“My colleague Drew Harwell, who has also been suspended, and I have been working on a story involving Musk and were hoping to get comment from him. We attempted to reach him several times through email over the past few days. At 8:30pm EST I tried reaching out for comment on Twitter by posting this:”
Taylor Lorenz @TaylorLorenz
@elonmusk @DavidSacks Hi Elon, @drewharwell and I sent
you a couple emails about this. We've learned some
information that we'd like to share and discuss with you.
We're taking this very seriously and want to ensure
this is pursued in the right way. Thanks
Twitter | Today at 5:30 PM
“When I went to log in and see if he had responded to our query, I was suspended. I received zero communication from the company on why I was suspended or what terms I violated.”
Weird thing is, I think it's very reasonable to adopt a "if the forum moderator and their friends just personally don't like you, you will be banned" approach.
This works fine in many smaller internet communities and it's even more or less the standard on places like SA. The capriciousness is kind of part of the fun of hanging out there.
From the point of view of running a business though -- Twitter is bleeding cash. Frankly, it's a little inefficient to staff a trust & safety team if they're just gonna be doing what the sysop says. What value does Ella Irwin's team add to the business now - can they not be completely automated and replaced?
My guess would be their team mostly exists to help EM learn to use internal tools and maybe to provide some cover for the FTC consent decree. Those don't seem like long-term reasons to staff a team.
“My colleague Drew Harwell, who has also been suspended, and I have been working on a story involving Musk and were hoping to get comment from him. We attempted to reach him several times through email over the past few days. At 8:30pm EST I tried reaching out for comment on Twitter by posting this:”
“When I went to log in and see if he had responded to our query, I was suspended. I received zero communication from the company on why I was suspended or what terms I violated.”