Back in 2006, when the world was being inundated with a flood of new social and web 2.0 tools, I signed up for a brand new thing called Twitter. It was an interesting, although somewhat bizarre idea: write short text blasts of up to 120 characters, telling the world (or whoever might read it) what you were doing. At the time, Twitter gathered its fair share of ridicule for the inanity of the idea. Critics would claim that nobody needed to know what you were eating for breakfast, or really, to know anything about what you were doing at all.
In those early days, Twitter was mostly filled with geeks and tech bros, posting about all kinds of vacuous stuff. Most people I know, including myself, joined Twitter (user number 779,452), didn’t really get it, then left. Like many others, I eventually came back. In those exciting early days, there was no ability to reply to a tweet. There were no images in tweets. There was no search function to find a tweet. Of course that changed over time, and these functions were gradually added. With the addition of search in Twitter, we saw the rise of the hashtag, a community-devised way to aggregate tweets around a particular topic or idea. Twitter eventually doubled the character limit from 120 characters (a limit originally imposed by the 140 character limit of SMS messaging, which old timers might recall Twitter was originally connected to), to 240 characters. Still short, but it made a world of difference in the way people expressed themselves in these short, but now a bit longer, blasts of thought.
Twitter evolved from people sharing inane topics like what they had for lunch, and became a genuine voice of the masses. It democratised communication and formed communities of like minded people who could find their tribe. It became a platform, no, THE platform, that genuinely changed the world. It aided with revolutions, emergencies, political uprisings, and more, and gave a voice to those who may never have been able to find a voice otherwise. It was the town square, on a global scale.
In its glory days, Twitter was the most incredible platform for connecting people and forming communities. I think educators, probably more than most others, really understood the power of what these communities could bring, and Twitter became synonymous with developing a PLN. There’s no doubt that, at least for most educators I know, Twitter was the major force in driving positive change and global connection on a scale not seen before.
And then it changed. The advertisers came along. The money came along. The political manipulation came along. And then Elon Musk came along. What started out as an amazing global town hall, eventually devolved into a greedy cesspit of inhumanity, more polarised, more obnoxious, more divided than ever. Gone were the days of people finding their tribe. Instead, people were dividing into opposing tribes and hurling insults and abuse at each other. It became impossible to have a civil conversation on Twitter, or X as Elon renamed it. Truth and facts became optional. It stopped being a place where people connected, and became a place where those with the loudest voices could simply shout into the void without any expectation of finding a response, making a connection or starting a conversation.
I used to really like Twitter. I was active on it a lot. It opened doors for me. It allowed me to find and meet my heroes. I wrote many posts about Twitter, explaining why it mattered, how it worked, and convincing others to give it chance, even if it seemed like a weird idea. It was the one social network that I felt had true value, and the one I would hang onto long after I let the others go. I believed in the people there, because I saw Twitter as giving us all a voice, democratising our ability to connect and share and learn together.
But enough is enough. I have been hanging onto Twitter/X for nostalgia more than utility. Despite having nearly 12,000 followers I can’t remember the last time I’ve had a proper exchange of ideas or a conversation. There are too many extremists, bullies, idiots, egotists. There’s probably still good stuff there, but I no longer see it. My replies tab is full of ads and random tweets from people I don’t even follow. In short, the Twitter I knew and loved is dead. It’s such a shame.
So, regretfully, I’ve decided I’m pulling the plug and deleting my account. The tool that mattered so much and helped me to become a “connected educator” is no longer connecting me to the people and ideas that matter to me.
It’s hard to believe that I will no longer be a Twitter user. I will no longer be an X user. I guess that makes me an Ex-Twitter user.
Ex-Twitter by Chris Betcher is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Chris, I appreciate your point about nostalgia. I too have found myself in Twitter less and less in the last few years. Personally, what I miss is reaching out, replying or mentioning people. Just wondering, have you found any other space that fills the space associated with developing a PLN etc?
Hi Aaron,
Yep I was definitely using Twitter less (a lot less) but for the most part I was content to just maintain my account and just dip in every so often to see what was going on. Sadly, there was rarely ever anything going on that I found all that interesting. In fact with a lack of any real education discussion or discovery, I found myself reading posts random posts on random topics (increasingly about politics) from others that were polarised, ignorant, argumentative, and when I occasionally got sucked into the conversations I just felt like they were just turning me into a cranky old man. (Ok, an even crankier old man)
So the worthwhile conversations has, for the most part, disappeared. Still, I was hanging on to the account, “just in case”.
But Elon’s recent foray into politics, and particularly his support for Trump was the final straw. Greedy billionaires are a scourge anyway, but when they start doing that kind of shit, it’s time to take a stand and say enough is enough.
As for a replacement, I have not really found anything I like. I tried Bluesky, I had a look at Tribl, I refuse to do Threads because of their user policies. So nothing is really grabbing me in the microblogging space at the moment. I have Facebook, but don’t particularly like it, and have concerns the the way Zuckerberg has handled privacy over the years, so I don’t really use it … It’ll probably be the next to go.
I miss Google+, it was the only social network that really got it right in my opinion. I do use Instagram and that’s the closest social place these days, but it’s not really that edu focused. I do like it though and it’s good for keeping in touch with friends.
Then there’s LinkedIn. It was always the professional network, which has definitely become more social lately, but it’s not really the same as Twitter. There’s some good conversation there but it’s all so ephemeral.
I do miss the days of blogs, where lots of really great conversation and deeper thinking happened, and a writer could own their space to have some degree of control over it.
Speaking of blogs, thanks for leaving your comment here! I read all the other comments that people left on LinkedIn, and couldn’t help but wish they were left here with the original post… I still think that adding comments to the place where the original post lives makes the most sense.
Chris, I couldn’t agree more with your sentiments. It was the first app I use to open, it was a space that supported my growth professionally. But like you I have said farewell!
Hi Lorraine,
Thanks for your comments! Agreed, for so long Twitter was the “go to” place for educators to share ideas. Sadly, it no longer seems that’s the case
I also tried Bluesky as a replacement after someone suggested it, and it was ok but I just didn’t feel any real traction there. I guess it would just be a matter of rebuilding my network again to create that community. But to be honest, it feels much harder to know who is worth following these days.