i buried this thought in a poorly-received rant about like counters [i am learning from my mistakes, and i hope you all can find it in your hearts to forgive me], but i want to dig it out and play with it a bit more
social media, typically, refers to media made by and for social networks. platforms like tumblr and cohost have developed cultures around creating, sharing, and interacting with media of different forms; instagram and facebook [in theory, anyway] foster IRL connections through shared posts; tiktok, for all its questionable design decisions, is a video-hosting service first and foremost, where users are encouraged to share in and contribute to global media trends
i don't think twitter follows this formula. at one time [admittedly, before my time], i'm sure it did—this is how social media platforms tend to be pitched, and what they claim to aspire to even if they don't actually achieve it. but, to me, twitter feels less "media made social" and more "society made media"
twitter, with its massive userbase, its main characters and breakout stars, its insane fringe subcommunities and its constant faction-warring, feels more than anything like a global hyperspeed reality show. the mass exodus of users to the fediverse, centralized platforms [cohost, tumblr, artist-focused spaces], and more local communities [personal websites, discord servers, chats] may have been accelerated by the change of management, but i think people are coming to realize now that they've signed on for hyperreality hell when they wanted Media That Is Social
that being said, i think i'll miss twitter if it dies. i'm not going to speak to its societal effects—more intelligent beings have gone into much more detail on that topic—but i, for one, enjoy the free-for-all. like a reality series, it's engrossing at a safe distance, and the culture around it can be fun. and i doubt anything like twitter will ever happen again, at least not on its scale; bluesky certainly won't, with its cool-kids'-table invite code scheme, nor instagram or tiktok with their brand and celebrity oversaturation, and i suspect few other platforms really even want to
[there's no conclusion or overarching point to this. just throwing words on a page and hoping they mean something]
[and i know i come across more than a little standoffish, but if anyone sees this and has something to add, please do. i'd like to hear more]