5 social media alternatives if you're planning on flying the Twitter coop
Elon Musk's ownership of Twitter has created some unintended consequences for the social media giant that could help rival platforms grow.
Scores of users have fled Twitter — including celebrities — now that Musk is the new owner, according to multiple media reports. Internal company documents place the number of leavers in the hundreds of thousands, the Guardian reported. Singers Toni Braxton and Sara Bareilles and producers Shonda Rhimes and Ken Olin tweeted in recent days that they're leaving the social media service. It's unclear where or if those celebrities are migrating to other platforms.
If you're also looking to leave Twitter soon, here are five other platforms that might serve your social media needs.
CounterSocial
CounterSocial markets itself as the next generation of social media, with "No trolls. No abuse. No ads. No fake-news. No foreign influence ops." The social network, started in 2017 by an anonymous U.S. hacker who goes by the online pseudonym "the Jester," has 63.8 million monthly visitors, according to its website. The platform gives users a live stream of news programming, the ability to create online communities and a video chat feature. It's available on mobile and on desktop devices.
CounterSocial, however, is not offered everywhere. The platform has blocked off its service to people in China, Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia and Syria — countries that "are well known to be origin points of an overwhelming majority of bots and trolls," the company says on its website. Blocking some nations is a business decision that prompted criticism of the platform, most prominently by Mastodon founder Eugen Rochko, who called the move xenophobic and racist.
Discord
Created in 2015 to provide gamers ages 13 and over a convenient way to communicate while playing video games, Discord has grown into a social media site with 150 million active monthly users.
Structured more like the chat rooms of the early internet, there are no open public spaces on Discord, only topic-based rooms where members can share music and communicate via voice or video calls.
Users on Discord can join large groups on topics like Minecraft or Fortnite, but the platform is mostly composed of "private, invite-only spaces for groups of friends and communities to stay in touch and spend time together," according to the Discord website.
Discord has also received negative attention for incidents of cyberbullying and usage by extremist groups. In 2018, the platform was the center of a Daily Beast article on revenge porn.
Available on Android and iOS devices, Discord also has a video chatting feature and allows users to listen to music with friends via Spotify.
LinkedIn is mostly known as the business professional's networking site. Still, the Microsoft-owned platform has added some social media-friendly features in recent years, including a news feed and live streaming.
Much like Twitter, LinkedIn allows users to post updates, videos, pictures and links to other content. LinkedIn has the added features of helping users learn new skills through LinkedIn Learning (formerly Lynda.com) and apply for job openings.
LinkedIn originally launched in 2003 and Microsoft acquired it in 2016. It now has 875 million users, according to its website. LinkedIn has faced some fake accounts on the platform, but the company is stepping up its efforts to delete them, CNN reported last week.
Mastodon
Featuring "toots" instead of "tweets," Mastodon launched in 2016 from German developer Eugen Rochko as an alternative to Twitter. Like Twitter, Mastodon can be accessed through a mobile app or on a desktop website.
One key difference between Mastodon and Twitter is that Mastodon is open source — meaning the software used to power the service isn't owned by one company. It also has no ads.
Some people are already starting to migrate to Mastodon. The platform gained 22,139 new accounts this past week and 10,801 the day after Musk took over Twitter, according to the Washington Post. Mastodon now has more than 380,000 monthly active users, a fraction of Twitter's 237.8 million daily active users, the Post reported.
Reddit is not a social media platform in the traditional sense, but an online forum. Most visitors to Reddit use it to comment on what's happening in the news, pop culture or other niche topics. It was co-founded by entrepreneur Alexis Ohanian, husband of tennis star Serena Williams.
A defining feature of Reddit is its subreddits. Subreddits are smaller online communities on the website where users discuss a seemingly limitless range topics from celebrity gossip to pet health questions to the cosmos. There are subreddits dedicated to celebrities, historical figures, sports teams and politicians.
Reddit became the center of attention last year when retail investors in a subreddit called WallStreetBets gave rise to the meme stock phenomenon.