By Charles Passy & Emily Bary November 22, 2022
Some users began worrying about Twitter changing as soon as Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced plans to purchase the service earlier this year, when he teased a more relaxed approach to content moderation.
But many Twitter users have been bracing to say goodbye with more urgency over the last several days, after Musk followed up mass layoffs by asking remaining employees to either consent to long hours or take severance pay.
Now, Twitter users who once contemplated leaving the platform due to the CEO’s changing vision are contending with the possibility that Twitter might physically “break” given the absence of key engineers and other staffers.
While Twitter isn’t easy to replace, there are other social-media alternatives available in case Twitter changes radically or crumbles under Musk.
This oft-mentioned alternative platform describes itself as “radically different social media, back in the hands of the people.” It points to the fact it has “no algorithms or ads to waste your time” and “provides you with a unique possibility of managing your audience without middlemen.”
One benefit of Mastodon is that it doesn’t allow the equivalent of quote-tweeting the way that Twitter does, contributing to a more civil environment.
Another platform, Hive Social, says it’s “bringing back what you used to love about social media in a new way.” That said, it has many of the same features as Twitter (or Facebook for that matter), with a chronological feed of posts.
One thing to keep in mind: It’s a mobile-only platform, so if you access social media on a desktop or laptop, it may not work for you.
This platform bills itself as one that disallows trolls, abuse, ads, fake news and “foreign influence ops,” and says it has more than 63 million visitors.
An interesting feature of CounterSocial is that it monitors emergency radio traffic, and says that it can provide updates and chatter “from the ground when a major incident occurs long before traditional media catch on.”
Amino calls itself the platform that lets you “build your own community,” with a custom design that includes a logo, theme, background image and more. Some say it’s similar to Mastodon, but ZDNet notes that it’s also guided by the fact that it’s a “safe social space for teens” with “strictly enforced community guidelines.”
Describing itself as “a really snazzy site that allows you to showcase the events that make up your life in deliciously digestible chunks,” Plurk has a playful orientation. LifeWire calls it the platform most similar to Twitter, pointing to the fact that “you’ll find people discussing a broad range of mundane topics from knitting to Netflix.”
Often described as a conservative social-media app, Parler says its platform is social media “the way it was intended,” pointing to how it’s “built upon a foundation of respect for privacy and personal data, free speech, free markets, and ethical, transparent corporate policy.”
Ye, the musical artist formerly known as Kanye West, reportedly agreed to acquire Parler last month.
The 15-year-old microblogging platform was trendy in the early 2010s. But it failed to achieve broad cultural currency as Facebook and Instagram did, shuffling through a wave of owners as it sought commercial success.
Twitter users looking to connect with others over shared interests might like Tumblr’s fan-focused platform.
Twitter serves as a hub for news and real-time information, and some see newly created Post as an appealing entrant to the space. Noam Bardin, a Google veteran who worked on the Waze navigational system, calls himself the service’s “Chief Poster,” and pitches Post as a place for “real people, real news and civil conversations.”
People on Post are able to write and share “posts of any length,” as well as converse, buy individual articles from publications, and tip content creators, according to Bardin.
“Discord” might sum up what’s been going on at Twitter, but it’s also the name of a fellow social-media service that allows users to create spaces in which they can discuss shared interests with friends and strangers. While people can share text, images and GIFs to the service, Discord also supports voice and video.
The service represents yet another option for Twitter users hoping to connect in real time around topics of interest.
Photos by: iStock/Giphy/Apple App Store/Getty Images Story by: Charles Passy & Emily Bary Google Web Story by: Camille Dash