Twitter co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, Jack Dorsey, has spoken in defense of the platform following the indefinite suspension of outgoing US President Donald Trump, but said it sets a dangerous precedent.
Twitter banned Trump’s account following the invasion of US Capitol Hill by the embattled president’s supporters over a week ago.
In a string of tweets on his Twitter page, Dorsey gave the reasons for the permanent suspension of Trump’s account.
“I do not celebrate or feel pride in our having to ban @realDonaldTrump from Twitter, or how we got here. After a clear warning we’d take this action, we made a decision with the best information we had based on threats to physical safety both on and off Twitter,” he wrote.
The CEO noted that a ban on Trump showed that the platform failed to encourage healthy conversation.
“Having to take these actions fragment the public conversation. They divide us. They limit the potential for clarification, redemption, and learning. and sets a precedent I feel is dangerous: the power an individual or corporation has over a part of the global public conversation,” he added.
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Facebook has also banned Trump from using his accounts, citing his intent to “undermine the peaceful and lawful transition of power.”
Trump had complained that social media platforms are exercising censorship and suggested he may launch a competing platform.
Amazon had on Wednesday defended its decision to kick ‘Parler‘, a free speech social network, from its cloud servers, saying the platform — popular with Trump’s supporters — failed to delete threats of violence.
Some people used Parler to spread messages promoting insurrection and to plan for last Wednesday’s deadly invasion of the U.S. Capitol.
Amazon Web Services booted social network Parler on Monday in a move that effectively removed it from the internet.
The conservative-friendly platform then filed a lawsuit in a Seattle federal court that demanded Amazon keep Parler on its service.
