PFP – Primary Food Processors.
Isolating X from mainstream content is more likely to enhance than dampen conspiracy theories and polarisation.
Elon Musk and social media platform X are accused of being an epicentre of misinformation, with competitor Bluesky gaining millions of users after the US election.
The Guardian left X, calling it a “toxic” media platform with disturbing content “including far-right conspiracy theories and racism.”
Spanish newspaper La Vanguardia followed suit, saying X has become an “echo chamber” for disinformation and conspiracy theories.
The reasoning is curious. Indeed, X does not become any less of an “echo chamber” if opposing viewpoints vanish, nor X does not become any less “toxic” if moderate content is removed.
Targeting X’s finances could prove difficult, as the world’s richest man previously said “we’re going to support free speech rather than agree to be censored for money.”
“We think that the benefits of being on X are now outweighed by the negatives and that resources could be better used promoting our journalism elsewhere,” The Guardian wrote.
It is unclear exactly which benefits, negatives, or resources The Guardian had in mind.
Publishing articles on X can be automated, so the cost of maintaining a presence is virtually nothing.
On the benefit side, you would think that even that very rare meaningful engagement with The Guardian’s content from a “lost-in-conspiracy-theories” person would be very valuable, bridging damaging divides in society.
They could argue that it would be better if everyone should move to a more transparently designed platform like Bluesky, but not everyone is going to move. More likely, The Guardian and people with similarly inclined political views will move, creating their own echo chamber.
Of course, no one has to stay on X and see disturbing content unless they want to, but the morally flavoured reasoning seems misplaced.
The Guardian and La Vanguardia could instead be on Bluesky and X, forming a shared contact point of different digital bubbles.
Confirmation bias is ingrained in human nature, and we tend to see it in ideological opponents but not ourselves.
In general, the impulse boycott seems entirely the wrong instinct in the face of a fragmenting media landscape.
To prevent further fragmentation of our info sphere, it seems better to resist our natural inclination to steer away from what we dislike than to lean into it.
A more systemic approach is found in the EU’s digital rulebook, which attempts to improve basic digital infrastructure, including the infosphere.
EU Commission has accused X, as a very large online platform (VLOP), of violating the Digital Services Act (DSA) through misleading “verified” checkmarks, lacking advertising transparency and restricting researchers’ access to public data.
The jury is still out in an investigation into X’s measures to tackle illegal content and information manipulation.
Going forward, they might find it harder to evaluate the platform’s neutrality if only right-wing voices are left.
Whether X, and Musk in particular, actually comply with these EU regulations remains to be seen. His affiliation with the US government may embolden his cowboy attitude.
The success of the EU in enforcing the DSA in this unprecedented situation, or its review should it prove illegitimate or insufficient, is where the boundaries of free speech in the 21st century will be found.
Better norms can also help. For a start, we can stop patting ourselves on the back for following a path which facilitates a deteriorating information sphere.
Follow me on bluesky @wulffwold