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On Wednesday, Senate Commerce Committee called on a few major players in tech publishing in order to find out once and for all what secrets Jack Dorsey’s beard is keeping. When Dorsey appeared on the screen, it was obvious that his beard had grown even longer yet since the Senate last cast eyes on it a couple years ago, which must have been really frightening! But the brave senators pushed on.
The likes of Ted Cruz and Mike Lee asked the CEO of Twitter questions like, hey, “who the hell elected you?” And why fact-check our dear leader when he knows what is best and good? (Or rather, “I just don’t understand how you can label the president of the United States. Have you ever taken a tweet down from the ayatollah?” asked one senator, Cory Gardner of Colorado). And how long did it take you to grow that thing and is it haunted?
No clue what Dorsey actually said, but here’s what I heard his beard say: In the bramble waits a tip or two to take. What’s on the other side I’ll never tell, but a small hint will do you well: Through the thicket there’s a shadowy pall; ‘tis pale as the moon and round as the sun. It’s time to hear now from the thumb.
Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg was on the call (as was Google’s Sundar Pichai, although it appeared none of the officials seemed to know who he is). Zuck and the others were especially invested in defending Section 230 of the Communication Decency Act, a 1996 law that says websites like their’s can’t be held responsible for what its users post.
Both sides would like to take a whack at the law for different reasons, but there’s one thing on which I think we can all agree: We won’t feel at peace until we accept that the beard is the algorithm.
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