Does it feel like your X account belongs to you and you can do whatever you want with it? Thatās not true, according to a new court filing from the social media company formerly known as Twitter. Itās an argument that X is making in order to throw a wrench in The Onionās recent purchase of InfoWars, the conspiracy theory media company run by Alex Jones. And itās a great reminder that you donāt actually own what you think you own in the digital age.
Good thing I did jackshit with my Twitter account and had it fully deactivated. It was hacked and posted some spam ads that I knew nothing about.
Of course he does. Did you think differently?
Not supporting Musk here, but there is some truth to the claim in the headline.
One major danger we currently have is everyone thinking that social media platform accounts are property. They simply arenāt ā at least, not yours. If the company decides to terminate your account, they can do that. It will be supported by the TOS. You do not own it.
You also donāt own data you put on it. Post a bunch of photos to FB? They own them and can do whatever they want with them.
The danger is that these things are so ubiquitous they appear like information utilities, but they are not. They are corporate services wholly owned by their respective corporations. It is something that makes federated systems stand out from the crowd (not that you own an account there either, but there at least is not a single centralized corporate owner).
More people need to be made aware of this.
Itās days like this that Iām just so happy and proud of myself for never doing the whole Twitter thing.
