Elon Musk, A staunch believer in free speech, did it self-destruct on the evening of Thursday, December 15? Twitter, the social network that bought Tesla’s boss and SpaceX founder for $44 billion (41 billion euros), abruptly suspended at least eight accounts of journalists who wrote about him. Featuring Drew Harwell (The Washington Post), Ryan Mack (The New York Times), Donie O’Sullivan (CNN) or Aaron Rupar, has over 800,000 subscribers on the online platform Substack.
the previous day, Elon Musk started by suspending a Twitter account that tracks the movements of his private jetIn the name of protecting his privacy and endangering his family. “Any account that exposes someone’s real-time location information will be suspended as a physical security violation. This includes posting links to sites with real-time location information. Posting locations with a slight delay is not a security concern, so that’s fine.”, had tweeted during the day that he was a millionaire. A short time later, he also suspended the personal account of Jack Swaney, a 20-year-old student who asked for $50,000 to stop tracking Elon Musk’s jet.
On November 6th, Elon Musk bragged about not doing any censorship: “My commitment to free speech extends to not banning my account following my flight, even if it is a direct risk to personal safety.”He had tweeted that.
To justify the suspension of the reporters’ accounts, Elon Musk tweeted Thursday evening: “It’s okay to criticize me all day, but not to expose my location in real time and put my family at risk.” » Before adding: “The same rules apply to ‘journalists’ as everyone else. »
An incident involving a vehicle carrying one of Elon Musk’s children, named X, appears to be behind the acceleration of the case. “Last night a car carrying little X to Los Angeles was followed by a crazed stalker (thinking it was me), he immobilized the car and climbed on the hood. Legal action is ongoing against the organizations that supported the harm done to Sweeney and my family.Elon Musk tweeted.
Suspensions “concerning but not surprising”
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