A day after mass resignations from Twitter, the social media platform’s new chief Elon Musk announced an update on how the company will deal with hate speech. In a tweet on Saturday morning, Musk said the new Twitter policy is “freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach”.
"New Twitter policy is freedom of speech, but not freedom of reach. Negative/hate tweets will be max deboosted & demonetized, so no ads or other revenue to Twitter. You won't find the tweet unless you specifically seek it out, which is no different from rest of Internet," he tweeted.
In another tweet, he clarified that this policy applies only to the individual tweet and not the whole account. He also added that he has not yet made a decision on whether former US president Donald Trump should be allowed back on the platform. Musk also posted a Twitter poll on if Trump's account should be reinstated.
Hundreds of people quit the company on Friday in response to his ultimatum to commit to “hardcore work”. Musk, however, said that he is “not super worried” over the future of the social media giant as “the best people are staying”.
The New York Times said in a report that after a 5 pm Thursday deadline was given by Musk to employees to choose whether to quit or stay on at Twitter, “hundreds of Twitter employees appeared to have decided to depart with three months of severance pay.” Twitter also announced through email that it would close “our office buildings” and disable employee badge access until Monday. “Whatever decision you make, thank you for your efforts to make Twitter successful," Musk wrote in the email to employees.
The billionaire, who completed the $44 billion takeover of the San Francisco company in late October, fired much of its full-time workforce by email early this month. Musk has also indicated that he plans to resume Twitter's premium service which grants blue-check verification labels to anyone willing to pay $8 a month - on November 29.
-with PTI inputs