(no subject)
Jul. 7th, 2023 09:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatAck, Ack...Musk is destroying Twitter! Where to Go Instead of Twitter?
As the implosion of Musk's Twitter continues, people are desperately hunting new versions of it. Kind of reminds me of the great LJ exodus to Dreamwidth, and then the Tumblr exodus to well Pillow(?), and then Ao3 exodus...to SquidgeWorld or in my case, to Wordpress and Squidgeworld. We're all looking for back-up plans.
Twitter, however, has been a bit more difficult. None of them are workable, until...now.
Apparently, Zuckerberg finally took advantage of his tech billionaire rival, Musk's, stupidity in regards to social media - and built his own version of Twitter, entitled Instagram Threads. And unlike all the other versions, it's a lot easier to get on, follow folks, and use.
If you already have an instagram account? (And let's face it - most everyone on Twitter does). This is remarkably easy to pop into. You just sign in using that account, and it will carry all the folks you are following from instagram onto threads. And then some.
So what are the alternatives...and are they worth the effort?
* bluesky aka [Bad username or site: bsky @ com]. which is still in the beta stages, with a waiting list, and by invite only. It's by Jack Dorsey. And it's hard to find people on it. Neil Gaiman and a bunch of folks from book twitter leapt onto it. Considering they mainly used to Twitter to promote themselves - I foresee a shift to instagram threads. Because it's not happening on bluesky until everyone is on it. If most people can't get on it - you are mainly talking to yourself. (Kind of like I've been doing here the last few posts and on Twitter for the most part.)
* Mastodone - is difficult to use, and no one can find anybody. I went on it, and gave up. There appears to be only 20 people on it.
* Spoutible - is worse than Mastodone, and I didn't think that was possible. It took forever for me to get on it, and I couldn't find anyone but weird marketing folks, and jumped off.
They were discussing Instagram Threads on NY1 this morning - and loving it. NY1 jumped on it, along with all of the NY State agencies, government agencies, and media outlets. Then the celebrities followed. I don't think the politicians have yet, so the media is enjoying it at the moment. The media has decided they like Threads better than the other alternatives. And where the media goes - everyone else goes - if they want to market themselves and their wares. It's really the news and entertainment media that's going to pick the outlet. And they'll pick the one that's easiest to maneuver, and follow people, and find newsworthy items.
***
Everyone at work is still traumatized by what happened Wed. It scared them.
And they are all happy to be in the union. (I'm glad I wasn't there - I probably would have said or done something I shouldn't. But I got all the stories from my co-workers, and several were contradictory. They all had different perspectives. But all agreed it was uncalled for, nasty, and bad, and that BYT went too far.)
This place has taught me to follow unions. Didn't think that was possible, but here we are.
***
I bought more books via Smart Bitches for about $1.99. I swear I'm nickle and diming myself to death on books. My weaknesses are books, television streaming services, and music.
I was told by Amazon that I'd already purchased one of the books way back in 2021. I keep forgetting which books I've bought.
***
As the implosion of Musk's Twitter continues, people are desperately hunting new versions of it. Kind of reminds me of the great LJ exodus to Dreamwidth, and then the Tumblr exodus to well Pillow(?), and then Ao3 exodus...to SquidgeWorld or in my case, to Wordpress and Squidgeworld. We're all looking for back-up plans.
Twitter, however, has been a bit more difficult. None of them are workable, until...now.
Apparently, Zuckerberg finally took advantage of his tech billionaire rival, Musk's, stupidity in regards to social media - and built his own version of Twitter, entitled Instagram Threads. And unlike all the other versions, it's a lot easier to get on, follow folks, and use.
If you already have an instagram account? (And let's face it - most everyone on Twitter does). This is remarkably easy to pop into. You just sign in using that account, and it will carry all the folks you are following from instagram onto threads. And then some.
So what are the alternatives...and are they worth the effort?
* bluesky aka [Bad username or site: bsky @ com]. which is still in the beta stages, with a waiting list, and by invite only. It's by Jack Dorsey. And it's hard to find people on it. Neil Gaiman and a bunch of folks from book twitter leapt onto it. Considering they mainly used to Twitter to promote themselves - I foresee a shift to instagram threads. Because it's not happening on bluesky until everyone is on it. If most people can't get on it - you are mainly talking to yourself. (Kind of like I've been doing here the last few posts and on Twitter for the most part.)
* Mastodone - is difficult to use, and no one can find anybody. I went on it, and gave up. There appears to be only 20 people on it.
* Spoutible - is worse than Mastodone, and I didn't think that was possible. It took forever for me to get on it, and I couldn't find anyone but weird marketing folks, and jumped off.
They were discussing Instagram Threads on NY1 this morning - and loving it. NY1 jumped on it, along with all of the NY State agencies, government agencies, and media outlets. Then the celebrities followed. I don't think the politicians have yet, so the media is enjoying it at the moment. The media has decided they like Threads better than the other alternatives. And where the media goes - everyone else goes - if they want to market themselves and their wares. It's really the news and entertainment media that's going to pick the outlet. And they'll pick the one that's easiest to maneuver, and follow people, and find newsworthy items.
***
Everyone at work is still traumatized by what happened Wed. It scared them.
And they are all happy to be in the union. (I'm glad I wasn't there - I probably would have said or done something I shouldn't. But I got all the stories from my co-workers, and several were contradictory. They all had different perspectives. But all agreed it was uncalled for, nasty, and bad, and that BYT went too far.)
This place has taught me to follow unions. Didn't think that was possible, but here we are.
***
I bought more books via Smart Bitches for about $1.99. I swear I'm nickle and diming myself to death on books. My weaknesses are books, television streaming services, and music.
I was told by Amazon that I'd already purchased one of the books way back in 2021. I keep forgetting which books I've bought.
***
no subject
Date: 2023-07-08 02:30 pm (UTC)Hmmmm. Now Mastodon might work for you there... How it works (you'll know some of this I'm sure) is that you pick an Instance (server) to join. There are loads of instances (which is why joining can seem very daunting and complicated), but on the plus side is that although some are just big 'general interest' places, there are also instances that cater to specific groups. There are instances for software developers and gamers and activists and people who cooking or art or archeology - or for specific places (I'm sure I saw one of the Isle of Man or similar). So for you, mastodon.art might be a good place to join (https://mastodon.art/about) - it's a dedicated instance for the Artists and the lover of arts. It has around 13K followers. Now the great thing about instances is that you don't have to look for people - your instance has a local feed with posts from all the other people on your instance, meaning that people on mastodon.art have 13k people to interact with at their fingertips: https://mastodon.art/public/local (Although I presume not all of them are active!). The other thing is that everything works off hashtags, so you can follow hashtags for stuff you like and that will bring through people for you to interact with and follow. (They go in your personal feed.)
Anyway, I'm rambling - sorry. I just think it's a good set-up, although I hope they make it easier to join.
no subject
Date: 2023-07-08 02:40 pm (UTC)Threads is hard to figure out too - it seems to be the same setup as Twitter, but here's the thing - you end up with a lot of threads of people you aren't following on it. I am not following katie couric for example. Also some people take it over - such as charisma carpenter, and british memes.
I'm trying to follow a securities lawyer who is obsessed with music over there, for example, but it took a while to find him.
I do have the patience to figure it out. Social media is crack for writers. LOL!
no subject
Date: 2023-07-08 10:39 pm (UTC)Threads is basically Instagram without the pictures.
I think there isn't a substitute for what Twitter was really providing for folks. Which is community alerts, agency information, etc. Such as the whole submersible crisis? Or when trains are taken out of service?
The stuff you mention - is all on FB and DW already.