With Facebook, Twitter, YouTube (and as of Thursday morning, Snapchat) pulling the plug on outgoing President Trump’s digital platforms – and with Google, Apple and Amazon declining to host the right wing social media app Parler – are we at a watershed in terms of the type of speech social media will allow?
And should this watershed have come sooner?
In this episode of The Big Story, we work through some of these big questions. Spoiler alert – like the rest of you out there, we’re still wrestling to find the answers, and there really aren’t any easy ones.
If anything, however, the tech world’s decision to no longer host Trump underscores its singular role determining what messages are heard and amplified. Moreover, the fact that so many smaller tech companies, like Paypal and Reddit, quickly emulated the decisions of Google, Apple, Twitter and Facebook epitomize the influence the major tech platforms hold across the entire industry.
With a new administration, a Democrat super majority, and the public perception of big tech at an all-time low, the decision to strip Trump of his digital presence might be overdue, but it will likely have reverberations for years to come.
