Twitter decided on Sunday to ban the promotion of other social media platforms, taking effect with a new policy. The tweets about it have disappeared and the help page is no longer online either. It is unclear whether the policy is still valid.
Twitter said which would ban the “free promotion of certain other social media” on Twitter. That policy also came back on a help page on the company website. Crossposting remained permitted under that policy. What would happen with linking to other social media sources is unclear: Politics said it wasn’t allowed, but the CEO said Elon Musk that was allowed.
Twitter hasn’t banned all social media platforms, and the reasons for choosing certain platforms are unclear. Twitter mentioned Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon, Truth Social, Tribel, Post, and Nostr, but failed to mention YouTube, WhatsApp, Telegram, Weibo, and TikTok, among others.
With the tweets and help page gone, it’s unknown if the policy is still in effect. A Twitter security survey is underway with the question of whether the policy should continue. One The European Commissioner already said so on Friday that the arbitrary blocking of journalists is contrary to European law. It is not known whether this also applies to the blocking policy of some social media. It is not yet possible to post links to Mastodon.
Meanwhile, Elon Musk published a survey asking whether he should remain chief executive officer and stating that he will respect the outcome of the poll. In the poll, which will run for several hours, the response that should stop is at the top with 56.4% at the time of writing.
