Assad family likely worth $1-2 billion, US report says

AFP - 
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's family is likely worth $1-2 billion, the US State Department said Thursday, despite US-led efforts to isolate him over the brutal war.

In a report required by Congress, the State Department said it could only provide an "inexact estimate" with the Assads believed to hold assets under fictitious names or through opaque property dealings.

"Estimates based on open-source information generally put the Assad family net worth at between $1-2 billion," said the publicly released part of the report, some of which was classified.

Quoting non-governmental and media reports, the State Department said that the Assads run "a complex patronage system including shell companies and corporate facades that serves as a tool for the regime to access financial resources."

The estimate includes the president's wife, brother, sister, cousins and uncle, most of whom are under US sanctions.

The State Department said it did not have enough information on the net worth of the president's three children, the youngest of whom is 17.

The US Congress has led sanctions that aim to prevent a return to business as usual with Assad, who has regained control over most of Syria after a decade of war estimated to have killed nearly half a million people.

The United States has called for accountability after wide concerns about human rights.

But much of the region is moving on, with Assad in March visiting the United Arab Emirates in his first official visit to an Arab country since the war broke out.

sct/st

Study predicts mass marine life extinction if warming continues


Under "business as usual" warming, marine ecosystems planetwide could experience a mass extinction comparable to that of the end-Permian extinction, known as the "Great Dying"

(AFP/PATRICIA DE MELO MOREIRA) 

Thu, April 28, 2022

By the year 2300, life in the oceans faces a mass die-off rivaling the great extinctions of Earth's deep past if humanity fails to curb greenhouse gas emissions, a study in the journal Science said Thursday.

But limiting planetary warming to two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels will stave off such a catastrophe, said the paper's authors, Justin Penn and Curtis Deutsch, both affiliated with the University of Washington and Princeton University.

The authors used ecophysiological modeling to weigh species' physical limits with projected marine temperatures and depletion of oxygen levels -- a task that was particularly challenging given a lack of previous work in the area.

The results were alarming: under "business as usual" warming, marine ecosystems planetwide could experience a mass extinction comparable to that of the end-Permian extinction, known as the "Great Dying."

This occurred 250 million years ago and led to the demise of more than two-thirds of marine animals, because of warming and oxygen depletion, similar conditions that are occurring today.

While the tropical oceans would lose the most species, many from these areas would migrate to higher latitudes in order to survive.

On the other hand, polar species would disappear en masse, since their types of habitat would disappear from the planet entirely.

Limiting warming to 2C, the upper limit of goal set by the Paris agreement, "would cut the severity of extinctions by >70%, avoiding a marine mass extinction," the paper said.

The preferred goal, of limiting warming to 1.5C, is impossible to achieve with current international commitments, according to UN climate experts.

"Because marine extinctions have not progressed as far as those on land, society has time to turn the tide in favor of ocean life," wrote scientists Malin Pinsky and Alexa Fredston in an accompanying commentary.

"Exactly where the future falls between the best-case and worst-case scenarios will be determined by the choices that society makes not only about climate change, but also about habitat destruction, overfishing, and coastal pollution."

la/ia/st

Canada finally lifts archaic, homophobic ban on queer men donating blood

MAGGIE BASKA APRIL 28, 2022
PINK NEWS

Health Canada authorised Canadian Blood Services to lift restrictions on blood donations from queer men. (Dursun Aydemir/Anadolu Agency via Getty)

Health Canada has lifted the antiquated ban on blood donations from queer men and others within the LGBT+ community.

The government department – which is responsible for national health policies in Canada – released a statement on Thursday (28 April) that it authorised a request from Canadian Blood Services to lift the restrictions on blood donations from men who had sex with men in the last three months.

The new policy, which goes into effect on 30 September, will screen all potential donors – regardless of their gender identity or sexual orientation – for high-risk sexual behaviours.

As such, Canadian Blood Services will bring forward a new donor-screening process to anyone interested in giving blood and plasma, which will include a sexual behaviour-based questionnaire.

“Today’s authorisation is a significant milestone toward a more inclusive blood donation system nationwide, and builds on progress in scientific evidence made in recent years,” Health Canada said.

Health Canada has authorised several changes to the restrictions on blood donated by members of the LGBT+ community. The regulator dropped the outright ban on gay, bisexual and queer men donating blood down to five years in 2013, to one year in 2016 and to three months in 2019.

Health Canada added that this latest change was based on a “thorough assessment of evidence supporting the safety of the revised donor screening”, and it had met with a “group of scientific and medical experts” in the field of blood safety for a meeting on 13 April.

Dr Graham Sher, CEO of Canadian Blood Services, said the approval of their request to remove the eligibily criteria for queer men is the “result of a over a decade of work to make participation in Canada’s Lifeline as inclusive as possible” without risking safety or the security of supply.

“Numerous 2SLGBTQIA+ and other stakeholder groups, researchers and Canadian Blood Services employees have contributed countless hours to this effort over the years,” Sher said. “This could not have happened without their hard work.”

Canadian Blood Services – which operates in all provinces and territories except for Quebec – said the new screening criteria will ask any donor if they’ve had “new or multiple sexual partners in the last three months”.

If the answer is ‘yes’, the service will ask if the person had anal sex with any of these partners, and the individual may be required to wait three months in order to donate blood and plasma.

“While this eligibility change represents a significant step on our continual journey to build a more diverse, equitable and inclusive national transfusion and transplantation system, we still have considerable work to do to build trust and repair relationships with 2SLGBTQIA+ communities,” Sher added.

Michael Kwag – acting executive director of Community-Based Research Centre (CBRC), a non-profit that champions the health of LGBT+ people in Canada – said lifting the blood donation ban means Canada is “finally catching up to other countries”, which already operated with a gender-neutral approach to donor screenings.

“Health Canada’s original policy was discriminatory and encouraged stigma and ignorance around queer men’s and trans people’s health,” Kwag said. “It also undermined Canada’s blood supply, which can run precariously low.”

But CBRC said that more work needed to be done as the original donation policy “contributed to the stigmatising idea that gay, bisexual and men who have sex with men are inherently unsafe”. As such, the non-profit said Canadian Blood Services must engaged in “public education campaigns to dispel stereotypes” and “fight misconceptions about our communities”.

Canadian Blood Services promised to spend the next couple of months preparing to implement the new inclusive blood donation criteria. This includes updating systems and processes as well as training staff.

The move puts Canada in line with many other countries – including Britain, France, Hungary and Greece – that have eased or eliminated their homophobic blood bans in recent years.

Canada lifts restrictions on gay men's blood donations


Health Canada announces a lifting of restrictions on blood donations by gay and bisexual men (AFP/GEORGES GOBET) (GEORGES GOBET)

Thu, April 28, 2022,

Canada announced Thursday a lifting of restrictions on blood donations by gay and bisexual men that dates back to HIV/AIDS crisis of the 1980s and 1990s.

Instead, donors will be screened for high-risk sexual behaviours, regardless of gender or sexuality.

"Under the new screening approach, Canadian Blood Services will introduce a sexual behaviour-based donor-screening questionnaire that will apply to all donors of blood and plasma," the health department said in a statement.

The policy change -- to be implemented by September -- marks "a significant milestone toward a more inclusive blood donation system," it said.

This follows several changes to the blood donation regime over the past decade that saw deferral periods for donations by gay men progressively lowered from a lifetime ban to three months in 2019.

This meant at the time that men who had sex with men could not donate blood if they'd had sex during the period prior to the donation.

For years, advocates said the policy was discriminatory and not based on science.

Research cited by Health Canada said current risks of contracting HIV from the blood supply, with all samples tested, was estimated to be "very low," at 1 in 20.7 million.

It noted also that no HIV positive donations had been made in recent years.

The outright ban on gay men donating blood had been introduced in 1992 after a tainted blood scandal that saw thousands of Canadians infected with HIV after receiving transfusions.

The Canadian Red Cross, which handled blood donations at the time, had failed to properly test and screen donors.

As many as 8,000 Canadians died, according to a public inquiry. And Canadian media reported at the time that people in Japan, Germany and Britain were also infected by blood products sent abroad.

France, Spain, Italy, Israel and Britain have similarly moved recently to loosen restrictions on blood donations.

amc/bgs

Canada looks to prosecute crimes on the Moon

Canada looks to prosecute crimes on the Moon

Canadian MPs will vote on changing the country’s Criminal Code to allow for the prosecution of crimes committed on the Moon On Thursday.

A 443-page budget implementation bill presented to Parliament this week explained the proposed modification to the law, which is expected to be passed.

Ottawa has previously broadened its jurisdiction to include criminal offences committed by Canadian astronauts while aboard the International Space Station

They are treated the same as crimes committed in Canada.

The update comes as the number of space flights are increasing, and ahead of the first crewed mission to the Moon in more than 50 years set to launch in May 2024, with a Canadian astronaut expected to be on board the Artemis II lunar flyby.

Under the subheading Lunar Gateway, the Criminal Code amendment reads: “A Canadian crew member who, during a space flight, commits an act or omission outside Canada that if committed in Canada would constitute an indictable offence is deemed to have committed that act or omission in Canada.”

This would include crimes en route to or on the Lunar Gateway station currently in the works to orbit the Moon, and also “on the surface of the Moon,” the document states.

Foreign astronauts who “threaten the life or security of a Canadian crew member” on a Canadian-supported space mission could also be prosecuted, according to the draft bill.

The Canadian Space Agency is participating in the NASA-led Lunar Gateway project, along with the European Space Agency and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.

Starting in 2026, the outpost will serve as a staging point for robotic and crewed exploration of the lunar surface, as well as travel to Mars.

Climate change creating new virus hotspots 'in our backyard'



Hidden threat: 10,000 viruses that could infect humans are 'circulating silently' 

among wild mammals in tropical forests (AFP/Raul ARBOLEDA)

Daniel Lawler
Thu, April 28, 2022

Climate change will drive animals towards cooler areas where their first encounters with other species will vastly increase the risk of new viruses infecting humans, raising the threat of another pandemic, researchers warned Thursday.

There are currently at least 10,000 viruses that have the capacity to cross over into humans "circulating silently" among wild mammals, mostly in the depths of tropical forests, according to a study published in the Nature journal.

But as rising temperatures force those mammals to abandon their native habitats, they will meet other species for the first time, creating at least 15,000 new instances of viruses jumping between animals by 2070, the study forecasted.

This process has likely already begun, will continue even if the world acts quickly to reduce carbon emissions and poses a major threat to both animals and humans, the researchers said.

"We have demonstrated a novel and potentially devastating mechanism for disease emergence that could threaten the health of animal populations in the future, which will most likely have ramifications for our health too," said study co-author Gregory Albery, a disease ecologist at Georgetown University.

"This work provides us with more incontrovertible evidence that the coming decades will not only be hotter, but sicker," Albery said.

The study, five years in the making, looked at 3,139 species of mammals, modelling how their movements would change under a range of global warming scenarios, then analysing how viral transmission would be affected.

They found that new contacts between different mammals would effectively double, with first encounters occurring everywhere in the world, but particularly concentrated in tropical Africa and Southeast Asia.

- The threat of bats -

Global warming will also cause those first contacts to take place in more highly populated areas, where people "are likely to be vulnerable, and some viruses will be able to spread globally from any of these population centres".

Likely hotspots include the Sahel, the Ethiopian highlands and the Rift Valley, India, eastern China, Indonesia, the Philippines and some European population centres, the study found.

The research was completed just weeks before the start of the coronavirus pandemic, but emphasised the unique threat posed by bats, in which Covid is believed to have first emerged.

As the only mammal that can fly, bats can travel far greater distances than their land-bound brethren, spreading disease as they go.

Bats are believed to already be on the move, and the study found they accounted for a large majority of potential first encounters with other mammals, mostly in Southeast Asia.

Even if the world does massively and quickly reduce its greenhouse gas emissions -- a scenario that still seems some way off -- it might not help for this problem.

The modelling showed that the mildest climate change scenarios could lead to more cross-species transmission than the worst-case scenarios, because slower warming gives the animals more time to travel.

- 'Not preventable' -

The researchers also tried to work out when the first encounters between species could start happening, expecting it would be later this century.

But "surprisingly" their projections found that most first contacts would be between 2011-2040, steadily increasing from there.

"This is happening. It is not preventable even in the best-case climate change scenarios, and we need to put measures in place to build health infrastructure to protect animal and human populations," Albery said.

The researchers emphasised that while they had focused on mammals, other animals could harbour zoonotic viruses -- the name for viruses that jump from animals to humans.

They called for further research on the threat posed by birds, amphibians and even marine mammals, as melting sea ice allows them to mingle more.

The study's co-author Colin Carlson, a global change biologist also at Georgetown, said climate change is "creating innumerable hotspots of future zoonotic risk -- or present day zoonotic risk -- right in our backyard."

"We have to acknowledge that climate change is going to be the biggest upstream driver of disease emergence, and we have to build health systems that are ready for that."

dl-juc/raz

Elon Musk's criticism of Twitter staff sparks backlash

Elon Musk's criticism of Twitter Inc TWTR.N sparked a barrage of abusive tweets against the company's top lawyer on Wednesday, raising questions about his compliance with a non-disparagement agreement and the tone that the social media platform's incoming owner will set for its users.© Hannibal Hanschke, Reuters

Musk tweeted he disagreed with a decision Twitter made in 2020 to restrict the distribution of a New York Post article about U.S. President Joe Biden's son, Hunter. The billionaire, who has about 87 million Twitter followers, called the company's decision to lock the Post's account on the platform "incredibly inappropriate."

Musk, who on Monday reached a deal to acquire Twitter for $44 billion, was responding to a tweet by a podcast host Saagar Enjeti about Vijaya Gadde, the executive who oversees Twitter's policy and legal teams.

Enjeti described Gadde as "the top censorship advocate at Twitter who famously gaslit the world on Joe Rogan's podcast and censored the Hunter Biden laptop story." Gadde then became the subject of a wave of personal attacks by Twitter users on the platform.

Twitter's merger agreement with Musk stipulates that Musk can tweet about the deal while it is pending "so long as such Tweets do not disparage the Company or any of its Representatives." There was no indication that Twitter, which inked the deal with Musk after deciding his offer was attractive, would seek to cancel the sale because of his recent criticism.

Representatives for Musk and Twitter did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Gadde could not be reached for comment.

Dick Costolo, a former chief executive of Twitter, criticized Musk for the move. "Bullying is not leadership.. What's going on? You're making an executive at the company you just bought the target of harassment and threats," Costolo tweeted.

Musk then tweeted back at Costolo: "What are talking about? I'm just saying Twitter needs to be politically neutral."

Musk also weighed in on a discussion about Twitter's deputy general counsel, Jim Baker. In response to critical comments made in a tweet by social media personality Mike Chernovich about Baker, Musk responded: "Sounds pretty bad."

Baker did not immediately respond to Reuters' request for comment.

Katie Harbath, a former public policy director at Meta Platform Inc's Facebook FB.O who now leads consultancy Anchor Change, said Musk's criticism of Twitter's content moderation raises concerns that he could overrule recommendations from the team charged with setting policy and procedure.

A key question, Harbath said, is whether Musk is "going to replace people inside of Twitter with people who go along with his viewpoints."

Others worried that Twitter's efforts to deal with harassment, misogyny and misinformation might take a backward step under Musk.

"Musk's pursuit of his normal daily activities on Twitter exacerbate the worst aspects of the site and undercut the good work that folks at Twitter have been doing," said Adam Conner, vice president for technology policy at the Center for American Progress.

While Musk's activity on Twitter is attracting new scrutiny because of his deal on Monday to acquire the company, the world's richest person is no stranger to controversy and criticism on the platform.

Last October, Musk criticized Missy Cummings, a Duke University professor who was hired by the U.S. vehicle safety regulator as an advisor, in a tweet that was followed by personal attacks online on Cummings. A longtime critic of Tesla's driver assistant software, Cummings subsequently deleted her Twitter account.

In 2018, Musk called a British diver "a pedo guy" after he downplayed Musk's idea of using SpaceX's mini-submarine to rescue a boys' soccer team trapped in a cave in Thailand.

"If he proves incapable of tamping down the polarisation, Twitter will slowly start to become less relevant because certain types of conversations will no longer be able to take place on it," said David A. Kirsch, an associate professor of management and entrepreneurship at the University of Maryland.

(REUTERS)

What Happens to #BlackTwitter When Musk Takes Over?

Kelsey Butler and Dina Bass, Bloomberg News

Elon Musk, chief executive officer of Tesla Inc., arrives at court during the SolarCity trial in Wilmington, Delaware, U.S., on Tuesday, July 13, 2021. Musk was cool but combative as he testified in a Delaware courtroom that Tesla's more than $2 billion acquisition of SolarCity in 2016 wasn't a bailout of the struggling solar provider. , Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- BlackPlanet? Tumblr? Or, God forbid — MySpace?

Those were some of the alternatives to Twitter floated by Black users contemplating leaving the social media platform following news that Elon Musk is buying it in a $44 billion deal. The Tesla Inc. chief executive officer’s plans for the brand center around fixing what he calls “free speech” problems, but his complaints have relied heavily on the dog whistles of the extremely online segment of the political right. That has Black Twitter users, along with other minorities, worried that the floodgates are about to be swung open for harassment, abuse and more.

Plenty of Twitter Inc.’s left-leaning users are already howling at the Musk deal. But the potential for the platform to lose many of its Black users — or #BlackTwitter to those in the know — could mean financial blowback for the company, which saw its social media app grow to prominence at least in part because of the cultural and social-justice discourse that Black users made popular. Researchers at Old Dominion University and Radford University have called African-American users “some of the most influential” on the app.

“It’s all hypothetical right now, but worst-case scenario, I can absolutely see a mass exodus of people from marginalized communities, especially those with large platforms who are already targeted, from Twitter,” said diversity and inclusion advocate April Reign, who’s also a major influencer in #BlackTwitter circles and the creator of the #OscarsSoWhite hashtag in 2015.

Influence of Black Users

About 11% of Twitter users are Black, according to a 2018 Pew Research analysis. But even the company itself has acknowledged the outsized influence they have had on the platform. In a 2019 Essence Festival interview former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said that #BlackTwitter  is “such a powerful force.” A 2014 Pew study showed that Black people spent more time on the social site — 22% of Black internet users accessed Twitter at high levels, compared with 16% of White ones. 

Now, Black Twitter users are asking: “What has Elon Musk done in his life to show that he has the context or cultural competency to run an organization like this?” Reign said. 

Musk’s track record on race at his existing ventures is spotty, at best. This month, electric-car maker Tesla revealed that it faced an investigation by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that predates a three-year-old probe by California's Department of Fair Employment and Housing. The state agency sued Tesla in February, saying the company ignored “rampant racism” and years of complaints from Black workers about racial slurs at its auto plant in Fremont, California.

Musk also calls himself a “free speech absolutist” and plans to take a minimalist approach to restrictions on the app. That prospect is already being celebrated by conservative activists and lawmakers, including Josh Hawley, the Republican senator from Missouri, and Tucker Carlson, the highly rated cable news host.

“I am against censorship that goes far beyond the law,” the Tesla CEO tweeted this week. Earlier this month, during a panel discussion at the Ted2022 conference, Musk said he would be “very reluctant to delete things” and “very cautious with permanent bans — timeouts, I think, are better.”

What Does Free Speech Look Like?

Under Musk, Twitter could bring back accounts that the company banned after they were used to harass others, spread misinformation, or incite violence. For his part, former President Donald Trump, who hasn't been allowed on the platform since 2021, said this week he won’t return if his account is reinstated.

“One of my concerns definitely is what does free speech look like on the platform?” said Sherrell Dorsey, the founder and CEO of The Plug, a digital news platform covering the Black innovation economy. “I am very concerned that free speech turns into open hate.”

The concerns come after years of criticism that the company hadn’t gone far enough to protect marginalized users. Research has shown that minorities, women and those from other marginalized backgrounds face a torrent of abuse on social media sites like Twitter — Black women in particular have been targets of the vitriol.

Amnesty International found in an analysis of millions of posts that one in 10 tweets mentioning Black women was abusive and problematic, compared with one in 15 for White women. Earlier this year, the Center for Countering Digital Hate reported 47% of the accounts that sent direct misogynistic abuse to high profile women like Vice President Kamala Harris and Lizzo went on to reoffend. Of the latest comments, 49% targeted a woman of color, and 41% included the word “bitch.”

And just this week, Musk’s criticism of a content decision made by Twitter’s legal team was followed by a wave of abusive tweets directed against the company’s top lawyer, Vijaya Gadde, a woman of color. 

Twitter has made some efforts to tamp down abuse. Last year, the company said it “took action” on a record number of accounts for violating its hate speech policies during the second half of 2020. In 2017, Twitter said it would hide content from abusive tweeters and prevent them from making new accounts in a bid to clean up the app. But it remains to be seen if those types of measures will continue under Musk’s ownership. 

#BlackTwitter

Researcher Meredith Clark defined #BlackTwitter as a “network of culturally connected communicators.” The platform is often used to bring attention to issues that impact Black communities, she said while an assistant professor at the University of Virginia in an interview posted on the school’s website. 

The community has had nationwide impact in recent years in response to police violence against Black people. The hashtags #ICantBreathe and #SayHerName flooded the site after the deaths of Eric Garner and Breonna Taylor, respectively. #BlackLivesMatter, which came to prominence following the acquittal of George Zimmerman in Travyon Martin’s killing, was used some 48 million times on Twitter in the immediate aftermath of the murder of George Floyd in 2020.

Black users say it’s also been a place for connection, reflection, nostalgia and humor, too. Andre Brock, an associate professor at Georgia Tech who studies #BlackTwitter, cites camaraderie around the 2009 BET Awards, which took place just after Michael Jackson’s death, and the early days of the show “Scandal” as early examples where the platform became a “second screen” experience. 

“These moments were where we shared our joy over something, our laughter over other things, our critiques of some other things,” Brock said. That built the platform “into a space that was immediately a fertile ground for then building out the impact of say, Ferguson, or Trayvon Martin,” he said. 

The decision on whether to leave the platform is complicated. 

Growing a following on the app can provide a pathway to jobs, mentorships and connections that may otherwise be closed to some people, said Dorsey of The Plug. (She has no relation to Twitter's Jack Dorsey.)

“I'm someone who is college educated, and grad school educated — has had a certain level of access,” she said. “I still get access to people, organizations, institutions and opportunities as a result of my presence on the platform.”

Reign, who said “I owe my professional career as it is now” to Twitter, is considering leaving the app, albeit begrudgingly. Her #OscarsSoWhite post kicked off changes at the Academy Awards to make the voting body more diverse. Reign said she will wait to see what changes roll out once the Musk deal is official. 

Bridget Todd, creator and host of the There Are No Girls on the Internet podcast and communications director for women’s advocacy group UltraViolet, said that the company owes the users who have made the platform successful some level of accountability and transparency on changes that will affect them. Regardless of what happens, she doesn’t think this will be the end of the vibrancy that #BlackTwitter has built.

“If there's one thing I believe in, and one thing gives me a lot of hope, it is that as Black folks, we will always make a way out of no way,” Todd said. “We will always carve out what we need from a space, even when that space goes out of their way to tell us again and again and again, that it wasn't designed with us in mind, that they don't want us there, that they're not going to amplify us.”

©2022 Bloomberg L.P.

 

Judge rejects Musk bid to free tweets from oversight

April 28, 2022   

Twitter’s new buyer Elon Musk still must have his tweets about his electric car company Tesla pre-approved after a US judge on Wednesday rejected an appeal to free him from oversight.

Musk last month filed a motion to overturn Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) restrictions imposed following his 2018 tweet, in which he said he had acquired funding to take Tesla private, but did not provide proof or file paperwork with the securities regulator.

The tweet, which caused share prices to fluctuate wildly, was ruled to be “false and misleading” and shareholders have accused Tesla of securities fraud.

The SEC also charged Musk with fraud and ordered him to step down as chair of Tesla’s board of directors, pay a $20 million fine and, after another unfortunate tweet in early 2019, demanded his tweets directly related to business of the company be pre-approved by a competent lawyer.

Musk said he was forced to agree to the deal, and denies lying to shareholders.

However, “Musk’s claim that he was the victim of economic duress is wholly unpersuasive,” Judge Lewis Liman wrote in his ruling.

The judge said Musk’s argument that the SEC has used the agreement “to harass him” and investigate his speech is “meritless” and “particularly ironic,” since free speech rights do not allow him to make statements that are “considered fraudulent” or violate securities laws.

“Musk cannot now seek to retract the agreement he knowingly and willingly entered by simply bemoaning that he felt like he had to agree to it at the time but now -- once the specter of the litigation is a distant memory and his company has become, in his estimation, all but invincible -- wishes that he had not.”

The judge also rejected Musk’s request to quash part of the SEC’s demand for documents about his November 6, 2021 tweet calling for followers to vote on whether he should sell 10 percent of his Tesla stock.

The tweet sent the company’s share price lower, and the SEC wants to know if it was approved as required. The agency also is investigating possible insider trading after Musk’s brother -- a Tesla board member -- sold $108 million in the carmaker’s stock a day before the poll.

Source: AFP

The Asian Voice

Twitterdom with a new king should worry us all: Daily Star contributor

The writer says the role of social media for free expression is crucial in general, but especially important in countries where democracy is weakening.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk at the E3 gaming convention in Los Angeles on June 13, 2019. 

PHOTO: REUTERS

Kamal Ahmed

DHAKA (THE DAILY STAR/ASIA NEWS NETWORK) - Elon Musk, a self-proclaimed free-speech absolutist and the world's richest man, is the new king of Twitterdom.

His takeover of Twitter may have provided the company a much-needed new direction of exploring uncharted adventures, as its founder Jack Dorsey says, "Solving for the problem of it being a company, however, Elon is the singular solution I trust." The reason for using "however" by Dorsey in his tweet was in his words, "In principle, I don't believe anyone should own or run Twitter. It wants to be a public good at a protocol level, not a company."

The way Musk, Twitter's top troll, bullied the management of the company and bought it indicates that the platform may not remain a space for public good as it becomes a private property. Here's a reminder about the acquisition of Twitter that he said, "this is not about economics, this is about power and influence."

With 86.1 million followers, Elon Musk is the top Twitterati, but he has also courted controversy by taunting others on the Twittersphere. Musk has been described as a troll by none other than a former insider of the company, Twitter's former head of news and currently the executive director of the Aspen Institute, Vivian Schiller.

And there's no dearth of examples. The New York Times reported that before his pivotal meeting with the Twitter's board, Mr Musk tweeted in which he made fun of Bill Gates for taking a short position on Tesla. His tweeting habit does not give much confidence in his post-takeover tweet that he hopes his "worst critics remain on Twitter."

The way the Tesla boss bought Twitter was also quite unconventional. He first wanted to know how much it would cost for buying by firing a tweet. Then he acquired more than nine percent of the shares, but discounted speculations of taking a seat on the board or interfering in running the business.

But within days, he made a new enticing offer through a tweet to buy the whole company, and the deal was done at an unprecedented speed. His critics, therefore, have every reason to argue that Musk is desperate to gain more power, and promotion of free speech is a mere facade.

Why does the Twitter takeover by Elon Musk matter for anyone in Bangladesh, when it has a tiny audience of about 750,000, whereas Facebook has a whopping 44.5 million users?

Social media platforms worldwide have been increasingly coming under scrutiny-mainly owing to its power of democratisation, but also for its toxicity. The role of social media for free expression is crucial in general, but especially important in countries where democracy is weakening or rulers are becoming autocrats.

Therefore, prospects of more freedom of expression or free speech should be a very welcoming development. If any one of the existing social media platforms becomes more democratic, then there's bound to be some positive impact on the rest.

And in terms of social influence, Twitter with more than 300 million users enjoys a certain edge over Facebook or Instagram, despite those having far larger subscriber numbers. It's due to the nature of the content, which is more news-oriented than personal and family affairs and networking.

But the scary prospect is its potential toxicity, where individuals could face an endless torrent of abuse based on their skin colour, faith, gender, political ideology, and so on.

Vivian Schiller told BBC's Radio 4 on Monday (April 25) that about two weeks ago, when asked how he would make the platform more free speech-friendly, Mr Musk could not give a clear answer. Musk's declaration, so far, is that he wants to see more "free speech" and less moderation. Many right-wing forces, like Trumpian Republicans in the US, who have long been complaining that Twitter's moderation policies favour the freedom of speech of left-leaning viewpoints, rejoiced.

According to Ms Schiller, this moderation is an art without which this public space is ungovernable. She also admitted that the Twitter management had not always had it right. The most glaring example in the US of Twitter being used to incite violence was the Jan 6 insurrection at Capitol Hill by Trump supporters, fuelled by conspiracy theories that led to the permanent ban of the outgoing president on Twitter. In India, presumably the largest democracy in the world, we have seen how religious hate preaching on Twitter has been spreading communal division and violence. It, therefore, makes Elon Musk's proposition of unbound free speech a serious cause for concern as it could amplify disinformation too.

There is no doubt that we all love freedom of expression and hate censorship, but not without restraints on the spread of hate and violence. Some of his memorable tweets include those against Covid-19 lock-down bolstering conspiracy theorists, extending support to Canadian truckers' disruptive sit-in protest, and violating Securities and Exchange Commission directives that led to wiping out of US$14 billion (S$19.4 billion) in a minute from the share market. Repeating such erratic behaviour now will no longer make him accountable to anyone, other than expensive private legal actions.

One thing that encourages most of us is that Elon Musk has promised to bring transparency in Twitter's algorithm, making the metrics of populism and support visible, and cracking down on bots. If it happens, then ghost followers of many popular but controversial figures will disappear.

In India, Twitter's third top market, political observers have begun speculating that the IT cells of major political parties will be folding as they are accused of maintaining bots and troll armies. However, Musk could have brought in such transparency without taking it out from the public control, as he had the opportunity to take up a seat on the company board with the single largest holding of its shares.

Many observers believe that the US$44 billion takeover will push politicians and regulators around the world to bring in new and stringent rules on social networks and force them to take more responsibility for the content they carry, issuing steep fines for non-compliance on material that incites violence, is abusive or classifies as hate speech, among other things.

In the US Congress, before Twitter's takeover, it was the Republicans who were pushing for taking on Big Tech companies, and now Democrats have started gearing up for a fight.

The writer is an independent journalist and writes from London. The Daily Star is a member of The Straits Times media partner Asia News Network, an alliance of 23 news media organisations

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Elon Musk's deal for Twitter includes a $1.4 billion break-up fee

A look back at Elon Musk's tweets: Musings and missteps

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Musk's Twitter purchase puts moral champion in crosshairs

2022/4/27 
© Agence France-Presse

Elon Musk, the world's richest man, has vowed to be a free speech absolutist when he takes control of the global messaging platform

San Francisco (AFP) - The fate of Twitter's top attorney, deemed a moral champion of the platform, was in doubt Wednesday after Elon Musk tweeted displeasure with content moderation she had carried out.

Musk, the world's richest man, has vowed to be a free speech absolutist when he takes control of the global messaging platform as part of a $44 billion deal.

The lawyer, Vijaya Gadde, has led efforts to battle bullying and posts that could lead to real-world harm such as the attack on the US Capitol by supporters of former US president Donald Trump.

She was also involved in decisions such as removing political advertising from Twitter, and banning Trump from the platform for instigating the January 6 attack.

Musk on Tuesday criticized Gadde's role in taking down a New York Post story about the overseas business dealings of President Joe Biden's son Hunter ahead of the 2020 election.

The billionaire said that banning the story was "incredibly inappropriate" in a tweet responding to another user's post that included a Politico article detailing how Gadde had cried during a meeting about the Musk takeover.

Musk went on to retweet a meme featuring Gadde and accusing Twitter of having a "left-wing bias", prompting former Twitter chief Dick Costolo to fire off a reply asking what he was trying to accomplish.

"You're making an executive at the company you just bought the target of harassment and threats," Costolo said in the tweeted reply to Musk.

-Tweet clause -

The deal Musk signed to buy Twitter comes with a clause saying he can tweet about the merger as long as the posts "do not disparage the company or any of its representatives."

Women's rights group UltraViolet said Musk's tweets aimed at Gadde are "proof positive that his leadership of the company will open the floodgates of harassment and abuse."

"The fact that not even one day after the deal was announced, Musk was already breaking the terms of his agreement with Twitter to explicitly single out and encourage harassment against one of Twitter’s top employees, is all you need to know about his intentions," said the organization's spokesperson, Bridget Todd.

Twitter chief Parag Agrawal defended his team in tweets of his own on Wednesday, endorsing a post that praised its lawyers as among the most aggressive in going to court to protect free speech.

"I took this job to change Twitter for the better, course correct where we need to, and strengthen the service," Agrawal tweeted.

"Proud of our people who continue to do the work with focus and urgency despite the noise."

Users taking flight?

In a further sign Musk may do some housecleaning, he also responded to online criticism of another Twitter lawyer, stating that the individual had acted in a prior job at the FBI in a way that "sounds pretty bad."

Musk has said he wants to increase trust in Twitter, which he sees as a digital town square for free speech and debate.

Key figures on the American left, including former president Barack Obama, have shed thousands of followers since Musk's planned purchase of Twitter emerged, as users appeared to be following through on promises to leave the platform. Numbers have soared, meanwhile, for right-wing politicians.

Twitter co-founder and former chief executive Jack Dorsey has tweeted his support for Musk taking the company private, saying that his goal of creating a "maximally trusted and broadly inclusive" platform is the right one.

"In principle, I don't believe anyone should own or run Twitter," Dorsey said in a string of tweets.

"It wants to be a public good at a protocol level, not a company."

Musk’s ‘free speech’ push for Twitter: Repeating history?

By BARBARA ORTUTAY and AMANDA SEITZ

April 26, 2022

The Twitter page of Elon Musk is seen on the screen of a computer in Sausalito, Calif., on Monday, April 25, 2022. On Monday, Musk reached an agreement to buy Twitter for about $44 billion. (AP Photo/Eric Risberg)

Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, is spending $44 billion to acquire Twitter with the stated aim of turning it into a haven for “free speech.” There’s just one problem: The social platform has been down this road before, and it didn’t end well.

A decade ago, a Twitter executive dubbed the company “the free speech wing of the free speech party” to underscore its commitment to untrammeled freedom of expression. Subsequent events put that moniker to the test, as repressive regimes cracked down on Twitter users, particularly in the wake of the short-lived “Arab Spring” demonstrations. In the U.S., a visceral 2014 article by journalist Amanda Hess exposed the incessant, vile harassment many women faced just for posting on Twitter or other online forums.

Over the subsequent years, Twitter learned a few things about the consequences of running a largely unmoderated social platform — one of the most important being that companies generally don’t want their ads running against violent threats, hate speech that bleeds into incitement, and misinformation that aims to tip elections or undermine public health.

“With Musk, his posturing of free speech — just leave everything up — that would be bad in and of itself,” said Paul Barrett, the deputy director of the Center for Business and Human Rights at New York University. “If you stop moderating with automated systems and human reviews, a site like Twitter, in the space of a short period of time, you would have a cesspool.”

Google, Barrett pointed out, quickly learned this lesson the hard way when major companies like Toyota and Anheuser-Busch yanked their ads after they ran ahead of YouTube videos produced by extremists in 2015.

Once it was clear just how unhealthy the conversation had gotten, Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey spent years trying to improve what he called the “health” of the conversation on the platform.

The company was an early adopter of the “report abuse” button after U.K. member of parliament Stella Creasy received a barrage of rape and death threats on the platform. The online abuse was the result of a seemingly positive tweet in support of feminist campaigner Caroline Criado-Perez, who successfully advocated for novelist Jane Austen to appear on a British banknote. Creasy’s online harasser was sent to prison for 18 weeks.

Twitter has continued to craft rules and invested in staff and technology that detect violent threats, harassment and misinformation that violates its policies. After evidence emerged that Russia used their platforms to try to interfere with the 2016 U.S. presidential election, social media companies also stepped up their efforts against political misinformation.

The big question now is how far Musk, who describes himself as a “free-speech absolutist,” wants to ratchet back these systems — and whether users and advertisers will stick around if he does.

Even now, Americans say they’re more likely to be harassed on social media than any other online forum, with women, people of color and LGBTQ users reporting a disproportionate amount of that abuse. Roughly 80% of users believe the companies are still doing only a “fair or poor” job of handling that harassment, according to a Pew Research Center survey of U.S. adults last year.

Meanwhile, terms like “censorship” and “free speech” have turned into political rallying cries for conservatives, frustrated by seeing right-leaning commentators and high-profile Republican officials booted off Facebook and Twitter for violating their rules.

Musk appeared to criticize Twitter’s permanent ban of President Donald Trump last year for messages that the tech company said helped incite the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol last year.

“A lot of people are going to be super unhappy with West Coast high tech as the de facto arbiter of free speech,” Musk tweeted days after Trump was banned from both Facebook and Twitter.

Trump’s allies, including his son Donald Trump Jr., have even pleaded for Musk to buy out the company.

“If Elon Musk can privately send people into space I’m sure he can design a social network that isn’t biased,” Trump Jr. said in the caption of a video posted to Instagram last April.

Kirsten Martin, a professor of technology ethics at the University of Notre Dame, said Twitter has consistently worked at being a “responsible” social media company through its moderation system, its hires in the area of machine learning ethics and in whom they allow to do research on the platform. The fact that Musk wants to change that, she added, suggests that he’s focused on “irresponsible social media.”

Twitter declined to comment for this story. A representative for Musk did not immediately respond to a message for comment.

New social media apps targeted at conservatives, including Trump’s Truth Social, haven’t come remotely close to matching the success of Facebook or Twitter. That’s partly because Republican politicians, politicians and causes already draw large audiences on existing, and much better established, platforms.

It’s also partly due to floods of inflammatory, false or violent posts. Last year, for example, right-wing social media site Parler was nearly wiped off the internet when it became evident that rioters had used the app to promote violent messages and organize the Jan. 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol. Apple and Google barred its app from their online stores, while Amazon stopped providing web-hosting services for the site.

Musk himself regularly blocks social media users who have criticized him or his company and sometimes bullies reporters who have written critical articles about him or Tesla. He regularly tweets at reporters who write about his company, sometimes mischaracterizing their work as “false” or “misleading.”

His popular tweets typically send a swarm of his social media fans directly to the accounts of the reporters to harass them for hours or days.

“I only block people as a direct insult,” Musk tweeted in 2020, responding to a tweet from a reporter.

Evan Greer, a political activist with Fight for the Future, said Musk’s lack of experience in moderating an influential social media platform will be a problem if he successfully takes over the company.

“If we want to protect free speech online, then we can’t live in a world where the richest person on Earth can just purchase a platform that millions of people depend on and then change the rules to his liking,” Greer said.

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