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After the House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary released a report accusing the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM) of colluding with companies to censor conservative voices online, Elon Musk chimed in. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Musk wrote that X "has no choice but to file suit against the perpetrators and collaborators" behind an advertiser boycott on his platform.

"Hopefully, some states will consider criminal prosecution," Musk wrote, leading several X users to suggest that Musk wants it to be illegal for brands to refuse to advertise on X.

Among other allegations, Congress' report claimed that GARM—which is part of the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), whose members "represent roughly 90 percent of global advertising spend, or almost one trillion dollars annually"—directed advertisers to boycott Twitter shortly after Musk took over the platform.

Twitter/X's revenue tanked after Musk's takeover, with Bloomberg reporting last month that X lost almost 40 percent of revenue in the first six months of 2023 compared to the same period in 2022. That's worse than prior estimates last May, which put Twitter's loss around one-third of its total valuation. Ars chronicled the worst impacts of the ad boycott, including sharp drop-offs in the US, where an internal Twitter presentation leaked to The New York Times showed Twitter's ad revenue was down by as much as 59 percent "for the five weeks from April 1 to the first week of May" in 2023.

Last year, Musk sued other "collaborators" in the X boycott, including hate speech researchers, the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), and Media Matters for America (MMFA). However, his suit against the CCDH was dismissed this March, and Media Matters has claimed that Musk filing his MMFA lawsuit in Texas may be "fatal" because of a jurisdictional defect.

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[-] sunzu@kbin.run 13 points 5 months ago

AIPAC lobbied for this shite and got it done...

Now remember this when your favourite daddy politicians tells you how congress can't accomplish anything due to partisan grid lock ;)

[-] Grippler@feddit.dk 4 points 5 months ago

I read a little on the wiki page you linked, and it seems it was in fact not passed.

The act consisted of House and Senate bills H.R. 1697 and S. 720 and died in Congress

[-] sunzu@kbin.run 5 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago)

I think I linked the wrong wiki

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/999

Here is the law.

Better wiki: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-BDS_laws

Looks like the criminal part is at the state level with 38 passing such laws.

[-] Agrivar@lemmy.world 3 points 5 months ago

Another day, another reason to be glad I live in Massachusetts!

this post was submitted on 12 Jul 2024
332 points (88.6% liked)

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