Free Speech Warrior Elon Bans Twitter Account Tracking His Private Jet

Twitter has banned @ElonJet, the favored bot account that tracked CEO Elon Musk’s aircraft, days after the account’s proprietor accused the social media platform of shadowbanning it.

Over the weekend, Jack Sweeney, a first-year pupil on the University of Central Florida in Orlando and the operator of the account, claimed that an nameless Twitter worker had instructed him the corporate had severely limited the visibility of @ElonJet starting on Dec. 2. The reported transfer got here roughly 4 weeks after Musk made a giant deal about how he wouldn’t ban @ElonJet due to his “commitment to free speech.”

By Monday, Sweeney stated that it seemed like Twitter had reversed course and reinstated @ElonJet’s visibility. However, the corporate appears to modified its thoughts once more and taken an much more drastic transfer by early morning Wednesday, when some customers observed that @ElonJet was suspended.

Suspending an account even after he promised to not can be nothing new for Musk, whose interpretation of “free speech” has been far and wide, driving chaos at Twitter.

Back in January, Musk told the student via DM that he would give him $5,000 to take away the account as a result of it was a “security risk.” Sweeney rebuffed Musk’s provide, however stated he would take into account taking down @ElonJet for $50,000 and an internship at one of many tech billionaire’s corporations. In response, Musk blocked Sweeney on Twitter. Months later, after Musk introduced his intent to purchase Twitter, Sweeney stated he had made contingency plans to maintain the bot energetic on different platforms in case @ElonJet disappeared on the blue chook app. Faithful @ElonJet followers needn’t fear. You can nonetheless monitor America’s most notorious tech billionaire on Instagram, Facebook, and Telegram.

Gizmodo reached out to Sweeney on Wednesday morning for remark about @ElonJet’s suspension however didn’t get a response by the point of publication. Twitter not has a communications division to contact for remark.