Ever since Elon Musk took Twitter private for US$44bn (£36bn), the debate around the social media platform has been vitriolic. There has been considerable angst about the direction Musk has been taking the company and his potential backpedalling on initial promises about free speech.

Musk’s takeover appeared to do much financial damage to the company, with many advertisers walking away. Although Musk claims Twitter is no longer on the “fast lane to bankruptcy”, I would argue that neither the former nor current ownership models look capable of making much money or benefiting society.

What follows is a proposal that would make Twitter more financially sustainable and move it back towards open speech, within limits. It would remove many of the problems related to anonymous and bot accounts while allowing Musk to recoup at least a substantial amount of his investment.

A new Twitter hybrid

I’m certainly not the first to suggest an alternative ownership model for social media companies. Back in 2017, The Financial Times columnist Andrew Hill suggested ownership by a cooperative of users. Twitter shareholders even voted on such a move at their annual meeting that year after it was tabled by tech activists James McRitchie and Steffen Sauerteig, though only those holding 5% of the shares were in favour.