I've Been Checking Out the New Platforms: UPDATED

(The first few paragraphs were originally posted in November, but keep reading for an updated portion below.)

Twitter has been threatening to go under now for a few weeks and so far, nothing seriously calamitous has happened. There has been a mass departure of a lot of accounts, which has impacted the follower counts for many people, but I have actually appreciated the exodus. Twitter now feels a little more chill, but it is also much less active and the access to information from credible news feeds has dwindled significantly.

At that same time last fall, CBS News announced that it would halt its activity on Twitter due to Elon Musk’s turbulent and potentially devastating moves following his takeover of the company. They released a statement saying: “In light of the uncertainty around Twitter and out of an abundance of caution, CBS News is pausing its activity on the social media site as it continues to monitor the platform.”

Amee Vanderpool @girlsreallyrule

Everyone needs to take a deep breath. Twitter is a mess, but that is NOTHING compared to what we have faced politically in the past six years. Hunker down for a sec, and chill. ❤️

This has not affected my ability to source and post credible articles because I never used the CBS Twitter feed to find content. I still primarily use Google for that, so I don’t see the exodus of the major news outlets as much of a threat to Twitter’s overall functioning. If anything it will enable more content that is not properly vetted to be used as fact, but the Twitter users who know better are still easily able to source their posts at this point.

While I don’t see Twitter imploding overnight, I do suspect that Musk will continue to run it into the ground by doing nothing to shore up his security and continuity. Musk let Donald Trump back onto platform and the result reminded me of those really showy fireworks, with the ostentatious packaging and the hefty price tag, that you beg your Dad to get for you, only to have the fuse sputter out and then nothing happens. The temperature of that fiasco ranged between “who cares” to “If you ever mention his account I will block you.” Needless to say, it didn’t have the impact that anyone thought it would.

Amee Vanderpool @girlsreallyrule

It doesn't matter that Trump is back on Twitter - we can just ignore him like the Republican Party after all of his candidates lost.

This is sort of the vibe of Twitter now: nothing drastic really happens, it is mostly business as usual and Elon Musk has turned into a frat-boy circus barker who is desperate to garner attention for his sinking ship. The problem is really his: he will never get advertisers back and all of his attempts at pay-services fail quickly. I’m pretty sure the federal government will need to step in soon due to the lack of regulation and frankly, I would welcome it.