{"id":96514,"date":"2022-04-27T08:16:58","date_gmt":"2022-04-27T02:46:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/centralrecorder.com\/elon-musk-as-a-one-man-media-power-broker-is-scary-as-hell\/"},"modified":"2022-04-27T08:16:58","modified_gmt":"2022-04-27T02:46:58","slug":"elon-musk-as-a-one-man-media-power-broker-is-scary-as-hell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/centralrecorder.com\/elon-musk-as-a-one-man-media-power-broker-is-scary-as-hell\/","title":{"rendered":"Elon Musk as a One-Man Media Power Broker Is Scary as Hell"},"content":{"rendered":"
Placing the power of Twitter in the hands of a single man \u2014 however smart, interesting or entertaining \u2014 is a really bad idea<\/p>\n
Placing the power of Twitter in the hands of a single man \u2014 however smart, interesting or entertaining \u2014 is a really bad idea.\u00a0The entire apparatus of democracy is built on the bedrock of free expression, and the function of media is to hold the powerful to account by ensuring transparency.\u00a0<\/p>\n
When a single person owns that platform\u2026 you see where this becomes difficult.<\/p>\n
As a media outlet, Twitter is singular in so many ways. It\u2019s a massive network that instantly transmits information (and misinformation and invective and mean jokes about Bill Gates\u2026 all weekend) directly to millions of users. In the hands of a single owner, we cannot know all the consequences. But I predict they are not good. Not good for democracy. Not good for public discourse.\u00a0<\/p>\n We have already seen what happens when a single\u00a0user\u00a0<\/em>\u2013 then-president Donald Trump \u2014 abuses the platform, spreading lies about our democratic process and poisoning public discourse through his Twitter feed. Professional news media could not compete with the speed and impact of that misinformation. Our democracy came through it by the skin of our teeth, and at the time \u2014 just over a year ago \u2014 Twitter decided to kick Trump out.\u00a0<\/p>\n Would Elon have done the same?\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n And in the absence of shareholders or a board answering to their interests, who will hold him to account? Jack Dorsey? Jeff Bezos? Peter Thiel? His mother?\u00a0<\/p>\n We already live with the reality of a single person, Mark Zuckerberg, as the controlling shareholder of an enormous media platform, Facebook \u2013 or rather Meta (whatever that is) \u2014 despite being a public company. As we have seen, Zuckerberg is resistant to acknowledge the consequences of Facebook\u2019s role in media \u2014 the source of news for\u00a036% of U.S. adults, according to Pew research<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n