Twitters ban on political ads gets guarded welcome

NEW DELHI: Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey announced early on Thursday that the platform will no longer run political advertisements, saying that "political reach should be earned, not bought."
Politicians and internet experts in India welcomed the move, calling it a step in the right direction but they also remained skeptical of the step.
Twitters move assumes importance as it comes just a few days before the US Presidential elections. "Weve made the decision to stop all political advertising on Twitter globally. We believe political message reach should be earned, not bought…," Dorsey tweeted around 1.30am on Thursday, before he delved into a range of reasons behind the company's change in policies.

Weve made the decision to stop all political advertising on Twitter globally. We believe political message reach s… https://t.co/C8qijirtXW

— jack ������ (@jack) 1572465908000

The microblogging company has said it will stop both “candidate-based and issue-based ads” but there will be a few “exceptions”. Ads in support of voter registration will still be allowed, it added. Senior Twitter executive Vijaya Gadde elaborated on the current definition of the ad. They refer to “an election or a candidate, or ads that advocate for or against legislative issues of national importance (such as: climate change, healthcare, immigration, national security, taxes),” she wrote.
AAPs social media & IT strategist Ankit Lal said the party would be pleasantly surprised if Twitter manages to abide by their announcement. “Twitter has a revenue model, so its difficult to see if they will follow through what they have said about the blanket ban until the final policy is out. But it is a good call, especially because issue-based ads are misused by political parties,” he said.
Congress MP Rajeev Gowda, who heads the AICC research wing, questioned the purpose of a “blanket ban”, saying that regulation should be enough to control and curb misleading political ads. “Its not a good idea to ban all kinds of political content. We should, instead, have stricter regulation. The Election Commission can play a stronger role in this regard. Just like it vets the advertisements during the time of elections, they can have a fully dedicated team that goes through the content of each ad even when there are no elections,” he said.
BJPs former national co-convener of the IT Cell, Vinit Goenka, said that while Twitter is free to come up with its own policies regarding revenue generation, it is important that it does so within the ambit of the Indian legislation. “Twitter should be able to decide where its revenue comes from and I do not have any opinion on the change in their policies. My only concern was the anti-India ads that it previously ran on its platform. Those ads did not abide by Indian regulations and I had raised that issue with the company,” he added.
Derek OBrien, Trinamools parliamentary party leader in Rajya Sabha, said that this was a step in the right direction by Twitter. “But when it comes to misleading political ads, Facebook is by far the worst offender. In India, Facebook has broken every rule in the book. Will they brazen it out, again?” he asked.
Among other things, Dorsey said that “while internet advertising is incredibly powerful and very effective for commercial advertisers, that power brings significant risks to politics, where it can be used to influence votes to affect the lives of millions.”
“A political message earns reach when people decide to follow an account or retweet. Paying for reach removes that decision, forcing highly optimized and targeted political messages on people. We believe this decision should not be compromised by money,” Dorsey said in one of the tweets.
The California-headquartered company said it is stilRead More – Source