When Vivian Schiller signed on as a Senior Executive at Twitter in 2013, she was excited to be joining a company that seemed poised to remake the world. It was a heavy time for the social media start-up. Just a few years early, it had been messages on Twitter that connected Democracy activists throughout the Middle East leading to a revolutionary moment known as the Arab Spring. But Schiller soon became disillusioned and has long since left the company. In the years since, Twitter was increasingly hi-jacked by purveyors of hate and disinformation, fouling democracy instead of spreading it. Now, billionaire Elon Musk has taken over twitter, fired half its workforce, and signaled plans to revise if not roll back the content moderation policies that lead the company to kick Donald Trump off the platform for spreading election lies. We talk to Vivian Schiller about what we should make of the Musk takeover and what it portends for the future of Twitter, social media, and American Democracy.

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