In a characteristically immodest press release, Twitter’s new proprietor, Elon Musk, describes his social network as “important to the future of civilisation”. Which rather takes the sheen off civilisation. In Musk’s opinion what civilisation requires is “a common digital town square” where “a wide range of beliefs can be debated”.
The storms of bad temper that greeted Musk’s takeover swirled around the same theme. Twitter – newly sentimentalised as a precious democratic forum – has fallen into the hands of a bad actor. Tens of thousands of the outraged and fearful have fled to ingeniously disguised alternatives such as Mastodon, a social network where users send not “tweets” but “toots”.
In his statement, Musk warned that the alternative to a “town square” was a society
© Times Newspapers Limited 2022.
Registered in England No. 894646. Registered office: 1 London Bridge Street, SE1 9GF.