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Since Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced he would buy social networking giant Twitter, the topic of free speech has become popular among many online users both inside and outside the cryptocurrency industry.
Twitter announced on Monday that it would become a private company after the board accepted a bid from Musk. Musk will buy back the company's stock for $54.20 per share in cash — about $44 billion. Although the transaction is expected to be completed in 2022, it is still subject to approval by Twitter shareholders as well as some regulators.
In a post before the transaction went public, Musk said, "I hope that even my worst critics will still use Twitter because that's what free speech means." Tesla's ceo tweeted: "Freedom of speech is the basis of an effective democracy and Twitter is a digital square."
However, many people seem to assume that this tens of billions of dollars transaction will have the opposite effect. Angelo Carusone, president of the nonprofit social media watchdog Media Matters for America, expressed concern over the announcement that Twitter's approval of the transaction "would be a victory for fake news and its promoters." He suggested that Musk would unilaterally decide to allow accounts banned for provoking violence to resume operations.
.@GoAngelo: "A sale to #ElonMusk without any conditions will pollute the entire information ecosystem by opening the floodgate of hate and lies. #Twitter's board needs to take this into account now before the deal is done." https://t.co/WBoEr1p9Lb
— Francisco Taveira (@jftaveira1993) April 25, 2022
Jackson Palmer, co-founder of the Dogecoin meme token (DOGE), which Musk often promotes on social media, called the transaction a "hostile takeover" as opposed to the idea of freedom. Bitcoin investor Anthony "Pomp" Pompliano congratulated twitter's new boss, while cryptocurrency lender BlockFi appeared to take a more derisive look, posting a collage of his dog Dogecoin and Twitter's logo.
Michael Saylor, founder and CEO of MicroStrategy, did not comment directly on the acquisition. Instead, he responded to Musk by reiterating the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, indicating that he supports the move. Jody Hice, a member of the House of Representatives who supported fake news in the 2020 U.S. Presidential Election, also hailed the transaction as a victory for the First Amendment.
Elon Musk just bought Twitter!
WELCOME BACK FIRST AMENDMENT!
— Rep. Jody Hice (@CongressmanHice) April 25, 2022
What supporters of the First Amendment mean by Musk's takeover of Twitter is unclear. But this amendment to the Constitution does not limit free speech to private companies in the U.S. but prohibits Congress from approving laws prohibiting certain types of speech. The U.S. court had previously ruled that freedom of expression did not include causing "imminent unlawful actions." Similarly, Twitter's rules state that the platform does not allow users to "threaten violence against a person or group of people" or incite others to engage in harassment.
“The first amendment’s free speech protections don’t apply to private companies” was never meant to be a challenge and yet here we are
— Hayes Brown (@HayesBrown) April 25, 2022
Musk, with more than 83 million followers, outpacing Twitter's previous CEO Jack Dorsey with just 6.3 million, is likely to influence behavior on the platform and the social network after the acquisition. The Tesla CEO said on April 14 that one of his top priorities for Twitter is to eliminate "phishing junk bots and bots and an army of bots," including those involved in cryptocurrency scams.
Twitter's stock is worth $51.70, up more than 32% in the past 30 days.
