Australia’s prime minister has labelled X’s owner, Elon Musk, an “arrogant billionaire who thinks he is above the law” as the rift deepens between Australia and the tech platform over the removal of videos of a violent stabbing in a Sydney church.
On Monday evening in an urgent last-minute federal court hearing, the court ordered a two-day injunction against X to hide posts globally containing the footage of the alleged stabbing of Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel on 15 April. The eSafety commissioner had previously directed X to remove the posts, but X had only blocked them from access in Australia pending a legal challenge.
Anthony Albanese on Tuesday said Musk was “a bloke who’s chosen ego and showing violence over common sense”.
“Australians will shake their head when they think that this billionaire is prepared to go to court fighting for the right to sow division and to show violent videos,” he told Sky News. “He is in social media, but he has a social responsibility in order to have that social licence.”
“What the eSafety commissioner is doing is doing her job to protect the interests of Australians. And the idea that someone would go to court for the right to put up violent content on a platform shows how out of touch Mr Musk is,” he said.
quicken@aussie.zone 6 months ago
I find all this a bit weak when none of these politicians are willing to even consider leaving X
Ilandar@aussie.zone 6 months ago
Lambie appears to have done so, at least.
ajsadauskas@aus.social 6 months ago
@quicken @tardigrada Really great point.
If Albo really wanted to send a message to Musk, here's how he could do it:
1) Ask all federal Labor MPs to stop posting on X, and start posting on Mastodon.
2) Order all federal government departments and agencies to stop posting on X, and start posting on Mastodon.
3) Bribe the states to do the same.
"Hi Queensland, guess what? We just found a billion dollars under the couch for a shiny new Olympic stadium. Hi Tasmania, likewise for your new AFL stadium. And look Victoria, here's a few billion for the airport rail link — we'll cover the cost difference to put the airport station underground.
"But only if you direct all your MPs, departments, and agencies to switch to Mastodon."
danbeeston@mastodon.social 6 months ago
@ajsadauskas @quicken @tardigrada @mrkvnz Australia should host a Government server and provide a default account for each citizen. Make it an official point of information for the nation.
Nath@aussie.zone 6 months ago
For that much money, they could almost buy Twitter. Isn’t it only worth about $4Billion now?
To really rub salt in the wound, they should leave Elon with the “X” brand and only buy Twitter. Let the users decide whether they are Twitter users or X users.