Musk's Twitter Deal - Impact on Crypto Markets and Free Speech; Changes in Board

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Surge of Dogecoin

Dogecoin, placed at the third position last year in market cap ranking among all cryptocurrencies – has soared 26% after Twitter was acquired by billionaire Elon Musk this Tuesday. Musk had been advocating this memecoin through Twitter in the past months and is partially responsible for this massive surge of the cryptocurrency as he went forward in a billion-dollar acquisition deal. It peaked at $0.167 after details of the deal made rounds online.

This is nearly 13 times more than how much Bitcoin rose on the same day. Musk’s continuous sharing of memes relating to Shibu Inu dogs and other crypto memes has undoubtedly had a hand in pushing this crypto up the markets. Now with his recent attainment of the huge online platform, there has been rising excitement among crypto enthusiasts. Musk may use the platform to manipulate stock prices of both cryptocurrency and industrial assets as he had been doing previously anyway, but has the new acquisition added to his influence? Can this monumental authority further propel him to continue manoeuvring markets, now to an even greater extent?

As the Dogecoin founder tweeted, “Can Elon Musk buy the SEC now?”, indicating that he may be able to solve the problem of regulators taking an insane amount of time to approve a spot market Bitcoin ETF. Like attempting to resolve issues of free speech hasn’t been troublesome enough.

Bitcoin on the rise

Not only Doge, but BTC too hit $40K after the business deal was announced. Having an intraday high at $40,366, the cryptocurrency rose about 5.7% from its value during opening trading hours on Tuesday. Although this bullish price may last for a short period of time, it was reassuring to see a surge after a bearish sentiment reigned over crypto markets in preceding weeks.

Decline in BTC on crypto exchanges generally indicates a strong accumulation phase. But currently the bearish phase is still dominating crypto markets and this could either turn out to be profitable for investors or will end up finally falling to a sub $20,000 field. Which could result in the entire play being damaging to those who are already knee-deep in investitures.

If folks did want to see more bullish shifts in the market, it could be beneficial for Bitcoin to continue its dominance rate which is over 41.2% now. Current bullish divergence does indicate a continuing phase for BTC but it remains to be seen if macro cycle bottoms can encourage investors to keep pushing.

Apprehensions of Twitter employees

Now that the crypto market is in disarray, can the same be said for Twitter employees who are currently panicking over the recent acquisition? Distressed Twitter employees have voiced their concerns over there being layoffs across certain divisions. Preceding the whopping $44-billion cash deal, Musk had spoken about how he intends to stay committed to liberties apportioned to citizens by their Constitutions. And that includes free speech. However, with regards to employee layoffs – there “are no plans for any layoffs at this point,” as CEO Parag Agrawal has reassured workers in a recent virtual call.

He has also insinuated possible changes in the board and “regime”, that could impact the future of the company. But Agrawal offered some comfort as he promised to “continue making decisions as we’ve always had, guided by the principles we’ve had,”.

It doesn’t necessarily mean that coming changes will be in any way negative. If Musk follows on what he believes about free speech then this might just be the acquisition we all needed. It will prove to be a turning point for social media platforms where free speech had always been replaced by censorship.

In recent years, Twitter had been following the path of a dying medium. But it remains to be seen if Musk may just have saved it from its own destruction and simultaneously played a big role in revolutionizing the existing procedure of staying relevant in a rapidly progressing digital world.

Impact on free speech

History has proven that billionaires are prone to buying huge media companies in fulfilling their own vested interests – like Jeff Bezos buying the Washington Post in 2013, Marc Benioff buying TIME magazine in 2018 and Jack Ma buying the South China Morning Post in 2016. But for argument’s sake, let’s say Musk really is thinking of accomplishing a greater good through this deal.

In his recent SEC filing, Musk stated that Twitter could become a platform advocating free speech throughout the world and we agree. It truly holds the potential to unlock the greatest ever debates held over the future of the masses. But it also holds the key to unleash a tornado of hate speech in the form of discrimination, defamation, inciting hatred against classes and occasional obscenity.

But isn’t censorship exactly what we are trying to avoid? In today’s digital world, opinion has been replaced by offence. Therefore, just like Elon we all want to do away with a system that strives towards protecting political parties and otherwise powerful individuals. Truthfully, we all yearn for a place where every person can place their opinions freely without fearing suppression from higher forms of authority. But that is easier said than done. Opinions invite judgement and criticism, and the world is known to offer those doused with a heavy dose of disrespect.

Disrespect can exhibit itself in a variety of forms – ranging from sandwiching subtle classist connotations in polite conversations to downright verbal abuse. But how are the grounds for censorship decided in these scenarios? Simply based on an effort to not offend people can be considered a grave exploitation in the name of protecting one’s dignity. Nobody wants to be treated with prejudice or be abused, but how is effective communication achieved when there exists widespread intolerance over politically incorrect statements? I genuinely do not think forcing people to alter their speech would solve issues that go much deeper than just words.

But at the same time, speech with hateful content or even misguided intentions can do a lot more harm than good when it comes to promoting equality, inclusivity and overall societal harmony. The U.S Supreme Court has ruled time and again that laws prohibiting hate speech in any form are in violation to the First Amendment of the U.S Constitution that guarantees freedom to free speech. Democratic Constitutions around the world afford some form of the same freedom to its citizens. Then how exactly do we deal with issues that when let unaddressed, can cause both mental and physical harm to a much greater degree?

An unpunishable offence, with ambiguous grounds for subjecting the ones involved to higher factions of authority – surely sets the foundations to a chaotic digital community, sowing seeds of anarchy and incoherence that may lead to acts of violence and conflict. The answer to this remains in finding a perfect balance between safeguarding equality and dignity on an individual level and simultaneously keeping government interference and censorship at arm’s length by not allowing censorial power to punish speech that cause indirect harms or agitation when it comes to sensitivity.

Musk has also promised to defeat “spam bots” that not only spread unnecessary misinformation on the platform but also act as a deterrent to free thinking and scrutiny, majorly in the form of political propaganda. He will be doing us all a favor honestly, I can tell you that. If Twitter had remained a public company, Elon would not have gotten a chance to right all wrongs that currently exist in digital platforms everywhere, obstructing effective communication. I look forward to seeing positive changes being implemented in a world that has become exceedingly sensitive to different points of view. But certainly not at the expense of advocacy or incitement to discriminate, abuse or otherwise intentional harmful conduct.