Digital Oligarchs Gunning for Europe (DOGE)

In this week's round-up of the latest news in online speech, content moderation and internet regulation, Mike and Ben cover:
• Elon’s Twitter Destruction Playbook Hits The US Government, And It’s Even More Dangerous (techdirt.com/2025/01/31/elons-twitter-destruct…) (Techdirt)
• US presses Brussels for answers over EU social media law (politico.eu/article/jim-jordan-presses-europea…) (Politico)
• Inside the Elon Musk-Jim Jordan ‘mind meld’ shaking up Capitol Hill (politico.com/news/2025/02/05/elon-musk-jim-jor…) (Politico)
• Musk adds Shell, Nestlé, Lego to X advertiser ‘boycott’ lawsuit (thehill.com/business/5123606-musk-shell-nestle…) (The Hill)
• Musk Shows Us What Actual Government Censorship On Social Media Looks Like (techdirt.com/2025/02/03/musk-shows-us-what-act…) (Techdirt)
• In wake of Meta moderation shift, advertisers have accepted new status quo: brand safety is a myth (digiday.com/media-buying/in-wake-of-meta-moder…) (Digiday)
• Meta sees no ‘noticeable impact’ in advertiser demand since content policy shift (marketingweek.com/meta-advertiser-demand-conte…) (Marketing Week)
• Amazon Raises Its Ad Spending on Elon Musk’s X, in Major Reversal (wsj.com/business/media/amazon-raises-its-ad-sp…) (Wall Street Journal)
• Senator Hawley Proposes Jail Time for People Who Download DeepSeek (404media.co/senator-hawley-proposes-jail-time-…) (404 Media)
• Apple Blasts EU Laws After First Porn App Comes to iPhones (bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-02-03/apple-b…) (Bloomberg)
This episode is brought to you with financial support from the Future of Online Trust & Safety Fund.
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Ctrl-Alt-Speech is the podcast where we make sense of the major debates shaping online speech, platform power, content moderation and the future of the internet. It’s co-hosted by Mike Masnick (Techdirt (techdirt.com)) and Ben Whitelaw (Everything in Moderation (everythinginmoderation.co)).