Brazil's X ban is sending lots of people to Bluesky

Disclaimer: indifferent at best to musk, probably more dislike than anything else, but not with vitriol.

So I read that this is all because musk refused to appoint a Brazilian citizen as an X representative, as dictated by Brazilian law. I have not verified this part.

Musk refused because the last person to fill that role had all their bank accounts frozen by the judge.

The judge also cut off payments from Brazilian citizens to starlink, something about relating star link to x. so musk said “well then starlink is free for Brazilian citizens because I don’t want to cut people off from their internet connection.” Or something like that.

Edit: blackeyedblitzar child comment of this has better information.

Not exactly. X had a local representative who was threatened by this judge issuing illegal censorship orders. It’s not that they refused to appoint a representative but that they had to get rid of all their employees and legal representation in Brazil because the judge was going after them as individuals, making it impossible for X to challenge what they viewed as unconstitutional orders to censor speech.

The root of the issue is that Alexandre de Moraes, a single justice on the Supreme Court, has been issuing secret orders to censor content, ban accounts, and jail people over political speech. This is unconstitutional in Brazil per article 5 of the 1988 constitution, so X refused the orders. Note that the text of the Brazilian constitution explicitly says that the freedom of expression is guaranteed without censorship (it mentions “censorship”). If they were legal orders they would have complied, as they have in other countries.

Also the “Musk refused” part isn’t accurate. Ultimately these decisions are made by Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X.

> by this judge issuing illegal censorship orders

If the order is illegal you show that in court. U.S. district courts constantly issue illegal orders. There is a massive difference between appealing for an emergency stay and just blowing off the court. (Musk is a brilliant entrepreneur. He has given zero shits about the rule of law across his career, domestically or abroad.)

At the end of the day, both sides in this case are posturing. The judge gets to act like he's standing up to us American imperialists. Musk gets affirmation from his anti-work censorship crowd. The fact that X f/k/a Twitter has zero employees in Brazil should tell you how much that market really matters to him.

> Ultimately these decisions are made by Linda Yaccarino

This is nonsense. I have a lot of respect for senior people on the X team as well as many of their shareholders. Yaccarino is an obvious puppet.

I mean, let’s be real. X isn’t profitable so does retaining a bunch of users from a country with relatively low disposable income really matter?

I fully support Brazil banning X because a country can do whatever they want, but let’s not pretend X owes Brazil anything.

Brazil is irrelevant to X and countries that act like dictators deserve to be ignored by foreign companies. It’s hilarious to see Brazil play their cards and show they have no power over their citizens by threatening to fine them for using a VPN to access X.

This isn’t bias against LATAM, I also want to see Australia lose business due to their crazy spy laws.