Elon Musk tries (not) to buy Twitter. We need a broader discussion about the role of social media in society to answer the question of if we should let Musk buy Twitter.
Elon Musk has been in the news a lot recently due to his bid to buy Twitter, or mostly due to all the back and forth between Musk and the company as Musk has flipped between being excited for the purchase and claiming that Twitter has misled him. The original reasoning behind the offer to buy Twitter was that it, according to Musk, serves an important social function, stating: “Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated”. I’m personally not a fan of Twitter as a social media platform, but leaving that aside I think it’s worth discussing if social media platforms should be run as public or private companies. As I’ve argued previously on the blog, social media plays important political and cultural roles in modern society and as such we need to have a real discussion of how those institutions should be managed. You could make the case that platforms with that kind of reach and power should be regulated or state-controlled, but even if we decided that private ownership of social media is the better choice we should also consider what kind of ownership structure is most desirable.
On one hand having a single private owner like Musk could be a boon to Twitter as it can focus more on the platform’s long term health rather than constantly worrying about how investors will react to next quarter’s numbers. On the other hand though, there is certainly a risk that a strong single owner could alter the platform in their favour at the expense of those who have different views, political or otherwise. Then there’s the question of transparency, a public company is required to be more transparent with its financials than a private company. While the money Twitter generates is only really important as long as it is enough to keep the platform going in the context of free speech and democracy, transparency is always important to make public institutions work. If we take Musk at his word that the purchase really is motivated by a belief that it is crucial to modern democracy, he is taking on a tremendous responsibility to steward that institution to the benefit of all. I personally wouldn’t trust Musk to run any critical societal institution given how many CEO posts he holds concurrently as his focus must be very divided, and given how childishly he often acts, but even if he were the perfect candidate to run Twitter I’m not sure if taking it private is a net gain for free speech and democracy or not.
Unfortunately a lot of the talk surrounding the Twitter buyout is at the moment concentrated on whether or not Musk will be able to cancel the deal, and if so how much that would cost him. The question of whether or not social media platforms should be allowed to be controlled by very wealthy individuals, bought and sold on a whim, should not be left to business lawyers and billionaires. There should be a public debate ending with a parliamentary decision on whether or not social media firms are to be treated like any other business or if they perform a vital public service and thus should be subjected to different rules. If Twitter really is the digital town square on which our democracy rests then it would be strikingly undemocratic to let a single man without any official mandate run it. I don’t think it is all that important, but clearly Musk does. Before the Twitter deal can be settled we must settle on how we as a society should treat social media.
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I've always been interested in politics, economics, and the interplay between. The blog is a place for me to explore different ideas and concepts relating to economics or politics, be that national or international. The goal for the blog is to make you think; to provide new perspectives.
Written by Karl Johansson
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Cover photo by Brett Jordan from Pexels, edited by Karl Johansson
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