In light of the unclear developments on Twitter after the takeover by US billionaire Elon Musk, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) is considering withdrawing from the online platform. “The federal chancellor and the federal press office have been watching the development of Twitter very closely since it was taken over by Elon Musk,” government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit told the German publishing network.
In doing so, a balance is found “between the development of the platform on the one hand and the possible alternatives that can be used on the other hand”.
“We are tasked with providing extensive information about the work of the federal government and want to use as many channels as possible to reach users where they get their information anyway,” Hebestreit said in the RND podcast “Geyer & Niesmann” released on Friday.” Twitter is a route established by the previous government, with which Scholz can reach around 600,000 and the government spokesman around 100,000 followers.
It would have been “very short” “to immediately give up this information channel without having an alternative,” Hebestreit continued. “However, we cannot turn a blind eye to problematic developments in this network that continues to flourish.”
Musk acquired Twitter for $44 billion in late October. He then fired not only management but also about half of his 7,500 employees.
In addition, the Tesla founder has caused confusion with repeated announcements regarding, among other things, user approval and account verification. Critics fear that Musk could drastically limit the fight against the spread of hate speech and fake news on Twitter.
As a result, more and more former users are turning away from the short message service: Earlier this week, for example, the Prime Minister of Lower Saxony, Stephan Weil (SPD), deleted his account. As a reason, he explained: “The lack of scrutiny and verification on Twitter is increasingly leading to the mass dissemination of hate speech and hate speech, misinformation and conspiracy tales.”
Chancellor Scholz is the first tweeting chancellor who, in addition to the speaker and government profile, also has a personal account on the platform. However, according to Hebestreit, the story is not written by himself, but by a team from the federal press office.
On the other hand, no channels will be created for Scholz on the video clip platform Tiktok, Hebestreit explained. A corresponding decision has already been made. According to the government spokesman, among other things, there was an audit note from the federal press office, “which clearly said: We should think twice if we as the German federal government want to be present on a Chinese platform.” This convinced him not to do it, the government spokesman said. (AFP)
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