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Matt Bors, a left-leaning cartoonist who runs a site called The Nib, gets most of his traffic from Facebook and Instagram. Credit...Norman Wong for The New York TimesMatt Bors, a left-leaning cartoonist who runs a site called The Nib, gets most of his traffic from Facebook and Instagram. Credit...Norman Wong for The...

Deplatforming President Trump showed that the First Amendment is broken — but not in the way his supporters think.

Jack Dorsey, the chief executive, had reservations about locking the president’s account. But the calls for violence that his tweets provoked were too overwhelming.

The actions followed the barring of President Trump from the service last week, as Twitter has moved to distance itself from violent content.

The companies pulled support for the “free speech” social network, all but killing the service just as many conservatives are seeking alternatives to Facebook and Twitter.

Thousands of internal directives and reports reveal how Chinese officials stage-managed what appeared online in the early days of the outbreak.

Since the election, millions have migrated to alternative social media and media sites like Parler, Rumble and Newsmax.

In its short life span, it was one of the fastest growing groups in Facebook’s history and a hub for those trying to delegitimize the election.

Republican senators accused the leaders of Twitter, Facebook and Google of censorship. Democrats denounced that as posturing.

The companies have said they would do more to stop misinformation and hacked materials from spreading. This is what that effort looks like.

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s chief executive, once cited Holocaust denial as something he would allow on the social network for free speech reasons.

The influential pro-Trump community broke the rules on harassment and targeting, said Reddit, which also banned other groups.

In an open letter, nearly three dozen called on the chief executive to take action on President Trump’s messages.

Without certain liability protections, companies like Twitter would have to be more aggressive about policing messages that press the boundaries — like the president’s.

President Trump’s taking aim at Twitter for fact-checking his tweets is part of a long tradition upheld by aggrieved internet trolls. The stakes are high.