An end to “shadow banning” seems the only possible explanation for multiple right-wingers reporting a massive uptick in Twitter followers since Elon Musk bought Twitter on Monday.
If lower-level Twitter workers hadn’t taken fingers off the algorithms in anticipation of the new regime, why would Donald Trump Jr. see a gain of 87,296 new followers Tuesday, plus 119,022 more the next, after weeks of averaging roughly 7,000 per day?
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) picked up more than 205,000 followers in two days, per Social Blade analytics. Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, 141,000; Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), 112,000. Joe Rogan (who’s not even a righty, just an iconoclast the left obsesses about) gained nearly 135,000
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) urged Musk to investigate not only shadowbanning, but also “who was responsible for deliberately suppressing the New York Post’s now-vindicated reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop and business dealings.”
The old guard still running Twitter, meanwhile, says it seems to be largely a result of people deleting and then re-creating their accounts. Right.
Sure looks like a total vindication of Musk’s move to buy Twitter to protect free speech — and reason to suspect similar secret bias operates everywhere else in Big Tech.
It is beyond time that all of the companies who wield such enormous power over public discourse open up their black boxes so we can all see what is really going on inside.