Is Musk's libertarian views turning Twitter into a mess?
Elon Musk's remarks about his purchase of Twitter indicated his intention to eliminate content control on the platform, sparking widespread debate about the uncertainty surrounding her future.
"Historically, the term freedom of expression is to facilitate discussion between people with a different perspective on different policies with what looks like a marketplace of ideas, but Musk has a liberal, idealistic perception of this market," said Kevin Easterling, a professor of political science and public policy at the University of California, California.
"This is contrary to two problems of expression, the first is that Twitter is more common than the market, which means that there are no prices that determine people's contribution to it, which may lead them to misuse it, as if we were giving permission to factories to pollute the environment as they please," he said.
"The second problem is that even effective markets are regulated by a set of rules by the government that prevent fraud and monopoly, and if Twitter loses these rules, it will be contaminated with all kinds of content and bad people, which will prevent the market for ideas from working on the platform, and hinder the goal of freedom of expression in achieving democracy," he said, according to Tech Explorer.
Easterling advised musk's need to adjust to Twitter; he said it was "economically useless for Musk not to have some kind of effective management of the platform, because the absence of management and tight terms of use would lead twitter to become a poorly content platform that would drive users and advertisers to leave it."
"Twitter is a big enough organization and needs to be managed by a team that is likely to consult Musk on platform policies, to keep users, employees and advertisers satisfied," said Easterling, director of the Technology, Communications and Democracy Laboratory.
Easterling expressed concern that Twitter may back down in restricting the spread of misinformation because it "leads to more violence and diminishes the value of democracy based on sharing opinions and convictions in specific facts."
"Musk has strong views on unrestricted expression, and it could turn the platform into a mess of unrestricted expression, but I think no one knows the answer to that, not even Musk himself, because having abstract ideas is quite different from the practice of setting the necessary conditions and complex policies for the use of social media," Easterling said.
"Social media platforms restrict harmful content that users alienate while allowing content that users find attractive."
Easterling predicted that Musk would allow former U.S. President Donald Trump to return to Twitter, after being denied it, which could have major implications for the spread of misinformation on Twitter, and give Trump the opportunity to make a bigger appearance in the upcoming election.
Twitter's future remains uncertain, and opinions about its continuation as an organization run by a team of specialists, or its transformation into a private one-person company, are directly influenced by its personal views.
Easterling said past experiences of billionaires acquiring media platforms have shown that they do not necessarily have to become politicians.
"Jeff Bezos bought The Washington Post, and Patrick Suwon Cheung bought the LA Times, but their own ideas didn't affect the publications of these two newspapers because they have an editorial team and a private newsroom," Easterling said.
"Twitter also has several teams dedicated to monitoring and maintaining integrity of content, but they don't have independent authority, so Musk's personal views are likely to have an impact on determining Twitter trends, and people will see his ownership of the platform as a political activity."
