Twitter is a $44bn toy for billionaire Elon Musk to play with | Hamilton Nolan

Do not weep for Twitter, its users, or its investors. Weep for the entire chain of bad political decisions that allowed us to get to this point

The loudest reaction to Elon Musk buying Twitter, for some reason, has been concern about free speech". The second loudest reaction has been dismay about the fact that Elon Musk is a bad guy, and now he owns Twitter. I regret to inform you that both of these reactions are missing the point here - and the point is much, much scarier.

Will Elon Musk do anything meaningful to transform Twitter into a valuable and flourishing public square, a shining beacon of the power of untrammelled free speech to ennoble society, rather than the cesspool of neuroses, conspiracy theories and media feuds that it is now? Probably not. On the other hand, it's already a cesspool. Can't get too much worse.

Hamilton Nolan is a labor reporter at In These Times