Twitter’s Latest Failure Fuels Mastodon’s Growth
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July 3, 2023 11:37 am
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Elon Musk recently made an unexpected announcement that has caused quite a stir on Twitter.
The owner of the social media giant explained: “To address extreme levels of data scraping & system manipulation, we’ve applied the following temporary limits: Verified accounts are limited to reading 6000 posts/day. Unverified accounts to 600 posts/day. New unverified accounts to 300/day.”
To address extreme levels of data scraping & system manipulation, we’ve applied the following temporary limits:
– Verified accounts are limited to reading 6000 posts/day
– Unverified accounts to 600 posts/day
– New unverified accounts to 300/day— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 1, 2023
According to Musk, this was done to prevent massive data scraping that was affecting the stability and user experience on the platform.
The limits were later increased, but this did not quell the controversy on Twitter and users issued a tweetstorm lambasting the recent move.
In the wake of the recent changes to Twitter, decentralized competitor Mastodon has reportedly gained 100,000 new active users.
Users on Twitter had mixed reactions about moving to Mastodon or another decentralized competitor:
So with #Twitter possibly heading for the junk heap of social media, again, does this mean #Mastadon is back in play, again? 🤔
— Jeremy David Parker (@not3bad) July 2, 2023
https://t.co/hfcGUBxVyw will live on no matter wumhat happens here. We will find some social media outlet for it other than Twitter when one presents itself that suits our interests and isn't stupid like Mastadon or Bluesky. -OS https://t.co/iUtRGwXjBn
— Lyndon Baines Johnson (@lyndonbajohnson) July 1, 2023
Good time to mention that I’ve got a Tumblr and I’m working on getting a Mastadon set up as well; if there’s any other social media I should be using uhhh..
DM it to me.
— Belle Grace☕️ Pixel Cat (@BelleGrace_VT) July 1, 2023
Coin Telegraph highlights the recent surge in Mastodon users:
According to a post from the creator and CEO of Mastodon, Eugen Rochko, on July 2 the platform’s active user base surged, with an increase of at least 110,000.
The influx of activity on Mastodon comes after Elon Musk, the owner and former CEO of Twitter, announced that the platform will impose new limits on the number of posts accounts can read in a day.
One user who jokingly went by the name ‘Rate Limited’ writes: “Almost everything I know about the war I picked up on Twitter. It’s a shame Musk is ramming it into the ground. Which social media site hasn’t been picked clean by vultures? I’m thinking Mastodon.”
Almost everything I know about the war I picked up on Twitter. It's a shame Musk is ramming it into the ground.
Which social media site hasn't been picked clean by vultures? I'm thinking mastadon. https://t.co/QAt5VVj9dY
— RateLimited (@StruckThrice) July 1, 2023
Previously, The Guardian reported a similar exodus from Twitter to decentralized social media platforms:
Thousands of tweeters – myself included – fled to Mastodon: a scrappy social media project designed from its start in 2016 to be resistant against takeovers by billionaires.
Mastodon is decentralized: instead of a single website, it’s a network of thousands of independently run servers – each with their own moderators and users – who can interact with each other’s posts, called “toots”, using an open protocol called ActivityPub.
Other social media services can connect to ActivityPub as well, so no one app can monopolize the broader network that Mastodon is part of, called the “fediverse”.
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