Elon Musk will steer Twitter on a course to avoid being either a “free-for-all hellscape” or another social media “echo chamber,” he said in a Thursday post.
Musk is buying Twitter, with the deal set to close by Friday. On Thursday, he sought to address speculation about what the Musk era might bring with a post headlined “Dear Twitter Advertisers.”
A report in the Wall Street Journal had framed advertisers, who make up the bulk of Twitter’s revenue, as uneasy that Musk might do away with content moderation.
“I wanted to reach out personally to share my motivation in acquiring Twitter. There has been much speculation about why I bought Twitter and what I think about advertising. Most of it has been wrong,” Musk wrote.
Although reports have said Musk wanted to cut employees at Twitter by 75 percent, a report by Bloomberg said that when Musk met with Twitter employees on Wednesday, he said that was not taking place.
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In his post, Musk offered a lofty version of his motives.
“The reason I acquired Twitter is because it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square, where a wide range of beliefs can be debated in a healthy manner, without resorting to violence,” he wrote.
Musk then decried the impact of existing social media polarization.
“There is currently great danger that social media will splinter into far right wing and far left wing echo chambers that generate more hate and divide our society,” he wrote.
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“In the relentless pursuit of clicks, much of traditional media has fueled and catered to those polarized extremes, as they believe that is what brings in the money, but, in doing so, the opportunity for dialogue is lost,” he wrote.
Musk wrote that he did not acquire Twitter “to make more money. I did it to try to help humanity, whom I love.”
Using a word rarely associated with Musk,…
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