Is Twitter/X really going to shut down anytime soon?
As a disclaimer, I am a passive hater of Twitter/X ie I don't like it as a toxic social media platform and haven't used it but I am not asking the users to move to Threads or some other fediverse alternative as a paid promoter. Also I don't really intend to keep a strict tab on its status since I get any related major developments from other news outlets and Lemmy.
Seeing how it would be almost a year since the acquisition and all the decisions he took, people were speculating how it would only take a few weeks or months for it to shut down under the leadership of Elon Musk. Even I believed so after I saw the introduction of extremely high fees for API access, verification mark etc, thinking it may be under a financial crisis. But even now I am seeing no signs of it actually coming close to shutting down, as seen by the uninterrupted flux of screenshots/memes/posts of tweets in other social media platforms and its continued use for marketing by other brands and announcements by authorities. I did see some posts by Musk stating his issues with Twitter/X, news of his companies' stocks going down, and some reputable figures announcing their departure from the platform among some other minor related events, however I feel these aren't concrete evidences for me to come to a conclusion.
Could anyone clarify what the actual status of Twitter/X is, and if it is actually going to collapse anytime soon as rumored? Am I missing out on something crucial, like some secret funding to keep it alive or all of the rumors of it collapsing being just a huge overreaction by the internet in the end?
Platforms don't die like biological things do. They age and change until their core user base is alienated and the platform is then tucked neatly in a corner to operate in the shadows for the next 30 years.
Yes and no. The domain is still up, but it just a stupid Gawker-like blog. No user posted content. An ad company bought the domain uses it for blog spam.
I still find Slashdot relevant! It doesn't feel like it faded into irrelevance, only that it stopped growing (it reached its needed critical mass and that was it)
Think about it like Craigslist. It will still be around in 5 years but it won't be culturally relevant like it was. Just like Craigslist is still technically around, but no one talks about it and I don't know anyone who uses it.
Twitter is too big to fail completely in the near future, just like Craigslist was.
That would be fine if my favorite users leave Twitter when it becomes irrelevant. I don't mind if Twitter stays up as a containment zone for people stupid enough to pay for a blue check mark.
Pfft. Craigslist came back into style where I live. There's even an instagram account dedicated to reposting Missed Connections locally and sometimes I even see those posts getting reposted to tumblr.
AOL and Yahoo are still around, so I don't think it'll ever completely disappear. But it's going to keep becoming more and more irrelevant by the day indefinitely.
Musk is the richest man on Earth, give or take a few billion here or there. He can keep it running as long as he wants. It's nothing but a toy to him. The problem will start when he finally gets bored of it, because he has already broken it to the point that nobody else will want it. He has killed it, it's just not dead yet as long as he keeps swinging it around and paying its bills. But one day he'll stop doing that, maybe once he finds a new, shinier toy. We just don't know when.
Musk bought it, so it's a private company, now. It'll stay up as long as he wants it to stay up. How long are you going to keep your Minecraft server online? As long as you want to, right? Same thing, larger scale.
If he wants to close up shop, he can do that. If he wants to operate it regardless of revenue for the next 10 or 20 years, he can do that, too. He could also sell it, and then the next owners would decide what happens.
Yeah, what we're witnessing right now is Musk downsizing to the point that he can basically operate it at a loss indefinitely. It'll stay around until everyone leaves and he's only left with bots and his own echo chamber, which could take a while.
It's probably some sensational headline. Twitter is too big to fail. And Elon wants to convert it into his idea of an everything-app. So he will probably not kill it tomorrow either. And there currently isn't a competitor that is enticing customers away at any alarming rate. So no reason to think it is collapsing.
There are vested interests who could probably keep it afloat on their own dime alone, and it would be worth every penny if they were forced to do so. It’s a ready made propaganda platform with a built in audience and sympathetic leadership. The only reason they’re trying to make profit with it is because it’s less money out of donor and investor pockets.