue. There are occasional things that fall outside of this category (aptly described in this thread), but, on the balance, it is nothing like a censorship that it was before.