What is going on with Twitter (X)?
Twitter is no more. The social media platform known for its blue bird and 280-character posts has undergone a radical transformation. Since its acquisition by Elon Musk last year, the company has changed its name and logo to X. A capital X that Musk says stands for "the everything app". But what does this change mean for users and the future of the platform?
X wants to be more than a place to share your opinions or follow the latest news. Musk's ambition is to turn X into a "super app" that combines all kinds of features and services in one app. Think communication, multimedia, payments, banking, e-commerce, games and much more. The idea was inspired by WeChat, the popular app in China that has more than 1.3 billion users and where you can do almost anything you can think of.
WeChat is an example of a decentralised open-source social network, where users can create, host and moderate their own communities. WeChat uses the Fediverse, a decentralised social network running several independent servers with compatible software. Some examples of this software are: PeerTube for videos, Funkwhale for music, PixelFed for photos and NextCloud for files.
Musk wants to bring this concept to the West with X, but he is facing a lot of resistance and criticism. Many Twitter users are not happy with the changes and feel betrayed by Musk, who they say has taken over the platform to promote his own agenda. There are also concerns about X's security, privacy and censorship, as Musk has a lot of power and control over the app's data and content. Moreover, there is no guarantee that X will succeed in creating a super app, as the market and culture in the West are different from those in China.
As a result, many people are looking for alternatives to X that are more in line with their desires and values. Some examples of these alternatives are:
One of the most frequently mentioned alternatives is Mastodon, another decentralised open-source social networking platform very similar to Twitter. You can post "toots" (instead of tweets), follow other users and brands, and favourite (like) and boost (retweet) posts. Mastodon has no ads and no owner, making it less prone to manipulation and abuse.
A new alternative is Threads, an app from Meta (the company behind Facebook, WhatsApp & Instagram) that competes directly with X. Threads is much like Twitter in terms of interface and functionality, but offers more choice over the algorithms that determine what you see in your feed. You can also share up to 10 photos per post and upload videos up to 5 minutes long. Threads is linked to Instagram, making it easy to log in with your existing account and follow anyone you also follow on Instagram. Threads has already attracted more than 100 million users since its launch in July 2023 and is currently not officially available in the Netherlands.
Another initiative attracting a lot of attention is Bluesky, a project funded by Twitter itself. Bluesky is an open and decentralised social media platform. Bluesky aims to create a platform where users can set their own rules and standards, without depending on a central authority. Users send skeets and the platform resembles an earlier version of Twitter. This is hardly surprising, as the owner and developer is Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey. Bluesky is under development and is currently only accessible by invitation from an existing user.
The impact for OSINT investigation on X has already become a lot clearer. API access that has become largely paid for means that many of the free OSINT tools from the community do not work, or hardly work at all. Searching and viewing tweets is also becoming increasingly difficult, if not impossible, without an account. This also affects the indexation of tweets by search engines.
It is too early to say whether X will succeed in its mission to become the all-in-one app or whether it will fail due to competition and user dissatisfaction. However, the changes made by Musk do create a more diverse landscape with small(er) communities, in which you as an OSINT investigator are increasingly expected to be able to move quickly. Of course, as DataExpert, we are ready to assist you with training, consultancy and products to support you in this regard.