Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

There seems to be a contradiction in what Ms White says. Earlier, in reply to Deputy Connolly, she spoke of the idea of counter speech, that Twitter allowed a conversation to happen so that others from a counter view could get in and put their piece in. That might be all right at one level but at another I wonder if it is part of a big picture which Twitter is trying to create.

From the point of view of the platform gaining traction and popularity, be it Twitter, Google or something else, if there is controversy, a heightened conversation or a major debate, it means people are interested, watching and keying into it. As such, creating these two counterviews and giving them amplification helps the platforms gain traction. Many people have the view that, although the platforms claim they are watching over something, they are really just letting it run. To date, there has been at least some evidence of this.