{"id":23906,"date":"2022-12-16T02:24:50","date_gmt":"2022-12-16T02:24:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2022\/12\/16\/elons-commitment-to-free-speech-rapidly-replaced-by-his-commitment-to-blatant-hypocrisy-bans-the-joinmastodon-account\/"},"modified":"2022-12-16T02:24:50","modified_gmt":"2022-12-16T02:24:50","slug":"elons-commitment-to-free-speech-rapidly-replaced-by-his-commitment-to-blatant-hypocrisy-bans-the-joinmastodon-account","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mailinvest.blog\/index.php\/2022\/12\/16\/elons-commitment-to-free-speech-rapidly-replaced-by-his-commitment-to-blatant-hypocrisy-bans-the-joinmastodon-account\/","title":{"rendered":"Elon\u2019s Commitment To Free Speech Rapidly Replaced By His Commitment To Blatant Hypocrisy: Bans The JoinMastodon Account"},"content":{"rendered":"

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from the a-hypocrite-is-hypocriting<\/i> dept<\/h3>\n

Oh, Elon. Following on yesterday\u2019s nonsense in banning the ElonJet account<\/a> that robotically posted the public information regarding Elon\u2019s private plane flights, and then trying to justify it later (after initially promising to keep the account alive to demonstrate his \u201ccommitment to free speech\u201d), it appears that Elon\u2019s commitment to free speech continues to dwindle.<\/p>\n

This afternoon it showed itself in the form of banning the @JoinMastodon account, which is the official account of the Mastodon federated, open source, social media network that has been growing by leaps and bounds, mostly from people exiting Twitter.<\/p>\n

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\"Image<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Its crime? From the Internet Archive<\/a>, it appears that its last tweet was\u2026 to let people know that the @ElonJet account exists on Mastodon:<\/p>\n

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\"Image<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Just earlier this week, in a Twitter spaces, Elon mocked Mastodon by claiming that people weren\u2019t going there because \u201cno one\u2019s listening,\u201d implying that the audience is too small. I\u2019ll just note that, personally, I\u2019ve found the opposite to be true. The engagement on Mastodon has been a lot more interesting and valuable than on Twitter of late.<\/p>\n

Either way, it does seem like Musk is doing the classic content moderation learning curve<\/a> in quite incredible speed \u2014 and still without actually learning anything<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now, we\u2019re the first to admit that content moderation at scale is impossible to do well<\/a>, and that it\u2019s important to give the benefit of the doubt to mistakes. But, seriously, how does one explain this?<\/p>\n

The Mastodon account did not violate even the new policy. I guess, if you did a really, really strained reading of the new policy, by linking to the ElonJet account on Mastodon, it was, in some twisted way, linking to travel routes, and that\u2019s banned? That\u2019s the best<\/em> explanation for this. But\u2026 it\u2019s still not a good one.<\/p>\n

And it definitely<\/em> does not show a commitment to free speech.<\/p>\n

Then, of course, there are the worst explanations for this, which is that Musk actually is nervous about how much Mastodon is growing. As impulsive as Musk appears to be, I actually doubt that\u2019s why this happened at all. But it still looks pretty, pretty bad.<\/p>\n

But, yeah. Every social media network needs some form of content moderation. It\u2019s not about \u201ccensorship,\u201d as some people keep claiming. But how that moderation plays out is very much dependent on who is in control over the site. And sometimes it may be a hypocritical billionaire surrounded by sycophants with no real commitment to anything other than himself.<\/p>\n

Anyway, I\u2019ve been hanging out at Mastodon myself, and it\u2019s been great. Come follow me there<\/a>. I\u2019m hoping to have some more posts soon about some of what I\u2019ve learned while there.<\/p>\n

\nFiled Under: content moderation<\/a>, elon musk<\/a>, elonjet<\/a>, hypocrisy<\/a>, mastodon<\/a>
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Companies: twitter<\/a>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n