[hardnose]

>I was pretty firmly of the theory that his real motive re Twitter was basically narcissism, and I'm still not sure that's wrong.

Why is it so hard to believe that Musk genuinely believes in exactly the version of "freedom of speech" that everyone in his generation grew up with, that served as the impetus for much of the internet's creation, etc.?

[colinmhayes]

Well personally I don't believe that because I watched his ted talk and it didn't seem like he had spent more than a few minutes thinking through the specifics of what his implementation of free speech would mean.

[hn2017]

Agree, he seems to lacking incredible nuance in the different levels of free speech.

[weeblewobble]

It seems like a lot of people (Rogan, the Thiel guys, Calcanis) are coming to him talking about free speech, and he kind of nods along, but I didn't really see anything that demonstrated his own passion for the topic. He seems primarily motivated by a belief that Twitter is poorly run as a business, and that it will be difficult or impossible to turn it around as a public company.

[p49k]

Because this viewpoint isn’t consistent with his actions; he has a long history of retaliating against anyone who criticizes him, including attacking journalists and threatening them with lawsuits as well as firing employees who raise issues within his companies.

[robswc]

How is "retaliating against criticism" contradictory to free speech?

I could certainly argue with someone on HN but also say their banning is unjust (if I felt that it was).

This has been a "solved" issue for centuries.

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/06/01/defend-say/

[andrewflnr]

Your comment is baffling. You ask, 'How is "retaliating against criticism" contradictory to free speech?', then spend the rest of your comment explaining why it's good to not retaliate against criticism.

Did you mean to ask and answer your own question? If that was your intent it sure wasn't clear. Do you not know what "retaliate" means, even with the context clue of threatening lawsuits against journalists? Is your first paragraph meant to be entirely causally disconnected from the rest? If so I kind of have to respect it, but it would sure help to give us some clues because that is not a conventional writing structure. What, in short, are you trying to say?

[robswc]

There is nothing contradictory about retaliating against criticism.

>Do you not know what "retaliate" means

I'm using the actual definition, which I assumed you were too?

"make an attack or assault in return for a similar attack."

If someone were to criticize you, you can "retaliate" while also believing said person should be kicked off the platform. I'm doing it right now.

>threatening lawsuits against journalists

https://www.google.com/search?q=elon+musk+threaten+lawsuit+j...

I can't find anything about this, except for a FastCompany article which I can't access atm because their website is down.

[p49k]

Retaliation with the intent to silence critics is acting to undermine free speech. He could, for example, welcome the criticism and respond with facts.

[robswc]

>Retaliation with the intent to silence critics

which critics?

When I search for this, I get this article:

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/25/elon-musk-and-free-speech-tr...

Which is full of honestly ridiculous examples like "he told an analyst to shut up and stop asking boneheaded questions." Or "he told his followers to edit his wikipedia page" ...?

The "best" examples are of workers are are currently in litigation.

Everything else, I see no reason why one couldn't support free speech on a social platform while also requiring beta testers to sign NDAs.

>welcome the criticism and respond with facts Do you have examples of where/when this could have been done?

At the end of the day, I feel like a lot of this just comes from the fact that when one supports free speech, it comes with a *. It's easier to say "I support free speech" vs "I support the idea people should be able to post their opinions online without being banned (this doesn't mean anyone can post live execution videos or organize crime, etc)."

[rchaud]

He grew up with freedom of speech in apartheid South Africa?

[hardnose]

I feel like this response deliberately avoids the point I was making, in favor of kicking up confusion.

He grew up on the internet. At a time when everyone was turning their internet web pages black to protest censorship. At a time when "the internet interprets censorship as damage and routes around it" was a slogan touted proudly by technologists and philosophers.

It's not Elon Musk that changed, it seems to me. It's the cultural values on the internet that have changed, and arguably not for the better - more control, more censorship, more centralization.

[teachrdan]

> He grew up on the internet

Elon Musk was born in 1971. He grew up on television.

[hardnose]

So, no thoughts on how Musk's attitude seems remarkably consistent with the speech and actions of the internet's founding minds, I take it?

[deanCommie]

> "freedom of speech" that everyone in his generation grew up with, that served as the impetus for much of the internet's creation

Yes, because bulletin board systems famously had no moderation whatsoever.

Wait...

[hardnose]

I don't know how much you remember about the transition from BBSes to the internet, but the heavy handed moderation of FidoNet is one of the exact reasons we all flooded into UseNet when it started to become available, and most likely a big part of why "FidoNet" is consigned to history's dustbin despite being, at one time, the most popular forum discussion system.

[andrewflnr]

Because if that's his real motivation, it's more efficient to build a competitor. It would probably be even more efficient to put polish on existing competitors like Mastodon. Buying Twitter is one of the silliest possible approaches. Thus, skepticism.

[malshe]

I wonder whether Elon supports the freedom of speech in China