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.
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.
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.
Maybe his idea of a town square is more like a place for Nuremberg rally events.
All the while being fellated by feline feces, white nationalists, and dox-happy anti-LGBT bigots who celebrate the suicides of oppressed minorities.
Totally on your page, but what you’re describing sounds kinda like times square.
I’ve never been there so don’t know really. But it does seem full of ads and not very social either.
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.
And to top it all off, it’s run by this guy in particular.
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.
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.
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.
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.
No, that’s the issue. I can see the post but not the thread so I bail.
Many times I can’t even see the post.
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?
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.
Good. Come to mastodon
Bluesky
Mastodon
Duck season.
Wabbit season!
Duck season!
Less filling.
No.
Why?
I don’t think mastodon will be around in a decade, while I can easily imagine bluesky being around in 20.
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.
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.
Misskey or one of it’s many forks is good too
You mean boneless fediverse?
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.
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.
X marks the Nazi
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.
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.
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.
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’.
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.
What’s “ratioing”
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.
When a reply to a tweet gets more engagement than the tweet itself.
what a save!
what a save! what a save!Or using a laugh react as a thumbs down.
Yup. That’s actually a problem when people dog pile on someone with a valid point.
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.
Well said, I think that is the best explanation I have ever heard on the sites flaws.
That’s what happens when you cater to Nazis
That you lose only 18% of your users?
I mean that’s millions of people, that’s not nothing
Tens of millions. I recall Twitter having around 400 million users before the buyout, so an 18% loss would be nearly 80 million.
And don’t forget that it might be offset by increased bot activity.
It’s probably about 40% of the non bot users.
Can we get musk to buy russia?
Elon was right when he said history will remember who killed Twitter, but we disagree on who
Twitter is even more cringe than LinkedIn, which is saying something.
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.
I joined to read a thread because i figured why not and it wanted all of my personal information, I stupidly gave it up. The only interaction I’ve had is with bots and transphobic celebrities.
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!
Oh no, how will people know if their opinions are right or wrong without our top most social ethicists?
