- Friday, April 19, 2024
By: Shubham Ghosh
Elon Musk, the new owner of Twitter, on Saturday (19) posted a poll on the social media platform asking whether former US president Donald Trump’s account should be reinstated, months after he promised to reverse the ban which was put after the violence at the Capitol in January 2021.
Reinstate former President Trump
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 19, 2022
The tweet was widely received with millions voting either in favour of the ‘yes’ or ‘no’ option.
“Vox Populi, Vox Dei,” Musk wrote in another tweet, a Latin phrase that implies “the voice of the people is the voice of God.”
Vox Populi, Vox Dei
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 19, 2022
A day earlier, Musk said that a decision to bring back the temperamental politician on Twitter was yet to be made and that Twitter had reinstated some controversial accounts that had either been banned or suspended.
The poll comes months after Elon Musk said that he would reverse the ban on Trump.
Twitter had imposed the ban on Trump on January 9, 2021, just a few days after the Capitol violence. The move had come after he called those who had stormed the Capitol as “patriots”.
It said the decision was taken “due to the risk of further incitement of violence”.
Trump was succeeded on January 20 by Joe Biden as the president of the US after the former lost the 2020 election.
Meanwhile, Trump, who welcomed the recent change of guard at Twitter, on Monday (14) asked an appeals court to revive his lawsuit against the social media giant challenging his permanent suspension from the platform.
On Friday, Musk unveiled a new content-moderation policy and reinstated some accounts.
New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach.
Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted & demonetized, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter.
You won’t find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 18, 2022
In a series of tweets, the billionaire entrepreneur said the new policy is freedom of speech and not freedom of reach, pointing out that “hate tweets” will be max deboosted.
This means Twitter will minimise how many users see ‘hate speech’ and the number of ads appearing alongside it.
“Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted and demonetised, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter. You won’t find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet,” Musk said, adding that it applied just to the individual tweet, and not the whole account.
