Josh Simons, newly elected MP for Makerfield and close ally of Starmer, is continuing his new campaign against Elon Musk’s Twitter. Simons complains that Musk’s tweets are too visible to people and claims that letting consumers who are disattisfied leave voluntarily is not enough:

“Waiting for Westminster to voluntarily quit X risks a very long wait… it’s a mistake to focus on individual choices… the question has to be: What do we expect of this platform?

Rising star Simons, who headed up Starmerite think tank Labour Together before his election and is now trying to get himself onto the Technology Select Committee, complained on Politics Live: “I do not want any man or woman to have that kind of power over our public debate.” Helpfully ignoring that Twitter closely managed reams of content before it was taken over by Musk…

He went on to spell out his personal dislike of Musk:

“Musk is a problem. I don’t like him. But Musk is symptomatic of the fact that he has this power… Think of the algorithm like a newspaper editor. Newspaper editors have values, they have standards, they have integrity. The people who build the algorithms should have the same values and integrity and professional standards.”

The key difference between a democratised social media and the legacy dead tree press is, of course, that editors and hacks operate in collusion with politicians. Now that information is no longer so closely controlled authoritarian politicians are itching to regulate a free social media to exctinction…

Guido’s founder and editor Paul Staines appeared on GB News this morning to explain the reasoning behind the twelfth annual  #PositiveXDay.

Maybe, just for one day, we can all try;

• to have a conversation, not a shouting match, with someone with whom you don’t agree. Caps lock off.
• post about somebody on the other side of a big debate – whose views and perspective you have learnt something from, because of how they engage.
• Share a positive experience of using X – how people rallied around to support you personally, or how it helped you spread the word about something that really mattered.
• Or just join in the discussion and show your support with the #PositiveXDay hashtag.

Make an effort to reach out to those with which you usually have violently opposing views. Or simply share your support by clicking this link #PositiveXDay

Alastair Campbell left the internet’s town square on tenterhooks last night as he revealed he was thinking of leaving Twitter because “Toytown Trumpy Fashboy” Elon Musk is running it. Displaying the level of analysis Alastair is known well for…

Like a lot of people, am thinking about leaving Xitter (copyright @LeightonAndrews ) given how truly awful it has become since Toytown Trumpy Fashboy @elonmusk took over. Staying for now on the grounds you should fight the far right wherever they are. But meanwhile have set up…

— ALASTAIR CAMPBELL (@campbellclaret) August 14, 2024

Campbell was encouraged by former Change UK candidate Jessica Simor to join the alternative Bluesky platform. A great decision for Bad Al as his potential audience will be 1% the size of Twitter’s…

Other fans of Campbell said: “No one is forcing you to stay,” “No, just go, you won’t be missed by anyone,” and “Good riddance moron.” As usual Campbell says he’ll stay on the platform to “fight the far right wherever they are“. Dominic Cummings’ “SW1 NPCs” are best known for their insistence that they will leave Twitter without ever actually doing so. Despite Twitter apparently being like “Paris under Nazi occupation” the Musk-hating loons just can’t keep away…

Trump returned to Twitter last night ahead of his major interview with Elon Musk on the platform. After 42 minutes of delay caused by what Musk called a co-ordinated attack on Twitter, Trump launched into all his favourite topics pretty much unabetted by the billionaire. The main points:

• Trump will return to Butler, where he was almost killed, in October.
• Biden didn’t want to go, it was a coup. He certainly didn’t look happy about it…
• Kamala is avoiding interviews because she can’t have a normal conversation.
• Harris is a “radical left lunatic”. Just look at her tax policies…
• Biden has jacked up inflation to intolerable levels.
• ‘Border tsar’ Harris failed to tackle the border crisis.
• The US is going to build an iron dome.
• Kamala will fail to deal with Jinping, Putin, or Jong-Un who are at the “top of their game.“
• Trump told Putin not to invade Ukraine.

Harris’ team attacked the event’s tech problems and Musk: “Trump’s entire campaign is in service of people like Elon Musk and himself — self-obsessed rich guys who will sell out the middle class and who cannot run a livestream in the year 2024.” Let’s see how she performs when she sits down for an interview…

Twitter users have noticed that the @Conservatives account is nowhere to be seen. Did the Tories delete it after the worst election ever?

Tories tell Guido that Twitter Support deleted their account, and it is their mistake to rectify. Elon putting them out of their misery… 

UPDATE: The account is back up.

Ivor Caplin, a former Labour Defence Minister and current board member of South East Labour, has been tweeting some rather eyebrow-raising stuff recently. In between some more sophisticated commentary on local election results and policy impacts, Caplin has been…encouraging – in a very polite manner, Guido may add – gay porn-stars on Twitter. Here are just a few tweets that Caplin hasn’t defended from the public eye…

Guido did ask whether he’s been hacked…