Musk's Twitter

Twitter is not so much a social media company as a core part of the global digital infrastructure.

Today, that core infrastructure that hosts billions of messages - from the public communications of governments, corporations, civil society and celebrities to the mundane rants of ordinary citizens - is about to pass, silently and without regulatory oversight, into the private hands of one very rich man.

What does that say about our current times?

It used to be that critical infrastructure could be nationalised to prevent any one person from exercising disproportionate influence over society. But what do you do when digital infrastructure is global and virtually impossible for any single country to control?