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Comment by dclowd9901 | Hacker News Reader

So funny to read this comment this morning. I just hopped on twitter for a second — not sure why, I basically never use it — and it seems to be just a dumping ground for low effort AI spamming.

I really don’t understand how people enjoy using twitter. I mean I didn’t before but now I can’t understand how it’s worth anything to anyone.

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Curration. I don't see the bots (unless I look at a post's replies) because I only see who I follow.

Same with Reddit back when I was regularly visiting. I don't see the dumping ground of low value memes because I only see the subreddits I want.

Probably the same for facebook? But I wouldn't know.

Like most things, it takes a bit of work to reap rewards.

Defaults as they are today on reddit are terrible. Log out and look at the shitshow. Its either low effort flamebait, gawking at hotties, or basically shill driven ad posts, all of which probably contribute to engagement from multiple angles. The beast is rotten. At this point all thats of value are the vestigial users who still have their network of non-default subreddits they frequent. However that population will only decrease over time since these new users engage with the site in a different way now than e.g. nerdy niche interests like it was in the past. I don't even know where to go these days to discover content that isn't pure agitprop or on the race to be something like that these days. Even this board is only so busy. I might have to just write off browsing the web like I've done for years and get into that pile of books I've been meaning to read instead.

Nobody enjoys Twitter anymore, they're just too passive to leave until the early adopters make their decision for them about what the next place will be.

The problem is, network effects may not make this possible anymore.

Based on what I've read in HN comments and elsewhere, leaving Twitter is seen as a political act, specifically aligned with liberals or wokeness or whatever term du jour. These folks tremble in fear that they will be judged harshly by their peers for abandoning the cause ... ultimately the cause of making one of the richest people in the world richer.

Yeha it's obvious that a certain group loves it there as a way of virtue signaling allegiance with his performative political incorrectness. But it's incomprehensible why all his haters, who now have his balls in their hand, don't leave and cripple him.

Because the vast majority of people are neither Elon haters nor Elon simps. They're just people doing what they were already doing because changing habits is hard and there's no easy alternative.

Bingo. the alternatives just aren't there yet, and most people don't care enough to get angry about his insanity, esp. since you curate your own experience.

anecdotally, my use, and that of all of the people I know on it, is fairly limited. its basically just a way to keep track of family, local groups, etc. I've given up on the platform as a way to get accurate news, but it's still useful for organizational contacts; ditto for FB.

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