Elon Musk’s proposed amnesty plan for suspended Twitter users, despite previously promising to form a content moderation council before making any decision about reinstating accounts, is the result of threats from a large coalition of political/social activist groups who promised not to starve Twitter of advertising revenue if Musk broke his earlier promise.
Musk made this known while responding to a user trolling his previous tweet on the content moderation council in a Twitter thread about free speech, saying “A large coalition of political/social activist groups agreed not to try to kill Twitter by starving us of advertising revenue if I agreed to this condition. They broke the deal.”
Musk revealed the amnesty plan after asking for votes on the reinstatement of suspended accounts in a poll posted to his timeline, asking if those who broke the law or engaged in egregious spam should be reinstated. On Thursday, the final poll results showed that 72.4 percent voted in favor of the general amnesty policy, while 27.6 percent opposed it. Over 3.2 million people voted in the poll.
“The people have spoken. Amnesty begins next week. Vox Populi, Vox Dei,” Musk tweeted after, using a Latin phrase meaning “the voice of the people, the voice of God.”
Now that sanctions like suspension are no longer effective on Twitter, there has been discussion about the return of abusive behaviors like attempting to harass, intimidate, or silence someone else’s voice; threats of violence or “wishing, hoping, or calling for serious harm”; unwanted sexual advances; using insults, profanity, or slurs to harass or intimidate others; encouraging or calling for others to harass an individual or group of people; despite a greatly reduced staff to respond to any further claims of abuse.
The sources for this piece include an article in TheRegister.