Elon Musk ended weeks of speculation May 10, saying he would allow former President Donald Trump back on Twitter (TWTR) if he completes his acquisition of the company.
At a Future of the Car event hosted by the Financial Times, the Tesla (TSLA) and SpaceX founder said that he would reverse the ban on Trump that the social media platform enacted after the fatal January 6, 2021 insurrection.
Last month, Twitter agreed to be purchased by Musk for $44 billion in a takeover bid that sent shockwaves across the tech industry.
"I think that was a mistake," Musk said of the Trump ban at the May 10 event. "[...] It alienated a large part of the country and did not ultimately result in Donald Trump not having a voice."
Musk claimed Trump "is now going to be on Truth social, as will a large part of the ... right in the United States." Truth Social, Trump's copycat microblogging site, had about 2 million users as of March vs. 300 million for Twitter, according to data compiled by Statistia. Trump himself rarely posts on the site. During his presidency, Trump frequently tweeted many times a day.
Trump has claimed he won't rejoin Twitter even if the ban on him is lifted.
What Else Does Musk Have In Store For Twitter?
While Musk's comments on Trump were the most widely-covered moment of the speech, he made a number of other announcements about his plans for Twitter.
Calling Twitter the "least bad" town square, Musk said that the social media platform has too much of a left-wing bias — insisting it needs to be more balanced to build trust among conservatives.
"Twitter needs to be even handed and [...] victory would be that the 10% of the most far right and the 10% of the most far left would be equally upset," Musk said in his speech. "I don't think this is a, a situation where you're going to necessarily get a lot of praise. You're just going to balance the anger."
While Musk did not elaborate on what "even-handedness" would mean, many predict that it will lead to more lax content moderation rules as well as a focus on subscription instead of advertising.
A day earlier, Musk had also said that he is "exactly aligned" with the new law against harmful and dangerous content that will soon come into effect in European Union countries. Termed the Digital Services Act, the act will impose up to a 6% fine for platforms that fail to control harmful content.
Twitter Algorithm For All?
Ever since Twitter first hit the scene in 2006, the question about what exactly constitutes harmful content has divided users. In prior statements, Musk indicated that he views it more as calling for direct violence rather than harassing or piling onto individual users.
One more change hinted at by Musk includes open-sourcing the algorithm behind the platform. A subset of users often complain that certain parts of which posts one sees and how certain features work are couched in proprietary secrecy; having the algorithm public would make it more accessible but also pose security risks from hackers.
"I would literally literally just put the Twitter algorithm on GitHub and say l'Hey, anyone wanna suggest changes to this, please go ahead?'" Musk said at the event.
On Twitter, People Are Not Exactly Happy
Musk's announcements were followed by celebrations in the name of free speech from the right and apprehension over what a looser harassment policy will mean.
But above all else, many were unhappy at the prospect of once again hearing Trump on the platform.
"Giving someone who tried to overturn an election and helped incite an insurrection a major forum to continue undermining democracy is dangerous," Noah Bookbinder, president of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, wrote on his Twitter account. "Neither Elon Musk nor anyone else should reverse Donald Trump's Twitter ban."
Musk said he expects the acquisition could close in two or three months, depending on regulatory approvals.
