Elon Musk and his critics are wrong about free speech on X

Both sides of this divide must read the US First Amendment again

- Noah Feldman is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist.

Elon Musk is in a free-speech fight over his decision to demonetize the content of some far-right 'Make America Great Again' (MAGA) critics who disagreed with his immigration views on his social media platform X. What is most remarkable about the argument is that both sides fail to acknowledge the simple truth of how speech, free or otherwise, works on social media. It's worth taking a moment to clarify what free speech means in the context of those platforms.

The most fundamental fact about speech on social media is that it takes two to tango: the user and the platform. You, the user, produce content—commonly described in this industry as 'UGC' for user-generated content. The platform takes that content and, using its algorithm, sends it out to other platform users, your audience.

Both actors are essential and both are necessarily working in tandem. Nothing would be said on social media without the user to produce content. No one would know what you said without the platform to publish the content. Hence, every act on a platform necessarily combines your speech with the platform's choice of what to distribute.