Twitter top boss, and the world's richest man, Elon Musk on Thursday congratulated the team for being able to reduce hate speech on the microblogging website by over one third.
In a tweet, Musk posted a picture of a graph showcasing levels of hate speech between October 20 and November 20. The graph shows hate speech impressions to be around 2.5 million on October 20 and had spiked days after that exceeding the 10 million-mark. The graph shows an eventual dip after the spike and dips further than the 2.5 million mark on November 20.
Musk captioned the graph with, "Hate speech impressions down by 1/3 from pre-spike levels. Congrats to Twitter team!"
He then replied to the same tweet and said, "I have half a mind to wag my finger at the 1500 accounts that caused the spike, but I shall forebear."
According to Musk, this decline in hate speech is due to Twitter's restriction on number of tweets that can be posted in a day and per hour. A user can send 2,400 tweets per day and not more than 100 per hour. He said, "Reducing the max allowed tweets/day to a number below what a speed typist on meth could do was helpful."
Musk has been a flagbearer of free speech and from his tweet reply, it can be understood that it is his belief in freedom of speech that is stopping him from wagging his finger at the accounts that indulged in hate speech.
Another issue with the microblogging website that Musk has consistently pointed out is spam and bot accounts. To defeat bots, Musk had envisioned the new Twitter Blue subscription that was launched on November 9, a week after he completed the $44 billion deal. It enabled users to pay $8 for verification and obtain the blue tick. However, in just a day the revamped Blue model proved to be a half-baked solution as it caused more chaos. Multiple fake accounts impersonating popular personalities sprouted up with the verification checkmark after paying for it and, before Twitter could take them down, they caused enough confusion with their tweets, many of which did indulge in hate speech and fake news.
Another key change that the new Musk-regime at Twitter brought in was a revision in suspension guidelines. Now the microblogging site suspends any account that's impersonating somebody else and fails to mention 'parody' in the bio. One of the first accounts to be suspended under this policy, without warning was of American actress and comedian Kathy Griffin who was impersonating Musk on Twitter.