Fewer people are using Elon Musk’s X as the platform struggles to attract and keep users, according to analysts (www.nbcnews.com)
from Stopthatgirl7@lemmy.world to technology@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 10:29
https://lemmy.world/post/13447711

Data from two research firms and figures published by Musk and X suggest a deteriorating situation for X by some metrics. Musk has marketed it as the world’s “town square,” but in number of users it continues to lag far behind social media rivals that focus on video, such as Instagram and TikTok. 

In February, X had 27 million daily active users of its mobile app in the U.S., down 18% from a year earlier, according to Sensor Tower, a market intelligence firm based in San Francisco. The U.S. user base has been flat or down every month since November 2022, the first full month of Musk’s owning the app, and in total it’s down 23% since then, Sensor Tower said.

#technology

threaded - newest

autotldr@lemmings.world on 23 Mar 2024 10:30 next collapse

This is the best summary I could come up with:


Musk has marketed it as the world’s “town square,” but in number of users it continues to lag far behind social media rivals that focus on video, such as Instagram and TikTok.

In February, X had 27 million daily active users of its mobile app in the U.S., down 18% from a year earlier, according to Sensor Tower, a market intelligence firm based in San Francisco.

The worldwide user base has been flat or down every month during Musk’s tenure began except one, when it grew slightly in October and then resumed falling, according to Sensor Tower.

Other social media apps experienced modest increases in their worldwide user bases during the same period, according to the research, with Snapchat growing 8.8%, Instagram 5.3%, Facebook 1.5% and TikTok 0.5%.

X had “the most material decline in active users compared to its peers,” Abe Yousef, a senior insights analyst at Sensor Tower, wrote in a research report.

“For microblogging platforms, X had dominant market share of app downloads right up until Threads launched,” Tom Grant, vice president of research at Apptopia, wrote in an email.


The original article contains 1,153 words, the summary contains 183 words. Saved 84%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

SorteKanin@feddit.dk on 23 Mar 2024 10:49 next collapse

Musk has marketed it as the world’s “town square"

He says it so clearly here which makes me wonder how people don’t realize it:

How fucked up would it be if your actual town square was owned by a private company?

A private company that is in control of who is allowed to talk and what they are allowed to say. A private company that even decides what you hear and see while walking the square. Meanwhile also shovelling ads in front of you while you try to find the people you actually want to engage with.

“Social” media owned by private corporations is not social. Such media is anti-social, corporate control of public spaces that ought to belong to the people, just like they mostly do in real life.

fluxion@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 11:14 next collapse

And to top it all off, it’s run by this guy in particular.

charles@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 11:20 next collapse

Totally on your page, but what you’re describing sounds kinda like times square.

SorteKanin@feddit.dk on 23 Mar 2024 11:23 collapse

I’ve never been there so don’t know really. But it does seem full of ads and not very social either.

cygon@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 13:01 next collapse

Considering the teams tasked with containing political opinion manipulation campaigns were the first to go, I think that is exactly what the acquisition boils down to. A license to manipulate and meddle in public discussion for anyone rich or powerful enough (and of a political disposition agreeable to Musk’s increasingly GOP/Russia-indoctrinated mind).

It’s a “public town square” where the major approvingly smiles as groups of paid shills and remote-controlled opinion pushers insert themselves into discussions and roughen up people they notice going against the opinions they push.

Ragnarok314159@sopuli.xyz on 24 Mar 2024 02:43 collapse

I maintain the Saudis gave Elon the loan, even if he never pays back a dime, to keep another Arab spring from ever happening again.

OhNoMoreLemmy@lemmy.ml on 23 Mar 2024 13:27 next collapse

How fucked up would it be if your actual town square was owned by a private company?

You have just invented malls. Hugely damaging to society, but they come with convenient parking and air con.

I quite like the tag line X, the abandoned shopping mall of the internet.

I think it describes it well.

Potatos_are_not_friends@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 13:43 collapse

Ah in this town square metaphor, don’t forget the private company’s CEO has a megaphone and talks over people, and outright kicks them out of the square if you hurt his feelings.

agressivelyPassive@feddit.de on 23 Mar 2024 14:01 next collapse

Maybe his idea of a town square is more like a place for Nuremberg rally events.

billiam0202@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 16:27 collapse

All the while being fellated by feline feces, white nationalists, and dox-happy anti-LGBT bigots who celebrate the suicides of oppressed minorities.

DrSleepless@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 11:42 next collapse

That’s what happens when you cater to Nazis

ripcord@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 13:01 collapse

That you lose only 18% of your users?

Cheems@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 14:45 next collapse

I mean that’s millions of people, that’s not nothing

mosiacmango@lemm.ee on 23 Mar 2024 17:10 collapse

Tens of millions. I recall Twitter having around 400 million users before the buyout, so an 18% loss would be nearly 80 million.

ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 19:57 collapse

And don’t forget that it might be offset by increased bot activity.

Kabloink@lemm.ee on 23 Mar 2024 16:36 collapse

It’s probably about 40% of the non bot users.

rebelsimile@sh.itjust.works on 23 Mar 2024 12:21 next collapse

X marks the Nazi

Harbinger01173430@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 12:42 next collapse

Good. Come to mastodon.

Edit: wtf is bluesky?

banghida@lemm.ee on 23 Mar 2024 14:29 collapse

Bluesky

Harbinger01173430@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 14:42 next collapse

Mastodon

banghida@lemm.ee on 23 Mar 2024 15:14 next collapse

No.

Anafabula@discuss.tchncs.de on 23 Mar 2024 15:33 next collapse

Misskey or one of it’s many forks is good too

Zoidsberg@lemmy.ca on 23 Mar 2024 16:36 collapse

Why?

banghida@lemm.ee on 23 Mar 2024 17:15 collapse

I don’t think mastodon will be around in a decade, while I can easily imagine bluesky being around in 20.

moon@lemmy.cafe on 23 Mar 2024 18:12 next collapse

Bluesky will be around as long as there’s a company behind it. If it’s not profitable, it’ll cease to exist overnight. Activitypub will be around as long as people enjoy it, which is a lot more sustainable.

SorteKanin@feddit.dk on 23 Mar 2024 19:25 collapse

Mastodon is just one platform used to access the Fediverse. I agree, Mastodon might not be the hottest Fediverse microblogging app in a decade, but the Fediverse will certainly still be around. And that’s what you should really care about.

Don’t go to Mastodon specifically, just go to the Fediverse.

dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 16:47 collapse

Duck season.

WhiskyTangoFoxtrot@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 19:19 next collapse

Less filling.

Snowpix@lemmy.ca on 23 Mar 2024 21:43 collapse

Wabbit season!

dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 22:09 collapse

Duck season!

Snowpix@lemmy.ca on 23 Mar 2024 23:11 collapse

Wabbit season!

dual_sport_dork@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 23:18 collapse

Duck season!

Ragnarok314159@sopuli.xyz on 24 Mar 2024 02:44 collapse

Kill da wabbit. KILL da wabbit! KILL DA WABBIT!

ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 19:22 collapse

You mean boneless fediverse?

selokichtli@lemmy.ml on 23 Mar 2024 14:21 next collapse

Weird. I’ve never seen Twitter more hostile to visitors and potential new users. And if you happen to register to a new account you will be welcomed by even more hostility from trolls and seasoned users. It’s just a terrible experience.

Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works on 23 Mar 2024 14:58 next collapse

I noticed that as well. Every once in a while there will be a link to something interesting om Twitter, but you only get basically a screenshot. If you try and do any other viewing you immediately get pushed for sign in.

Krauerking@lemy.lol on 24 Mar 2024 14:51 collapse

Actually yeah, why would if you are new to Twitter would you go through the effort of signing up and beating your head against the wall to try and find some community on Twitter when you could just avoid it?

You can’t just scroll around and check it out before you create your account. Your home page is probably artificially filled with the nonsense garbage of the owner making his own big statement and the ads you can see are for ball tanning, so you aren’t even sure you cAn trust the sponsors.

If you were young and not yet on it, why would you join unless you want to argue with assholes or try to get someone to lend you some crypto because you think it will get you out of your shit life.

selokichtli@lemmy.ml on 24 Mar 2024 16:44 collapse

Right? It feels more like they are trying to hide the toxicity of their community.

S_204@lemm.ee on 23 Mar 2024 14:34 next collapse

Whenever I get linked to twitter, it tries to get me to login when I just want to scan the thread… I back out everytime now.

teejay@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 15:09 next collapse

Same. It loads the page where the tweet would be, then it seems like 2 popups cover it up, both about logging in. I immediately no longer care about viewing what I wanted to see, and close the window.

Anafabula@discuss.tchncs.de on 23 Mar 2024 15:30 next collapse

You can view threads without logging in? I haven’t been able see replies/parent posts in months.

Except with Nitter, but that had to shut down too.

S_204@lemm.ee on 23 Mar 2024 15:36 collapse

No, that’s the issue. I can see the post but not the thread so I bail.

NewNewAccount@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 16:14 collapse

Many times I can’t even see the post.

BallsInTheShredder@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 19:25 collapse

Honestly I feel like that killed Twitter more than many other changes.

People tell me "there’s no way he (musk) would intentionally crash his own company - it makes no sense - “he’s just terribly bad at business!”

But is he really THAT bad? In what world could these changes be made in which he’s actively trying to improve the company? If nothing else, seeing the negative backlash, bad publicity and dropping number of users wouldn’t any sound minded business owner at least temporarily undo some of these changes?

With any business, if you make a change that causes you to lose customers and get bad publicity… don’t you try to mitigate the damage done? Who goes balls to the wall on obviously bad decisions?

SoyTDI@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 21:47 collapse

He’s that bad at business. On Twitter, Musk has no workers to contain his bullshit or create a good public image for him. Nor does he have enough workers to keep Twitter running smoothly as it used to.

BallsInTheShredder@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 02:10 collapse

My point is, look I’m a dumb white hick. I’ve never ran anything as significant as this. Just from the way the guy talks I can tell he has eons more experience than I do. His track record? Jesus Christ.

Still, if I were him I would’ve just… stopped. Long, long ago.

Yet he hasn’t. Admittedly, I’m a dumb fuck yet smart cookie compared to some but honestly what are the odds that with zero experience I could make better business decisions than this guy?

Make it make sense, ya know? Explain to me like I’m 5 why he would make decisions that are so obviously detrimental to the company? What are the odds that I could give better business advice than this guy?

Yet this is what he’s doing. He’s either purposely destroying it or has some weird master plan and I’m not sure I can be convinced otherwise tbh. We all see it, as bad as he seems to be there’s no way he doesn’t.

Ragnarok314159@sopuli.xyz on 24 Mar 2024 02:38 next collapse

If he was smart, he would have known his own limitations and kept the facade. People thought he was the real life Tony Stark.

Instead, he believed all the bullshit. The actual smart people around him were replaced with sycophants. I have yet to meet one engineer that thinks highly of Elon. They might like working at SpaceX, but Elon has shown himself to be so pathetically stupid fake side projects have to be made for him to participate in so he doesn’t derail the actual work.

Elon has also caused so many failures at Tesla. He has sunk resources into garbage that have yet to be manifest with today’s computers rather than make a good EV. His companies succeed in spite of him. He is nothing more than a slightly below average rich kid who failed upwards.

aesthelete@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 23:17 collapse

Elon has also caused so many failures at Tesla. He has sunk resources into garbage that have yet to be manifest with today’s computers rather than make a good EV.

His explanation for removing LIDAR from self-driving cars because “people can drive with their eyes, so a camera should be good enough” is another one of those things that sounds right until you think about it for more than a half a fucking second.

modeler@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 03:43 next collapse

Elon sounds like he’s experienced, skilled and is approaching things from a theoretical or ethical or other grand point of view. He used to impress me with his approach on building an electric car company with full self-driving vehicles in the 2010’s. I wasn’t a full believer, but I thought he was competent and wanted Tesla to succeed.

Then he went and bought Twitter. As a software engineer all my life, and in the startup scene, and having worked in a failed social media platform, I have some experience. Everything he’s said about Twitter is crap and everything he’s done is stupid. And the results speak for themselves.

I’ve seen people say that Elon sounds great about things they don’t know too much about. But when the topic comes to things they do understand, Elon clearly is wrong.

He started his career with hundreds of millions of dollars, and he bet it all on a couple of businesses be bought (he was never a founder, always a purchaser).

Basically he’s been lucky twice (Paypal and Tesla), but each of these won 10-100x on his initial stake.

[deleted] on 24 Mar 2024 23:11 next collapse

.

dragontamer@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 22:58 collapse

He used to impress me with his approach on building an electric car company with full self-driving vehicles in the 2010’s. I wasn’t a full believer, but I thought he was competent and wanted Tesla to succeed.

Elon Musk didn’t build the company.

Elon Musk invested into the company, and then sued Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning into giving him “Founder” status. When Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning left the company, it all started to go to shit. Sure there’s some momentum, but by 2015+, its clear that Elon Musk’s buffoonery has taken over (ex: using Tesla money to buy his cousin’s company SolarCity) and today we have 100% Elon bullshit like Cybertruck.

modeler@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 23:53 collapse

Elon Musk didn’t build the company.

Elon Musk invested into the company,

That’s what I said a couple of paragraphs later

Hubi@feddit.de on 24 Mar 2024 04:09 next collapse

He’s the best example of someone falling upwards. He’s not much more than a cash cow for other people running the companies that he owns and their successes are not happening because of Musk, they are happening despite of him. It goes as far as SpaceX allegedly using “handlers” to keep him from interfering with the actual development. I’m pretty sure that you, as a mod of !mechanicadvice@lemmy.world, have more technical experience as the guy who claims to be the genius behind Tesla.

The reason that Musk is making these obviously dumb decisions at Twitter is because it’s 100% his toy to play with and there’s nobody else running the show for him. What we are seeing is essentially the unfiltered effect that he has on a business.

aesthelete@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 23:06 collapse

It’s not a meritocracy. That’s basically all there is to it. He’s in his position by a combination of birth, dumb luck, and people thinking he sounds smart because he’s got a weird accent.

The idea that the rich’s ranks were ever or ever would be mostly full of smart or hard working people that “earned it” or “deserve it” is just a giant bunch of rich people propaganda that the masses devoured…bigly.

[deleted] on 23 Mar 2024 14:35 next collapse

.

DrunkDragon@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 14:36 next collapse

I used to be really active on Twitter. Everyone was there: my friends, people in my industry, people involved in my hobbies. When Musk bought it out everyone left. I tried to follow them to Bluesky and Mastodon but they mostly just quit posting. Between that and Reddit falling apart I don’t often use social media anymore.

Adderbox76@lemmy.ca on 23 Mar 2024 15:03 collapse

Yeah. Same. I moved to Mastodon, and then ended up getting my invite to Bluesky (two weeks before it opened to everyone…thanks Jack Dorsey…real helpful…). But no one is there. Mastodon has mostly tech and open source. Bluesky is…well…nothing that I can tell.

Unquestionably the winner of Twitter’s fall was TikTok, when suddenly everyone including politicians started making accounts/posts. Which is likely a large part of the push to get it banned in the US. Because it’s taking away users/advertisers from good ol’ 'murican tech businesses owned by south african diamond mine nepo babies.

seliaste@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 24 Mar 2024 09:42 next collapse

Jack Dorsey isn’t really involved in Bsky anymore

halva@discuss.tchncs.de on 24 Mar 2024 10:13 collapse

Mastodon has mostly tech and open source. Bluesky is…well…nothing that I can tell.

depends on your instance and social circle, i maintain a total lack of that in mine

eran_morad@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 16:56 next collapse

Can we get musk to buy russia?

ReallyKinda@kbin.social on 23 Mar 2024 17:16 next collapse

Oh no, how will people know if their opinions are right or wrong without our top most social ethicists?

SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca on 24 Mar 2024 02:21 collapse

For that I can give you a handy twitter analysis you can apply to every comment you write:

Your opinion is wrong and probably racist.

rsuri@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 17:24 next collapse

I’m actually glad to see what’s been happening to Twitter because as much as it was started with good intentions and used to be a positive force for tech, it was also fundamentally flawed social media model. The basic problem was that only positive reactions were allowed - like, retweet, follow. This is NOT the town square, where you can get any reaction. It’s more akin to a dictator’s rally, where you’re only allowed to clap and booing is not allowed. So it’s no surprise that over time, it led to filter bubbles and the spread of mass delusions. Because you could say the craziest or most depraved thing, and all you’d hear is applause.

systemglitch@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 17:49 next collapse

Well said, I think that is the best explanation I have ever heard on the sites flaws.

TheBat@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 18:07 next collapse

The basic problem was that only positive reactions were allowed - like, retweet, follow

Idk if I would call retweeting positive reaction, especially when that retweet is ‘look at this fucking moron’.

WarlordSdocy@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 18:34 next collapse

Yeah I think if anything twitter is a lesson in how even if you try to give users only positive ways to interact they will find ways to use them to interact negatively. Whether that be quote retweeting or ratioing.

BallsInTheShredder@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 18:59 next collapse

What’s “ratioing”

JungleJim@sh.itjust.works on 23 Mar 2024 19:33 next collapse

When a piece of content that doesn’t allow downvotes, like a tweet, has lots more reposts than it does likes, the “ratio” is seen as proof the opinion was disagreed with, proportionally to the “ratio” itself.

LunarLoony@lemmy.sdf.org on 23 Mar 2024 20:18 next collapse

When a reply to a tweet gets more engagement than the tweet itself.

horsey@lemm.ee on 24 Mar 2024 00:10 collapse

I’ve seen it used to describe when a post has more comments than it has likes.

BallsInTheShredder@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 02:02 collapse

Makes sense thanks

misspacific@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 23 Mar 2024 19:23 next collapse

what a save!
what a save! what a save!

radicalautonomy@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 21:35 collapse

Or using a laugh react as a thumbs down.

whereisk@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 00:47 collapse

A laugh react is more insidious than a thumbs down.

radicalautonomy@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 01:54 next collapse

My point was that a laugh react is meant to be a positive interaction (what you said was funny, and I enjoyed your contribution) but has been co-opted as a negative reaction (I’m laughing at what a willfully ignorant idiot you are) because FB only wanted to provide users with positive ways to react. My concern wasn’t the level of negativity, only to provide the person to whom I was replying with a other example.

whereisk@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 08:23 collapse

I think that was clear, my further comment was to highlight how far off (maybe), FB’s implementation intent has been from the way people are now using it.

Yes, in a joke or funny post the laugh emoji is used as intended. But in a more serious announcement it is the equivalent of mocking disgust, hence more emotionally devastating than a thumbs down.

Eg say someone posts a somber poem about their late father - a laughing emoji is saying “fuck you, I laugh at your pain or your shitty poem or the memory of your dad”.

The only question is, why, now that they’ve seen how it’s used don’t they let people disallow certain reactions. I’m assuming because emotional distress is more addictive…

r3df0x@7.62x54r.ru on 24 Mar 2024 02:13 collapse

Underrated observation.

Boiglenoight@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 19:50 collapse

Yup. That’s actually a problem when people dog pile on someone with a valid point.

HarkMahlberg@kbin.social on 23 Mar 2024 20:58 next collapse

I would say that the "positive vibes only" trait is part of it, but the far bigger problem was the character limit. Even when it was double from 140 to 280, that still doesn't not leave room for nuanced opinions. And then, the least nuanced opinions also become the most easily spreadable. Both traits really reward our worst instincts.

r3df0x@7.62x54r.ru on 24 Mar 2024 02:09 next collapse

Downvoting and disliking can have their own issues too.

On Lemmy, downvoting isn’t really that bad, especially compared to Reddit, and that’s likely because of the federated model where instance admins can’t trust the authenticity of votes. On Lemmy, voting effects the score on the post and that’s it, as opposed to Reddit where taking on too many downvotes will shadow ban or lock your account, even if you still have thousands of karma in the subreddit where it happened. Those restrictions also apply site wide. Lemmy users also don’t have a global karma count, which removes most temptation to delete posts that go negative and self censor. Of course there are probably many people out there who would delete a post with a 10:1 negative score ratio. Then again if it’s that bad then it might not be a bad thing to delete it.

Both models have their place and pros and cons. I understand the nefarious intent behind this change on Youtube, but I feel like hiding negative feedback so that only the poster can see it has potential. It could deter bandwagon downvote brigading. Dislikes are really only relevant to the algorithm and the user who posted the content.

selokichtli@lemmy.ml on 24 Mar 2024 15:07 collapse

In Lemmy you can also disable the visualization of the voting system instance-side and client-side. I disable it, then, after writing my piece, it’s out there. If people don’t like it and they don’t reply, well, deal with it.

SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca on 24 Mar 2024 02:15 next collapse

Yeah I’ve always thought of it as a “build your own cult” toolkit. On Twitter you too can try your hand at being a cult leader with followers that agree with everything you say.

AnAngryAlpaca@feddit.de on 24 Mar 2024 21:19 collapse

I’m not sure which platform (fb, Twitter, YouTube???) it was, but it did count “unfollow” or “block user/block channel/block post” as negative feedback, limiting future reach of this person’s posts to other users of the platform.

SpeedLimit55@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 17:37 next collapse

Of course engagement is down, nobody wants to post anymore when most replies are spambot nonsense and cheech and chong gummies ads. It is still the best place for breaking sports news and my feed is highly curated to only see what I want.

Ragnarok314159@sopuli.xyz on 24 Mar 2024 02:40 collapse

Don’t forget the endless “Pussy in Bio” advertisements that are now filling up most feeds.

turkishdelight@lemmy.ml on 23 Mar 2024 18:06 next collapse

Twitter is even more cringe than LinkedIn, which is saying something.

kilorat@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 20:18 next collapse

Elon was right when he said history will remember who killed Twitter, but we disagree on who

hOrni@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 08:33 collapse

People acting as if twitter is something important. And killing it is meaningful. In Europe we don’t use it. Literally. I’m Polish, I never had a twitter account and don’t know anybody who has. The whole twitter/musk debacle is a war over nothing.

forgeddit@sopuli.xyz on 24 Mar 2024 09:11 next collapse

Just because it’s not popular in your social bubble in Europe doesn’t mean it’s not important. I’m European, and I found it very useful during e.g. COVID or the start of the European invasion. (Ukraine*)

Of course there were problems with fake accounts back then, but it was still the best platform for curated expert feeds if you followed the right people.

It’s not the same anymore, many of the experts have left and especially the feeds don’t have the replies of other verified e.g. scientists. Similar to Reddit, but probably even worse/more noticeable.

seliaste@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 24 Mar 2024 09:43 next collapse

It was pretty widely used in France

Ellecram@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 22:11 collapse

American here. Never used twitter. Never pay attention to it.

EmperorHenry@discuss.tchncs.de on 23 Mar 2024 21:29 next collapse

Weird, whenever I browse twitter I see loads of people of all kinds tweeting things.

radicalautonomy@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 21:33 next collapse

Right? I browse Twitter a lot and whenever I do I just kidding no I don’t.

BreakDecks@lemmy.ml on 23 Mar 2024 21:55 next collapse

It’s almost like “fewer people” is a distinctly different concept from “nobody”.

EmperorHenry@discuss.tchncs.de on 23 Mar 2024 21:58 next collapse

People on mastodon and lemmy keep saying twitter is dead, but it’s actually very active.

One of the idiots that replied to that comment of mine literally said they don’t go there anymore but looked at me like I’m some kind of idiot for just saying that people are still tweeting. Out of the two of us, I’m the one who still goes there, they don’t go there anymore.

So who do you think would know better about what’s going on on twitter as of late?

BreakDecks@lemmy.ml on 23 Mar 2024 22:07 next collapse

  1. The post you responded to didn’t say that Twitter is “dead”.
  2. People who still use Twitter are, in fact, idiots.
  3. NBC News does seem to be a more credible source than you on this topic.
VerbFlow@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 22:10 collapse

As for me, it should be dead. I’m tired of having people link Twitter, as if any good person will join a discussion on there. It’s a digital parasite feeding off ad revenue and it should be taken down so people stop linking to it and posting on there.

PrefersAwkward@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 21:59 collapse

What do you mean Albuquerque has fewer people than NYC? One time I was at this cafe in Albuquerque and it was packed!

SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca on 24 Mar 2024 02:18 collapse

“Nobody goes there anymore, it’s too crowded” - Yogi Berra

VerbFlow@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 22:06 next collapse

Whenever I browse Twitter I do it because others link to it

spoiler

, and a lot of porn originates from there

. I’m glad that people are moving away, because that means these not as many people will use it as a primary source, and post art and other stuff somewhere else.

Stopthatgirl7@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 22:47 collapse

Because the algorithm will always try to fill the timeline with something. It’s not going to show you empty spaces where tweets WOULD have been if people who left had been there.

EmperorHenry@discuss.tchncs.de on 23 Mar 2024 22:58 collapse

I don’t see any empty spaces.

Stopthatgirl7@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 23:04 collapse

Yes. Because the algorithm fills them with tweets from other people. That’s why it seems like there are still the same number of people there even though there aren’t.

yoz@aussie.zone on 23 Mar 2024 22:48 next collapse

Even of nobody uses twitter , he got the money to keep it running for next 100 years.

SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca on 24 Mar 2024 02:09 collapse

Not really. His wealth isn’t in money, it’s in shares of companies like Tesla. If Tesla drops in value his wealth drops. If he sells shares in Tesla to subsidize Twitter, the value of his remaining shares in Tesla drops. Which is why he borrowed a lot of money from the Saudis to acquire Twitter. Using Tesla shares as collateral. Tesla stock is crazy overvalued, and he’s leveraged it to shit. It’s possible Elon Musk could be bankrupt in a couple of years.

yoz@aussie.zone on 24 Mar 2024 03:44 collapse

I see a lot of “if”

marx2k@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 04:48 next collapse

Tesla is down 31.23% YTd

SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca on 24 Mar 2024 05:29 collapse

Normally it would be “he won’t do that because it would be completely stupid.” But since we’re talking about Elon Musk, it’s gotta be “If he does this stupid thing here’s what could happen.”

[deleted] on 23 Mar 2024 23:03 next collapse

.

dynamojoe@lemmy.world on 23 Mar 2024 23:19 next collapse

I need someone to tell me why Musk won’t be a huge buyer of DWAC when it opens. How much of Truth Social would he need to get it merged with Twitter, which would get Trump back on the platform. Musk gets to help out the psycho conservative right and he gets to help himself.

SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca on 24 Mar 2024 02:05 collapse

It would get attention, but can that attention be translated into ad revenue? So it doesn’t really help Musk out, and would be a bad move. So it seems like a stupid thing to do. So he’ll probably do it.

dynamojoe@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 14:13 collapse

Trump is a meta-generator; there are articles critical of the articles critical of his coverage. Anyone could sell ads under a Trump tweet. How many real people joined Truth Social just to follow Trump, and more just to be able to see what the orange bastard spewed? There’s a reason pre-Musk Twitter bent over backwards to keep the shit-flinging orangutan on their platform.

If Musk does nothing, Twitter dies in a slow spiral. He has to do something. What better way than to get a guy who people can’t stop paying attention to, a frontrunner in an election season? The man gets clicks. If he’s already dropped $44B on Twitter, what’s another billion or two to save its life while simultaneously propping up his political choice, triggering the libs, and writing the loss off of his taxes?

SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca on 24 Mar 2024 21:09 collapse

Imagine Trump posts something about “killing immigrant vermin” and there’s a Nike swish with the slogan “Just Do It” beside it.

How much money do you think advertisers will pay when this is a possibility?

You’re thinking solely in terms of getting attention. And yeah no doubt Trump being on Twitter would get attention. The question is how do you turn that attention into revenue?

If he’s already dropped $44B on Twitter, what’s another billion or two to save its life while simultaneously propping up his political choice, triggering the libs, and writing the loss off of his taxes?

You’ve jumped to the conclusion that this will save Twitter. The problem is that this will get attention (which actually costs money in bandwidth) without a clear way to make money off of it. So he’d be spending billions on something that would not get him back into the good graces of advertisers and probably cement the inevitable destruction of twitter, not save it.

Like I say, it’s Elon Musk so the fact that it’s a bad move means he might actually do it.

Churbleyimyam@lemm.ee on 24 Mar 2024 00:15 next collapse

LOOOOOOL

r3df0x@7.62x54r.ru on 24 Mar 2024 02:29 next collapse

Right wing “free speech” spaces tend to crash and burn hard. If they don’t moderate blatant racism and shitty behavior, the white supremacists drive out all the sane people, but if they do moderate, then shit stains like Tim Pool will start casting massive amounts of FUD onto the platform and claim that it has “gone woke” and isn’t a true free speech platform.

jabjoe@feddit.uk on 24 Mar 2024 10:21 collapse

It’s something you see endless repeated. When there is no rules, you get the loudest, baddest, pieces of work, rise to the top and then set rules that favour them. Look over the world and history, where law and order has broke down, war/drug lords take over.

I lived in Holland for a bit, my Dutch colleagues told a story of the bus system. Holland tried a honor payment system, trusting people to pay what they needed to for their trip. It failed hard and was replaced with fair collectors my colleagues called “the bus Nazis”.

The same thing happens with free speech absolutism. You hit “Paradox of tolerance”.

Anarchy just doesn’t work. You need rules for everyone to play nice by.

Krauerking@lemy.lol on 24 Mar 2024 14:39 next collapse

I mean look at how self checkouts are now looking at putting a hold of $100 on your card you use or Walmart requiring that you are a subscriber of their plan so they can hunt you down if you steal stuff.

It’s cheaper for sure to just let people do whatever they want, but people suck and mostly just care about themselves. And we really don’t care about the minor rules when those making them feel like they have all the power.

Humanity works when it’s the people all agreeing to shared set of rules and interacting with each other to keep it in check.

jabjoe@feddit.uk on 24 Mar 2024 17:54 collapse

Yep, “Tragedy of the Commons”

Harbinger01173430@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 14:59 collapse

Now that you mention Paradox, I think we need neural parasites to turn us into a well ordered hive mind like in that Paradox Interactive game known as Stellaris. 🧐

megopie@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 24 Mar 2024 03:02 next collapse

What I find most interesting, is not that twitter is failing in active users faster than the others, but that all the other listed in the article are also all seeing a decline in user ship. Even the new “up and comer” TikTok is losing users.

To some extent I suspect that it’s just a result of people breaking their social medias built during the pandemic. But is there something else? Are they just going to new platforms? Is there a modal shift on how people congregate online driven by the issues with platforms? Or are people just spending less time online with the pandemic mostly over.

AAA@feddit.de on 24 Mar 2024 09:51 collapse

Social media fatigue is slowly getting traction. I don’t have an article or study at hand to back it up, but I read about it the other day. Especially in younger generations it’s a trend already.

Also, but that’s only my personal theorie, i think it’s a trend only among the less-hateful people. Hateful people nonstop spewing their vile messages everywhere is making “normal” people leave, which then turns off even more “normal” people.

The enraged slowly turning (unmoderated) social media into one big echo chamber.

aesthelete@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 22:57 collapse

It’s really not fun to be on any of the platforms anymore, if it ever even was.

I don’t know if there will be a new thing, but if there is I think it can’t look like any existing platform as they’re all kind of trash and have largely the same problems.

I think there was also a naive technological optimism in the early 2000s and 2010s that has died off quite a bit. Tech companies came in looking like they were using some new type of capitalism that wasn’t all about the almighty dollar, but instead about progress more generally…now most of us know better.

Notorious_handholder@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 20:20 collapse

There was a period in the mid 2000’s of like 3-4 years where social media was fun and not super toxic. It was still toxic to a degree, but nowhere near like it is now. Then it started to decline rapidly once the general public started to get involved as smart phones became better and better at helping keep people terminally online.

I hate sounding like a hipster, but everything good or at least semi-decent really does come to an end once it gets saturated by the general public.

aesthelete@lemmy.world on 26 Mar 2024 21:25 collapse

Totally agree with all of this. Facebook was actually fun when I first used it. I wouldn’t call it anything even remotely resembling fun at this point.

Reddit was similar. Now every platform (including actually this one, sorry guys) I find myself dreading when there’s a response in my inbox because everything is just overwhelmingly bitter and full of disagreement online. I am guilty of it myself, too…but part of me thinks the format has to change drastically in order to become fun again.

SomeGuy69@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 04:39 next collapse

For Twitter I’m apparently also a turbo user, as I get loading errors every day, after opening a few tabs quickly. Then it takes a while before I’m unblocked. Before Elon bought Twitter this never happened.

100_kg_90_de_belin@feddit.it on 24 Mar 2024 14:26 next collapse

“The platform struggles to attract and keep users”: why should I give up my data to an alt-right platform owned by a billionaire?

YeetPics@mander.xyz on 23 Mar 2024 11:48 next collapse

Remember when Twitter was being used by people in warzones and struggling under authoritarian regimes to avoid being killed for thinking “illegally”?

I miss the days when this platform served any purpose at all.

arc@lemm.ee on 24 Mar 2024 21:40 next collapse

I use Twitter through a browser and ad blocker and the content is borderline dogshit as it is. I use it because inertia means the things I want to find are still represented there. But it can’t be long before some major accounts move elsewhere, or deprioritize their presence. I’m thinking mainly of news orgs, but NGOs and governments might move too.

frostmore@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 2024 22:30 next collapse

twitter was overly woke before musk and after musk it edging close to being alt right.

gone were the days where people don’t get offended by the smallest of things and woke idiots using their nonsense to spread hatred and discrimination.

symthetics@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 00:02 collapse

Can you define woke?

frostmore@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 06:45 next collapse

my bad,it should have been woke extremism.

woke used to mean being alert to racial discrimination and/or prejudice used by black people.

nowadays perverted by sjw to be used as a weapon to discriminate and spread hatred.

symthetics@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 08:16 collapse

So you mean racism.

frostmore@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 09:54 collapse

basically bigotry, discrimination,racism not that much different used by right wing nutjobs.

symthetics@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 09:59 collapse

Do you have an example?

frostmore@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 10:06 collapse

reddit would be awashed with plenty but you probably can’t find much since the woke mods are banning and deleting posts and calling it whatever phobia they find convenient.

symthetics@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 11:59 collapse

So no examples to back up your claim. Ok.

frostmore@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 12:05 collapse

sure. we 😊

TwigletSparkle@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 25 Mar 2024 10:55 collapse

Woke is just a dogwhistle for bigots now. Instead of “I hate that there are gay people in my movie” it’s now “Going woke ruined this movie”.

symthetics@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 12:20 collapse

I know, I was just curious how many steps it would take before they were honest about their own bigotry.

Of course they don’t have the balls to be, so instead stay vague and deflect.

TwigletSparkle@lemmy.blahaj.zone on 25 Mar 2024 16:20 collapse

I thought as much; I was just hijacking the conversation to put that in black & white for passers by =)

symthetics@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 17:32 collapse

Haha all good :D

Hoticeberg@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 00:56 next collapse

It’s turned into such a cesspool of right wing nut jobs and musk groupies. Huge echo chamber.

books@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 03:15 next collapse

Eh I’ve been reading this headline forever.

Call me when it’s Myspace.

hex_m_hell@slrpnk.net on 25 Mar 2024 08:26 collapse

Myspace existed for a really long time after it ceased to be relevant. It actually only ceased to be relevant after they lost all the music that had been uploaded. That’s when independent musicians finally abandoned it, and it basically disappeared.

Reporting on “X” is what’s keeping it alive, IMHO. Stop reporting on it and it will stop being used. Alternatively, if there’s some major incident, that would probably be enough to finish it. It may eventually go bankrupt between now and then, but it’s actually pretty useful for people wanting to spread nazi propaganda so the far right will probably keep pumping money in until it collapses.

dragontamer@lemmy.world on 25 Mar 2024 23:25 collapse

Reporting on “X” is what’s keeping it alive, IMHO.

Nah. “X” had $Billions in cash from the buyout deal + loans. X will simply not fall until all that cash dries up, and they reach the end of their loans. Even then, Elon Musk can just command Tesla to buy a whole bunch of Twitter-advertisements to transfer money to Twitter/X and keep the party alive a bit longer.

I don’t know how long it will last. But Elon Musk was over $200 Billion in assets when he bought the company. He’s lost a ton of that money, but Elon Musk still has a long way to go before he runs out of options. It does seem like Musk’s wealth is collapsing before our eyes however (their big bet on China / Gigafactory Shanghai looks like its about to go bad this quarter), but I don’t expect X to fall until after Elon Musk runs out of money.


There’s a lot of money that needs to be deflated / lost before this whole thing collapses. But like gravity, it should be inevitable. No one can lie, steal, and cheat money forever and get away with it IMO, eventually people catch on. But it can last for more decades than people expect.

[deleted] on 25 Mar 2024 03:27 next collapse

.

Disaster@sh.itjust.works on 26 Mar 2024 00:25 collapse

It might help if they didn’t put all their efforts into killing Nitter and other useful frontends.