On Friday, Elon Musk postponed a decision to return former President Donald Trump to Twitter by announcing the removal of sanctions on three other banned accounts.
Musk tweeted on Friday, “Trump decision has not yet been made.”
The internet entrepreneur did unveil the relaunch of satirical news site Babylon Bee, controversial author Jordan Peterson, and outspoken comic Kathy Griffin.
“New Twitter policy is freedom of expression, but not freedom of reach,” Musk explained in a tweet.
“Negative/hate tweets will be deboosted and demonetized to the maximum extent possible, resulting in no adverts or other revenue for Twitter.”
“You won’t discover the [particular] tweet until you deliberately seek it out, which is no different than the rest of the Internet,” Musk noted.
Musk, who paid $44 billion for Twitter, has long promised to restore Trump, who has been barred from the service since the events of January 6, 2021, in the US Capitol.
Trump, for one, has promised to remain on Truth Social, the social networking program he developed after being barred from major sites during the Capitol incident.
Kathie Griffin, Jorden Peterson & Babylon Bee have been reinstated.
Trump decision has not yet been made.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 18, 2022
Large advertisers on Twitter have allegedly vowed to cut connections with the platform if Musk reinstates Trump.
The Babylon Bee was banned from Twitter earlier this year when it shared a link to a satirical news item declaring that a transgender Biden administration official, Rachel Levine, had been chosen “man of the year.”
Griffin, who was famously seen with what seemed to be Trump’s severed head after he was elected president in 2016, was recently barred from Twitter for impersonating Musk after he updated the site’s blue-tick verification method.
Peterson, the Canadian self-help author and psychologist, was banned from Twitter in the summer after he commented on the gender transition surgery undergone by the actor Elliot Page.
After Musk took ownership of Twitter, the service rolled out a new “blue-check” verification program, Twitter Blue, whereby users could purchase the badge for $8 per month.
Pranksters took advantage of the offer and impersonated well-known celebrities, political figures and corporate brands. They then posted nonsensical items for laughs.
One prankster passed themselves off as the official Twitter account of pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly and pledged to give away free insulin — causing the company’s stock to drop precipitously.
Since Musk assumed the helm three weeks ago, Twitter has been in chaos.
A mass exodus of employees who refused Musk’s ultimatum to commit to a “hardcore” work schedule has left a skeleton staff at the site — leading some to predict that the app will collapse.
News source: https://nypost.com/
