Twitter: Musk collects controversies with the press; remember – 04/04/2023 – #Hashtag

Elon Musk decided to remove, this Sunday (2), the seal of verification from the main account of the New York Times after the American newspaper disclosed that it would not pay to keep the sign of authenticity.

The vehicle was one of the first to suffer from the network’s new rules, which began to limit the badge to subscribers, even though it has one of the most influential accounts in the world with 55 million followers. Without the seal, profiles of public relevance can be mistaken for fakes.

Musk indicated, hours earlier, that he would personally remove it by commenting on a meme that mocked the newspaper’s refusal. “Okay then I will remove it [a verificação] “, he said.

Until this Tuesday (4), other institutions and personalities who also publicly announced their refusal to pay for the resource were not affected, such as the White House official profileNASA and basketball player Lebron James.

Shortly after the measure, the attacks made by the platform owner on the vehicle drew attention on the social network. The billionaire tweeted that the content produced by the newspaper is “propaganda that is not even interesting” and that the feed of the publication on the network is “unreadable” and “equivalent to diarrhea”.

Just Sunday, it responded to a post saying the New York Times was “incredibly hypocritical as they are super aggressive in forcing everyone to pay for ‘their’ subscriptions.”

This position is consistent with the businessman’s history of skeptical and often hostile statements in relation to the press. Very active on social networks, Musk dedicates a good part of his posts to defending an antagonistic view of what he calls the “corporate media”, or “mainstream media”, whose credibility has been undermined over the years, according to him, for being biased and spread fake news.

Despite declaring himself an “absolutist of freedom of expression”, Musk tends to treat traditional press vehicles as opponents. The posture brings him closer to right-wing populists like former presidents Bolsonaro and Trump, who have similar speeches.

“Clicker machine” and “hate machine” are some of the terms used by him to characterize media companies, which would seek to “control what you know” in terms of advertising revenue.

The businessman defends, on the other hand, the idea of ​​”citizen journalism”, promoted by ordinary users on the network. This is how it justifies, in part, the decision to do away with the verification stamp on Twitter, previously granted free of charge to notable profiles. Handing out the badge to anyone who pays would be a way to “democratize journalism and empower the voice of the people,” Musk said in a tweet.

“Mainstream media will still thrive, but increased competition from citizens will make them more accurate as their oligopoly of information will be disrupted,” he said in another post about the decision.

In many cases, Musk’s criticisms are reactions to press coverage that displeases the businessman himself. In response to a series of reports by American vehicles about accidents with Tesla cars, for example, he claimed that the publications sugarcoated the lie.

“The hypocrisy of big media companies that claim the truth but publish just enough to sugarcoat the lie is why the public no longer respects them,” he wrote.

In the case of Twitter Files, a set of internal documents that point to political filtering on the network in years prior to his administration, Musk complained about the little impact on traditional American vehicles.

In 2018, he even announced the creation of a platform that would assess the credibility of journalistic content, as well as that of journalists and editors. “Even if some of the public don’t care about the credibility score, journalists, editors and publications will. It’s how they define themselves,” he said at the time. The proposal, however, never materialized.

As early as December 2022, Musk suspended the accounts of several US journalists, including the New York Times and the Washington Post, after a controversy involving the publication of the plane route of rulers and public figures – like himself.

“The same doxxing rules apply to ‘journalists’ as everyone else,” he said at the time, referring to platform rules that prohibit sharing personal information.

After harsh reactions from government officials, advocacy groups and news organizations around the world, with some saying that Twitter was endangering press freedom, the accounts were restored.

Already this year, since March, Twitter’s global press service email has automatically responded to any message with a feces emoji. The address is used by journalism professionals to request company placements and was updated by Musk himself.

Amidst a scenario of cuts and reduction of teams, the company no longer has communication and press office professionals in some countries. Brazil is one of them.

See what Musk has said about the press

“The media is a click-seeking machine disguised as a truth-seeking machine.”

“The media wants to control what you know, which is why citizen journalism is essential.”

“The generalized verification [por meio de assinaturas de serviços do Twitter] democratize journalism and empower the voice of the people.”

“ChatGTP for mainstream media: look at me, I’m captain of advertising now”

“While Twitter pursues the goal of elevating citizen journalism, the media elite will do anything to prevent that from happening.”

“It’s moving to watch the rise of the individualist against the corporate media”

“The problem [da mídia] is that journalists are under constant pressure to get the most clicks and earn advertising money or be fired.”

“Why is the ‘mainstream’ media such a relentless source of hate? Real question.”

“The media is racist”

“Wikipedia is controlled by the mainstream media”

“So you think the mainstream press is biased? Hmm, the mainstream press needs to check that out. No, they said it’s fine.”