Monday, May 9, 2022, Thierry Breton, European Commissioner for the Internal Market, to whom we owe more and more projects related to tech, met Elon Musk at Tesla’s Gigafactory in Austin. The two men discussed the takeover of Twitter by Elon Musk and in particular the necessary moderation on the platform.
Traveling to the United States, Thierry Breton visits Elon Musk
In a video posted on Thierry Breton’s Twitter account, we witness a discussion between the two men about the regulation of social networks and the Digital Services Act (DSA), recently approved by the European institutions. The European Commissioner has clearly bent the billionaire who promisesagainst all odds, “respect the future European regulation”. After claiming an extreme vision of freedom of expression and ensuring that there would be no moderation on Twitter once the social network was in his hands, Musk seems on the same wavelength as Thierry Breton.
Tens of millions of American households will have access to the Internet for free, or almost
However, for the past few weeks, the billionaire owner of Tesla and SpaceX has hammered home his idealistic vision of an Internet where you could say whatever you want, including if it can hurt. This doctrine is obviously not shared by European leaders, even less since the DSA was passed. On the European continent, we have been fighting for years to better moderation of social networks. On this subject, the agreement on the DSA is historic. This is a new stone brought to the regulation of the digital space and the social networks will have to comply with it.
Today @elonmusk and I wanted to share a quick message with you on platform regulation ??#DSA pic.twitter.com/nvP5FEXECY
— Thierry Breton (@ThierryBreton) May 9, 2022
The future boss of Twitter says he is ready to collaborate
Elon Musk’s reaction is amazing. In the video, Thierry Breton uses Elon Musk as a ” witness “. The European Commissioner does not hide his satisfaction. He explains at the start of the video that the future boss of Twitter “understands very well the interest of the Digital Services Act and its challenges for social networks”. For his part, Elon Musk assures that he is ready to collaborate on everything to “make Twitter better”.
It’s a small victory for the former French minister, who succeeded with this surprise visit to bend Musk. With the DSA, the European Union will be able to order Twitter to pay up to 6% of its worldwide turnover in case of “repeated serious breaches”. The vision of total freedom of expression advocated by Elon Musk will therefore certainly have no place on Twitter.