Twitter is banning political ads – but the real battle for democracy is with Facebook and Google
Until the two giants change, Twitter’s political ad ban will have little effect on elections around the globe, writes Johan Lidberg from Monash University in this crossposting from The Conversation.
Finally, some good news from the weirdo-sphere that is social media. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey has announced that, effective November 22, the microblogging platform will ban all political advertising – globally.
This is a momentous move by Twitter. It comes when Facebook and its CEO Mark Zuckerberg are under increasing pressure to deal with the amount of mis- and disinformation published via paid political advertising on Facebook.
Zuckerberg recently told a congress hearing Facebook had no plans of fact-checking political ads, and he did not answer a direct question from Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez if Facebook would take down political ads found to be untrue. Not a good look.
A few days after Zuckerberg’s train wreck appearance before the congress committee, Twitter announced its move.
Huge news