While Americans hope Elon Musk buying Twitter is a sign that he wants to return free speech to the people, others have warned us not to be too quick to praise Elon. Dr. Robert Malone sees Musk as having “a dangerous vision for Twitter.”
As we’ve written and you’ve probably heard by now, Elon Musk has shared his vision for Twitter. If he has his way, people will be able to do everything from the app, from banking, auto loans, Amazon-type buying, insurance, paying loans and utility bills, medical insurance, service estimates, you name it- under the umbrella of Twitter. He’s already referred to it as TwitterX.
It struck me that it was a clever idea to make money and provide a service, but it sounded a bit like something the World Economic Forum would come up with to control us. It sounds like an ESG app.
Dr. Malone doesn’t believe Musk is about free speech at all. The doctor says he couldn’t believe it if he is planning to turn Twitter into an app that accommodates all those services.
We don’t know what Twitter will evolve into. Dr. Malone said on substack, “… the truth is social media platforms morph into new identities as soon as new apps, technologies, and even cultural-political ideologies change.”
Musk’s bigger plan for Twitter is to turn it into a “super app” that “acts as an operating system for people’s digital lives.”
Musk recently stated at Tesla’s annual shareholder meeting:
“It’s a pretty grand vision. And obviously that could be started from scratch, But I think Twitter would help accelerate that by three to five years.”
Having a super app for commerce and social media means that the risk of getting kicked off Twitter becomes not just a question of free speech and censorship, but of financial risk to each and every person who relies on Twitter as a complete, one-stop e-commerce app.
All it would take is the tiniest pressure or threat of removing someone’s ability to pay a bill or collect a debt, and the need to censor would go away as self-censorship would become de-rigueur. The amount of power such a corporation would hold over individuals, industries, and even whole nations would be enormous.
Full stop – integrating a huge “social media” platform – in this case, the most influential social media company in the world, with a complete e-commerce and financial services app is a very bad idea.
Just because a corporation “can” create such an entity doesn’t necessarily mean it “should.” Once upon a time, long, long ago, we had anti-trust legislation and a justice department that would enforce it. That now seems so anachronistic. Our federal government and Justice department seem to have become just another tool, a plaything, of large transnational corporate interests.
Given the way social media – once a great idea – has turned out, does Dr. Malone have a point? Just because he has had some extraordinarily good visions, doesn’t mean this one is. Are we going to be very disappointed?
I’ve been suspicious of Musk for quite some time. He may have some true genius or at least brilliance in him, and he may be serious in his belief of free speech, but at the same time you are looking at a man who has made all of his increase in wealth off of government programs. Electric cars would be… Read more »
Elon made his big money by starting PayPal, don’t forget. Now he wants a new PayPal hooked together with satellite phone service, social media, shopping networks, all of it, like a giant virtual Walmart on steroids. Gee, that’s exactly what the Chinese have now. Huh.
If twitter’s vision at it’s core uses crypto then yes. I want to control my keys, I want to be able to keep my transactions private. And I especially want crypto currency to have a solid foundation.
Yeah, well call me old fashioned but I’ll stay with the good old American dollar in my actual, non-virtual pocket.
If it pulls money away from Bezos and his dystopian world view then all the better.
Be careful what you ask for. A truly brilliant villian can easily hide his villians ways from the world. Remember that the anti-Christ will be beloved by all. I’m not saying Musk is this person, and you may not believe the anti-Christ will ever be real, but I’m saying a person like Musk, who ends up being beloved by all… Read more »
Great article…
Twitter is already heading in that direction, so Musk’s vision can’t be any worse. I have hope it won’t be because Elon Musk grew up in apartheid South Africa for the first 18 years of his life and knows what that kind of Government produces.