Big Technology

Should Facebook and Twitter Have Banned Donald Trump? A Conversation With Ryan Mac of BuzzFeed News

‘There’s a difference between banning him completely and banning the algorithmic spread of his statements’

Alex Kantrowitz
OneZero
Published in
25 min readJan 13, 2021

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Ryan Mac

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Over the past week, both Facebook and Twitter suspended President Donald Trump’s account. These companies don’t take such aggressive action lightly, and it took Trump sending a mob toward the U.S. Capitol, which they eventually breached, to force the issue.

For years, BuzzFeed News senior reporter Ryan Mac and I have been watching these companies’ every move. Previously as colleagues at BuzzFeed. Mac joined me this week on the Big Technology Podcast for a discussion on whether the social platforms’ moves were merited, where they go from here, and how he thinks about all the internal Facebook communication he’s obtained in his reporting.

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OneZero
OneZero

Published in OneZero

OneZero is a former publication from Medium about the impact of technology on people and the future. Currently inactive and not taking submissions.

Alex Kantrowitz
Alex Kantrowitz

Written by Alex Kantrowitz

Veteran journalist covering Big Tech and society. Subscribe to my newsletter here: https://bigtechnology.com.

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