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Jack Dorsey Decries Permanent Twitter Bans

May 3, 2022

Maverick former Twitter chief executive Jack Dorsey has spoken about Twitter and its future, days after the company was bought for $44 billion by Elon Musk. In the vague thread, Dorsey said he doesn’t believe in permanent bans, with the exception of illegal activity.

“As I’ve said before, I don’t believe any permanent ban (with the exception of illegal activity) is right, or should be possible. This is why we need a protocol that’s resilient to the layers above,” said Dorsey, who stepped down from his role at Twitter in November 2021 and currently works as the Block Head of Block.

While Dorsey’s thread didn’t name names, there’s a possibility that he’s referring to some of Twitter’s most controversial moments that have resurfaced amid Musk’s purchase of Twitter — including the platform’s choice to ban former President Donald J. Trump from the platform and the temporary ban of The New York Post after it published an article related to U.S. President Joe Biden’s son Hunter’s laptop. The social media giant’s chief legal officer Vijaya Gadde has recently been under attack online from trolls after Musk posted a meme about her

This storm in mind, Dorsey’s words today shed a very soft, dim light on his stance about whether controversial figures, even those who spread misinformation, should be allowed on the platform.

“Some things can be fixed immediately, and others require rethinking and reimplementing the entire system. It is important to me that we get critical feedback in all of its forms, but also important that we get the space and time to address it. All of that should be done publicly,” Dorsey said in the same Twitter thread.

Earlier this week, Dorsey said that “Elon is the singular solution I trust…I trust his mission to extend the light of consciousness.” But, there’s a tension there: If Dorsey believes in Musk, but Musk tweets memes at the cost of Twitter’s executive team, is Twitter really on the trajectory to get more transparent? As Dorsey said, the company needs “space and time to address” some of its most critical feedback. Morale plays a role in the rebuilding.

“What matters is how the service works and acts, and how quickly it learns and improves,” Dorsey said in today’s tweet storm. “My biggest failing was that quickness part. I’m confident that part at least is being addressed, and will be fixed.”

Kelechi Deca

Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry

Nigeria Plans to Lift Twitter Ban by End of 2021

August 21, 2021

The Nigerian government has revealed that plans are on ground to lift the Twitter ban before the end of this year even though earlier statements credited to the Minister of Information and Culture Lai Mohammed said the lifting would happen in a matter of weeks. The Minister said that the Federal Government’s negotiations with Twitter were soon to be concluded and that Nigerian users would be able to use the platform again as soon as the talks finished.

However now it seems that the Nigerian authorities expect to lift the ban on the social network before the end of the year.

Minister of Information and Culture Lai Mohammed

According to Mohammed, one of the outstanding issues in the ban being lifted is the country’s demand that Twitter establishes an office in Nigeria. The minister said that the social media company has agreed to this, but could not do so until 2022.

Another demand from the Federal Government was for the appointment of a country representative who would act as a liaison between it and Twitter.

The Nigerian government has reached an agreement on seven of the 10 requests it made to Twitter but was still waiting on the company’s response on final issues, including the establishment of a Nigerian office, the paying of local taxes and the cooperation with the government to regulate content and harmful tweets.

“We certainly want to put this behind us before the end of the year,” Mohammed said.

Twitter’s operations in Africa’s most populous country ceased dramatically in one evening after it removed a Tweet from President Muhammadu Buhari in which he threatened people living in the southeast of Nigeria, whom he blamed for attacks on public infrastructure in the region.

The Nigerian government announced the ban, ironically, on Twitter, after which many telecom operators were ordered to block access to the site. Since then, some Nigerian users have continued to use the service through VPNs and other means, while most government agencies have ceased to use Twitter for communications altogether.

Relations between the Federal Government and Twitter have been tense since the company chose Ghana, another, yet smaller, West African nation, for its continental headquarters. A decision that angered Mohammed, who said that Twitter had been influenced by media misrepresentations of Nigeria.