Elon Musk takes over of the Twitter To be complete. After going into the company’s headquarters on a Play with the word “sink” Earlier this week, the Tesla founder officially took the helm, closing a $44 billion deal and mining at least four of the company’s top brass in the process.
Everyone knew this was coming, knew Musk intend to make changes about how the site is moderated (or not). They used to scary day since news of the deal started spreading in April. So yes, people went to the foundation’s burial ground – i.e. the bird app itself – to deliver its eulogy.
Not long after Musk dashed into Twitter HQ with a sink, NBC News writer Ben Collins posted a reminder on the platform: “Okay guys, this is Hour 0 for this site, post your favorite tweets and give them a kiss goodbye.” He attached a screenshot of a 2021 tweet that read, “Me and my friends will kill ET with a hammer, I can tell you a lot of that.”
Another topic call for Members of the Black Twitter to share “things you learned, people you met, memes, tweets, videos”.
Both threads reveal the long string of Twitter’s biggest hits, the little moments that, since 2006, have made this site. And while many praised Twitter That Was, others – who did not recommend alternative platforms – talked about how to use the site’s existing functionality to keep the bad guys out. Because all the chatter about Twitter is a hell of a space, people go back and forth over and over again, avoiding racists, deviantists, TERFs, homophobes and Nazis with hoping to find a poignant tweet or an impactful topic will make it all worthwhile.
Those are the moments that people fear losing the most. Because even as Musk talks about wanting Twitter to be a digital city squarehe also has some insightful ideas about content moderation, ideas that can be devalued or completely removed, important voices for the platform.
Like Chris Stokel-Walker reported, bot followers noticed an uptick in right-wing accounts in April after Musk’s deal made headlines. Some have pointed out that those who have been de-disclosed could return to Musk-censored Twitter, which Christopher Bouzy of Bot Sentinel’s bot detection system said “could be catastrophic for women and communities disadvantaged groups already face targeted abuse and harassment on the platform.”
In general, I tend to agree with my colleague Jason Parham that a mass exodus from Twitter not necessarily a bad thing. If it happens – something that could still be a few years away – it “could lead to the next iteration of the social network somewhere else”. Digital culture is constantly changing, and it is not necessary to stay on a platform that is already a nightmare. However, in this moment, it’s hard to hear the prayer being sung on Twitter and not want to sing along.
