I'm going to crosspost this from something on tumblr because I'm real steamed about it
themathomhouse
I've been every bit as entertained by Musk running twitter into the ground as the rest of us (because hubris hasn't gotten less funny in the last few thousand years), but my boyfriend is getting more anxious about it by the day.He works in indie games, and they had a meeting today at his studio about how much they rely on word-of-mouth for sales. Most of that has been people being directed to their game via reviews on twitter, posts on twitter, or summaries by game websites on twitter. Their new game comes out later this year, and watching twitter collapse in real time means they have no idea whether they'll still exist by next January.
In terms of getting new jobs for the staff, that also used to be done via twitter. He got invited to give a talk at a conference after a twitter thread, found his previous and current jobs there, made most of his professional connections there.
It's not great that much of the gaming infrastructure was on twitter, but it was. There's not time to build a new one quickly enough for them, and they can't compete with the marketing for triple-A games.
I don't really know what the solution is. All kinds of journalism are nearly dead too, but maybe if people go back to browsing video game review sites they might get lucky idk.
He left triple-A games for this studio. Hopefully indie studios can weather the storm.
This is the thing people don't get, and it's infuriating to see from certain indie devs I know go "ugh, you're still on twitter? You're basically a nazi if you are." That's no exaggeration, by the way, that's near verbatim
Twitter was basically THE ONLY public facing community promotion option! Its ongoing collapse is fucking over a LOT of indie devs because not only does it mean that they're losing a whole angle of getting their stuff seen, but an entire promotional support network is imploding. People do not get how bad it is for smaller creators
"Just use tumblr!" buddy I just made up for this example, I get where you're coming from, but building that same network here is going to take years
This is true of all indie art spaces. I’m in a genre where the primary readership is found via Facebook groups and subreddits, so I’m going to be fine, but I know a lot of authors who are struggling with their platforms, and also it’s trapped me in a genre that is…not what I want to be writing anymore. TikTok is the next best thing and can work wonders for authors …if you’re cishet, white, conventionally attractive, and able to be engaging on camera.
I get people want to celebrate Musk failing. Hell, that part of this? I’m right there with you. But it’s possible to enjoy the failure of a massive company and a rich man losing money while also showing empathy to people who are watching segments of their lives and businesses collapse around them.