Posters to X — the site formerly known as Twitter — may have to contend with more spam, more harassment and the consequences of more unregulated free speech.
The social media platform’s owner, billionaire Tesla chief Elon Musk, announced Friday he intends to remove users’ ability to ‘block’ other users across every aspect of the social media site, excluding private ‘direct messages.’
Musk’s comments yielded an outpouring of concern from the site’s users, including many subscribers to its $8-per-month ‘Twitter Blue,’ now ‘X Premium,’ services, who compared ‘block’ to ‘self-defense’ and their rights under the 2nd Amendment.
But Twitter’s co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey praised the move, replying ‘100. mute only.’
The current owner of X (formerly Twitter), billionaire Tesla chief Elon Musk, announced he intends to remove users’ ability to ‘block’ other users across every aspect of the microblogging site, except for ‘direct messages.’ The statement caused a flurry of debate on the platform
Musk (left) has courted controversy repeatedly over changes to the social media site, which he assumed ownership of last October. A worker (right) dismantles Twitter’s sign at the site’s corporate headquarters on July 24, 2023, after Musk renamed the platform ‘X’
Twitter’s new name and logo, ‘X.’ as seen atop of its headquarters in downtown San Francisco, on July 30, 2023
Twitter’s co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey praised the move, replying ‘100. mute only’
But Musk’s comments yielded an outpouring of concern from the site’s users, including many subscribers to its $8-per-month ‘Twitter Blue,’ now ‘X Premium,’ services, who compared ‘block’ to ‘self-defense’ and their US Constitutional rights under the 2nd Amendment
Musk has courted controversy repeatedly over his changes to the social media site, which he assumed ownership of last October.
In June, Musk was accused of flouting free speech for reneging on a deal to air a Daily Wire-funded film over claims it ‘misgenders’ trans people – claims the CEO later shot down by calling the decision a ‘mistake’ made by his staffers.
The social media site — which has dropped tens of billions of dollars in value by Musk’s own estimates since his $44 billion purchase last year — has spent much of the year fending off competitors, including Meta’s Instagram-based Threads and open-source microblogging platform Mastodon.
Last month, in a bid to woo back advertising revenue, Musk announced plans to cut ad rates on the platform by 50 percent.
While it remains unclear if Musk will follow through on disabling the block feature, many users on the platform continue to plead with the billionaire to reconsider.
‘Block is a critical peace of mind issue for many people because it generally gets the cyber stalkers to move on,’ one X Premium user with the username @WallStreetSilv, noted.
‘It’s like getting rid of the second amendment,’ said another, @gollysue4truth. ‘You have no self defense other than to back away from X altogether. Save the block feature.’
