Ever since Elon Musk took Twitter private for US$44 billion (£36 billion), the debate around the social media platform has been vitriolic. There has been considerable angst about the direction Musk has been taking the company and his potential backpedalling on initial promises about free speech.
Musk’s takeover appeared to do much financial damage to the company, with many advertisers walking away. Although Musk claims Twitter is no longer on the “fast lane to bankruptcy”, I would argue that neither the former nor current ownership models look capable of making much money or benefiting society.
What follows is a proposal that would make Twitter more financially sustainable and move it back towards open speech, within limits. It would remove many of the problems related to anonymous and bot accounts while allowing Musk to recoup at least a substantial amount of his investment.
