In an interview with The New York Times this weekend, Twitter co-founder Evan Williams said he was horrified to learn that his social media platform might have been responsible for putting Donald Trump in the White House.
Williams, citing research that suggested that Twitter played a role in Trump’s stunning 2016 victory over Hillary Clinton, actually apologized for his site’s influence.
“It’s a very bad thing, Twitter’s role in that,” Williams said. “If it’s true that he wouldn’t be president if it weren’t for Twitter, then yeah, I’m sorry.”
What a sad man. For the first time in its history, Twitter actually served a function more valuable than keeping America abreast of the Kim Kardashians of the world, and this idiot thinks it’s NOW time to apologize? Why not apologize for the way Twitter has given a home to legions of “social justice warriors” who have gradually turned the internet into a haven for the most ludicrous left-wing cultural ideas that have ever come about? Ideas that are slowly but surely growing too big for Twitter and are now infecting mainstream society? Apologize for THAT, if you want to apologize for something.
We have a feeling that Williams is giving Twitter a little too much credit for Trump’s success, but it can’t be denied that the president used it masterfully both before and after his inauguration. And that’s part of what makes this presidency so exciting. Not because of Twitter, per se, but because it gives Trump a platform to take his message directly to the people. And in an era where the media has abandoned any and ALL objective journalistic integrity, the importance of being able to do that has never been more apparent.
More broadly, it’s clear that we’re moving into an era where the old media gatekeepers are no longer nearly as relevant as they once were. Information is out there, and it’s having an enormous impact on the country and the world. Some of that impact is unfortunate and some of it is very good; like anything else, you’re not always going to love every aspect of a thing. But if it’s down to a choice between a handful of coastal elites determining the flow of information and a wide cross-section of the population finding their own voices, well, that’s hardly a choice at all.
