Elon Musk’s first day as owner of Twitter was marked by confusion, anxiety and celebration on the social network, with some users testing conspiracy theories to see if the company’s disinformation policy was in place.
While no immediate change in the company’s policy was announced until late Friday night, users were quick to applaud or criticize what they hope will be the swift fulfillment of billionaire Elon Musk’s promises to reduce moderation in an attempt to promote free speech.
This Friday, the new owner of the social network announced the creation of a “content moderation board”, which will be responsible for making decisions about the restoration of certain profiles blocked by the previous administration of this platform.
But conservative personalities have become repeat conspiracy theories long exposed, including due to covid-19 or the 2020 US election, in an ironic attempt to “check if Twitter’s disinformation policy is being enforced.”
Popular right-wing experts have published “buzzwords” such as “ivermectin”. [medicamento para matar parasitas divulgado por republicanos e outros conservadores durante o início da pandemia] or “Trump won” to see if they get punished for content they think was previously flagged.
“Ok @elonmusk, is this thing on?” [Ok, @elonmusk, isto está ligado..?, em português]wrote Steve Cortez, a former newsmax conservative television commentator and adviser to former President Donald Trump, before writing, “There are two genders and Trump won ivermectin stones.”
Also Thursday, in a letter aimed at reassuring advertisers, Musk promised that Twitter would not be “a hellish public platform where you can say whatever you want without repercussions.”
But the public still doesn’t know what the new phase of the social network will be and what it will tolerate, while analysts are waiting to find out who will stay, who will leave and who could potentially return after the ban, with Trump at the top.
The Associated Press (AP) has checked at least a dozen other Twitter accounts that have been suspended by the platform, including those used by right-wing activist James O’Keeffe and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, and each has a “prohibited account.” message this Friday.
The former president, through his social network Truth Social, praised Elon Musk’s confirmation of the deal. “Now Twitter is in good hands and will no longer be run by lunatics and maniacs on the radical left who really hate our country,” he said.
Earlier in the day, several US media outlets repeated the news that rapper Kanye West (now Ye) had regained access to his account.
Twitter decided to block the singer’s profile in early October after playing anti-Semitic comments.
However, by the end of the day on Friday, there was no evidence that the status of the E account had changed.
Musk, the chief executive of Tesla and SpaceX, has completed a $44 billion purchase of Twitter (a similar cost in euros) and fired key executives.
Thus, the company’s shareholders will receive 54.20 US dollars (about 54.4 euros) for each share, and the social network will become the property of the philanthropist.
