Just a short note today: I’ve officially left Twitter.
I say “officially” because you really do have to fill out forms to leave, when you request your archived data and then deactivate your account.
It’s definitely a sad day. Twitter was always my go-to social media account, because I liked the microblogging experience. It was great to reply to people’s tweets directly, and the character limit demanded a certain level of wit and precision. Though of course, you could thread things together for a longer topic.
But as others have pointed out, that was Twitter’s problem, too. Short snappy thoughts and replies eliminated nuance. The major social impacts Twitter had, from enabling communities to find each other and call out injustices, also compressed issues into black-and-white versions of themselves. That worked for some areas: fascists and bigotry are always bad, and anyone who tries to do “nuance” in that respect needs to be called out and shut down.
Nevertheless, there were a lot of areas that demanded more considerate, long-form discussion. Twitter was a popular place for them, but it wasn’t designed with “thoughtful” as one of its key parameters, and the results were obvious.
Of course, what led me to quit Twitter was its takeover by Elon Musk. If he’s not a fascist, he’s an enabler of fascism due to their promise of quick and easy power, and he’s made his priorities clear.
I don’t begrudge anybody who wants to stay on the platform. I don’t agree with claims that they can “devalue” Musk’s purchase somehow, since social media users claiming they determine its value is a little like a loaf of bread saying it’s going to tank the supermarket’s stock. When you’re the product, anything you do feeds the revenue stream. But I understand why people like Twitter and why they want to fight for it.
But that’s not me. Not anymore.
I’ll be posting more here, I think. It’s nice to own a blog outright and have complete control. I might also do more on Instagram (and yes, I know I’m just trading one billionaire overlord for another, but the IG doesn’t have as much appeal to me as Twitter did). And I’ve been meaning to try my hand at making some videos, so I’ll probably get to that eventually. Maybe I’ll even get that first Roleplay Rewatch posted?
For now, though: goodbye, Twitter. It was real, and it was good… but it wasn’t real good.
