The news just dropped that Musk has purchased Twitter with the intention of returning it to a privately held company instead of a publicly traded one.
Privately held companies can control content in ways that publicly traded ones cannot. While M’s position is “unfettered” free speech, I sincerely doubt that claim.
So…I’m probably going to leave Twitter. I wasn’t engaging all that regularly on that platform, although it was a boon to connecting with and making some new friends. It wasn’t really helping me sell books, nor was its new “Spaces” feature something I utilized.
I’m still on Instagram, though I’ve hardly used it and its lack of being able to have in-post links and… how does one share/forward someone else’s post to their timeline to spread the love? It feels like a sea of bulletin boards and we’re all just walking up and down the aisles of them, liking or occasionally commenting, but we can’t really tell someone “hey, go look at this” very easily. Or at least I haven’t found out how to do it.
I’m also still on Facebook, too, which I quite like. I’m not a prolific poster, but at least I can share/repost or reply to posts that I enjoy, send private messages, and participate in groups with something of an archive available. Also the profile page is much more substantial that Twitter’s ever was.
In my sapphic writing and reading community, many are gathering at the GCLS’s new Hub, powered by MightyNetworks. The profiles are a bit sparse, but the threads for conversation are easy to use. It kinda feels like a more graphical version of the bulletin boards from the 1990s.
Let’s see, where else?
I am not the TikTok type, and it’s kind of like Insta in that it’s visuals-based, and I’m just not into being “live” all the time. I definitely prefer communities where LGBTQ+ people are, as well as writers and readers.
I do prefer text-based communication platforms. If there’s a way have a way to have a decent profile that’s more than A/S/L etc, and someplace where you can keep posts “pinned” or archives you can go through to get a feel for another person before hitting that “connection” or “friend” button. I’m a writer so words are my wheelhouse, after all.
What communities do you enjoy participating in? Hit comment and share. Where are you going next?
Lara Zielinsky 