There’s a common critique of Big Tech that goes like this: In the 21st century, social media platforms are the new public square, and it matters a great deal who sets the rules. Instead of allowing true free speech, unaccountable Silicon Valley elites like Mark Zuckerberg decide what can and can’t be said.
Twitter, like any other private publisher, controls what’s published on its platform. But the popular micro-blogging service governs itself more pluralistically than many other tech companies. When Twitter filed to become a publicly traded company in 2013, the company stuck out because it did not create a second, supercharged class of shares that would allow its founders, including its founder Jack Dorsey, to maintain power over the company as Zuckerberg did at Facebook.
That decision to allow a more traditionally democratic and activist playing field for Twitter investors became a fateful one this week, as it allowed Tesla CEO Elon Musk to acquire a minority stake and then launch a bid seeking sole ownership. If he overcomes Twitter’s “poison pill” defenses against a hostile takeover, Musk would control of one of the world’s most popular and important information platforms.
