tw*tter alternatives

[moon]

i know a lot of communities (art, indie etc) are quite tied up in their twitter platform, but what are your favorite alternative platforms that you've tried or heard of so far?

i've seen tumblr and Discord touted but they're both sort of very different in style and community-mechanisms from the way people use twitter, right?

interestingly i haven't really heard anyone suggest Facebook x) maybe it is truly the "that's what my parents use" platform at this day and age.

 

[_confused_piplup_]

Hmm yes, I would be curious too. I feel like one of the most interesting features of Twitter is the fast communication and fast news. If I am looking to replace Twitter, that would be what I would expect from an alternative.

Discord is completely different as it's main reason is to chat either in groups or in private. Quite the same goes for Facebook: you get the posts and especially pictures from people that you consider your friends or maybe public pages. Public pages can be a nice alternative if you are following a particular content creator, for example. However, in that case, it's quite likely that they also have Instagram, which is better than Facebook imo.

Idk much about Tumblr, but I guess there aren't many people there, so I don't know if it can be a proper alternative.

 

[RadEmpoleon]

I'd imagine Instagram is a good alternative to Twitter for artists, since its main purpose is for sharing photos. I've noticed that it tends to upload photos in lower quality than the original image though (or at least for me).

 

[Palamon]

None. I'm too tired to care about any other social media sites. I hate Tumblr. I don't trust cohost/Mastodon/hive etc.

So.
None.

I know all these "competitors" probably won't last, so I don't care.

 

[Starlight]

i know a lot of communities (art, indie etc) are quite tied up in their twitter platform, but what are your favorite alternative platforms that you've tried or heard of so far?

i've seen tumblr and Discord touted but they're both sort of very different in style and community-mechanisms from the way people use twitter, right?

interestingly i haven't really heard anyone suggest Facebook x) maybe it is truly the "that's what my parents use" platform at this day and age.

Interestingly FB has replaced Twitter for fast news for me now, a lot of people I followed on Twitter have started using FB again...

I'd imagine Instagram is a good alternative to Twitter for artists, since its main purpose is for sharing photos. I've noticed that it tends to upload photos in lower quality than the original image though (or at least for me).

This is the answer in all honesty, not just for art, but other things too. Insta, fb, and the family are far from ideal, but until something replaces Twitter - and it will - they're where the most people are.

 

[Orion☆]

I'm with Palamon here: none. Left Twitter two years ago, and it was one of the best things I could have done for my mental health. Before that I was on Tumblr, and I now realize I shouldn't have been there in the first place either. I admit Tumblr is way more organized when it comes to art though; it's easy to find what you're looking for as long as the search system works well.

Discord is fine, but only if you have patience for instant messaging, which I don't have. Personally, I'd just stick to message boards and call it a day. It feels more close-knit.

 

[Megan]

I wonder if personal web pages will ever make a return. Basically, your own website that is built exactly the way you want it to be. These used to be very common during the 00s but fell out of favor with the rise of dA, Tumblr, Facebook and lastly Twitter.

I've been pondering for a while if I should just make my own. But I'm also not tied to any social media account. Even dA only exists for me as a sort of art dump. xD

 

[ChristineLvX89]

I wonder if personal web pages will ever make a return. Basically, your own website that is built exactly the way you want it to be. These used to be very common during the 00s but fell out of favor with the rise of dA, Tumblr, Facebook and lastly Twitter.

I've been pondering for a while if I should just make my own. But I'm also not tied to any social media account. Even dA only exists for me as a sort of art dump. xD

This is always do-able. People still use those all the time like Linktree, Carrd, etc. Or diy with a freebie hosting site like those, weebly, wix... Or WordPress, Joomla, Drupal. So many good options and some are decent even just for free. Linktree and Carrd are great for that and very customizable but at paid options however. I've been considering it for a while now.

I'm trying to get away from Twitter as well. Especially from the lewd/sexual/hentai/stuff that goes on up there in Twitter. Just... Would rather just sanitize again for peace of mind, honestly... On top of all the annoying spam/follow bots, too.. Jesus....

 

[virtualpet]

Re: personal web pages: Neocities. It's a clone of Geocities where you can build a website from the ground up and it's completely free. If you don't know HTML/CSS, you can always find templates or guides online. There actually has been a huge increase in the personal site scene because of it, and I really wouldn't consider Linktree and Carrd as web pages since they're more for sharing links and way too business-oriented for my liking.



We've been tracking and preferring alternative social media for a few years now, since 2020 probably. Twitter alternatives are really common but the question is if they actually manage to last for more than a year. So far Cohost is the most successful start I've seen in recent years, and there is the website Status.Cafe which is basically what Twitter was originally supposed to be. Mastodon seems to be very hit or miss depending on the instance and I've seen a lot of people be confused on how to use it but its also lasted for awhile.

Tumblr doesn't feel like it counts as an alternative social media to me because I've used it since 2012-2013 and never stopped using it, but it's no longer considered one of the big social media so I guess it counts. I'm surprised by people saying it's dead since in my experience it's always been extremely active it just doesn't have an algorithm to feed you every post.

Though forums are always going to be the superior social media to us, the problem is being a system the more we figure out about ourselves the more we'd much rather have separate accounts and a lot of forums don't allow that. So the odds we find a forum that's active and that would be able to accommodate us are incredibly low, and its gotten worse by how a lot of forums are now moving to Discord which its monopoly is an issue and discussion in and of itself. Granted Discord servers do usually allow multiple accounts but we just hate how fast-paced it is and how intense they can get.

Also I really hope though that the death of Twitter means we bring back RSS. It might be a long shot, but here's hoping.

 

[moon]

Re: personal web pages: Neocities. It's a clone of Geocities where you can build a website from the ground up and it's completely free. If you don't know HTML/CSS, you can always find templates or guides online. There actually has been a huge increase in the personal site scene because of it, and I really wouldn't consider Linktree and Carrd as web pages since they're more for sharing links and way too business-oriented for my liking.



We've been tracking and preferring alternative social media for a few years now, since 2020 probably. Twitter alternatives are really common but the question is if they actually manage to last for more than a year. So far Cohost is the most successful start I've seen in recent years, and there is the website Status.Cafe which is basically what Twitter was originally supposed to be. Mastodon seems to be very hit or miss depending on the instance and I've seen a lot of people be confused on how to use it but its also lasted for awhile.

Tumblr doesn't feel like it counts as an alternative social media to me because I've used it since 2012-2013 and never stopped using it, but it's no longer considered one of the big social media so I guess it counts. I'm surprised by people saying it's dead since in my experience it's always been extremely active it just doesn't have an algorithm to feed you every post.

Though forums are always going to be the superior social media to us, the problem is being a system the more we figure out about ourselves the more we'd much rather have separate accounts and a lot of forums don't allow that. So the odds we find a forum that's active and that would be able to accommodate us are incredibly low, and its gotten worse by how a lot of forums are now moving to Discord which its monopoly is an issue and discussion in and of itself. Granted Discord servers do usually allow multiple accounts but we just hate how fast-paced it is and how intense they can get.

Also I really hope though that the death of Twitter means we bring back RSS. It might be a long shot, but here's hoping.

Interesting views. What do you mean by people rather wanting to have separate accounts?

 

[Tsutarja]

one alternate i'd heard about is post

https://9to5google.com/2022/11/20/post-waze-ceo/

seems like they're trying to revive the golden era of twitter

 

[virtualpet]

Interesting views. What do you mean by people rather wanting to have separate accounts?

This isn't really the thread to get too into it, but we're a system meaning we're multiple people in one physical body. For us at least our brain never really developed into one person and we've been like this pretty much our entire life and as an adult on the internet we don't really care to hide it.

 

[moon]

This isn't really the thread to get too into it, but we're a system meaning we're multiple people in one physical body. For us at least our brain never really developed into one person and we've been like this pretty much our entire life and as an adult on the internet we don't really care to hide it.

Oh, no I'm aware, you've told me before, and I know about systems. I misunderstood your sentence is all, my bad.

Honestly, if you talk to the admins they might allow you to have different accounts here :) I know that other people who share the same computer have been allowed it in the past.

But yeah, this is a parenthesis in the thread haha.

 

[Venia Silente]

i know a lot of communities (art, indie etc) are quite tied up in their twitter platform, but what are your favorite alternative platforms that you've tried or heard of so far?

Pokécommunity </thread> ^_^

i've seen tumblr and Discord touted but they're both sort of very different in style and community-mechanisms from the way people use twitter, right?

Tumblr is not a *social* platform, at least in the terms we understand "social platform" interaction to be nowadays. They're basically a personal blogging service of sorts, and IMO should be treated like that since that's where its power really lies, as we have seen every. single. time another platform dies or almost dies and as a result Tumblr reemerges.

Discord... is a chat, and a lackluster one at that. Not only is it not a social platform like Twitter is, but it has exactly the same kinds of problems that have caused these communities issues with being "too tied to Twitter": centralized, privative, ad- and interaction-focused, and tied to one unique legal authority over content (California courtrooms, IIRC).

Alternatives nowadays there are many (pro tip: there have always been), but my personal favourite in terms of "social platform"-ness is Mastodon instances. Takes some time and hard decisions to choose where to start from in Mastodon, since there's basically various topical instances for anything, but actually that works quite better for us Pokémon fans: we are *already* used to stand and face the hard choice of which Starter to pick, or what to nickname our character, so similarities and differences between instances are bread and water to us.

If Mastodon feels too heavy (which is kinda is, due to what it aims for in its protocol management), there are alternatives providers and tooling like Pleroma and Misskey that handle things differently, but I haven't tested enough of them to form a solid opinion.

interestingly i haven't really heard anyone suggest Facebook x) maybe it is truly the "that's what my parents use" platform at this day and age.

Communities that know the problems they face due to Twitter, are also smart enough to avoid promoting Facebook, Instagram, Discord or the like. You're basically swapping a blue caged jail for another blue caged jail, and to no good avail because due to recent news in Europe FB is going to have to moderate their content somewhat more strongly. And honestly, I don't know anyone from college or university that has actually ever used Facebook since around 2015.

I wonder if personal web pages will ever make a return. Basically, your own website that is built exactly the way you want it to be. These used to be very common during the 00s but fell out of favor with the rise of dA, Tumblr, Facebook and lastly Twitter.

IMO, personal websites are the way to go. They are reasonably easy to make and maintain nowadays. Whiel HTML wizardry levels are welcome, they are no longer anywhere even close to "required".

There are some meta-social platforms like SDF where you can create your own homepage plus have access to IRC chats and a shared Minecraft server, for about a one-time payment of $15 USD. One-time. No "monthly subscription fee for a blue checkmark" shit. And then there's payment-free website platforms like neocities, which attempts to restore the glorious old days of Geocities where everyone had their own personal sites full of BLINKING TEXT and "under construction" .gifs.

And if you are into the esoteric, "plain"-er web, there's Gemini protocol, which is basically an evolution of Gopher and a sort of alternate web where it's very easy and cheap, storage-wise, to have your own webpage.

But, when it comes down to it, an alternative to Twitter depends on what do you want as a community. If what you want is the community interaction, the best suggestion I can give is a combination of a self-maintainable forum platform service (like phpBB or Discourse, that get you something very close to Pokécommunity mechanics-wise) + a sovereign chat system, even if it is third-party (something like Revolt, Jabber, or a registered oficial IRC channel, for example).

 

[Ys]

For me, Tumblr and Discord are the best. It's where I keep in touch with most of my online friends nowadays. I only use Twitter for news and FB for birthdays.

 

[Roxas]

Seconding Tumblr and Discord, those are my primary "socials" and I am pretty allergic to anything else.

 

[Palamon]

So, Jack Dorsley has created a twitter alternative known as Bluesky.

I won't be jumping ship to it, but I assume many other people will be.

 

[Reginald Cosmic]

I wanted to try out Threads cuz I hate Twitter, but it said I had to sign in with Instragram. I made one under the name "Reginald Cosmic" and I got banned as soon as I entered the account creation confirmation code. The exact reason listed was "We don't allow people on Instagram to create fake accounts."

I'm assuming this is their way of saying I can't join without using my real name (which I'm not doing because I'm not stupid). Assuming that's the case, this is just such an insane decision. Mark Zuckerberg made billions before he was my age. How does he not understand that people prefer to use screen names for online activity?

Does anyone have any idea why else I would've been instantly suspended? Does anyone know what I should say when I click "I disagree"?

 

[Tsutarja]

i know of people who have had their facebook accounts suspended because of lack of proof of identity. they either had to go with a fake name (???) or send a photo of their drivers license to the platform just for identity verification.

huge invasion of privacy

 

[Reginald Cosmic]

I forgot to update my post with an edit. Whoops.

I clicked "disagree with decision" and then I confirmed my email address (again) and phone number (for the first time, at least as far as Instagram goes), and Instagram immediately lifted the suspension. To be precise, it said it would take a day to review, and I clicked "Okay," and then the suspension ended. (I genuinely thought I would have to write an appeal like a YouTube "community guidelines" suspension.) I followed a few people from Twitter (mostly artists) on Instagram before creating a Threads account.

I'd like to actively give this platform a good spin before I decide if I'll keep using it or not. There's no reason for me to recommend it or leave based on a day of it existing. I'm not a fan of the billionaires in charge of either platform, but I don't have much of a choice.