Editor’s Note: David M. Perry is a journalist, historian and co-author of “The Bright Ages: A New History of Medieval Europe.” He is a senior academic adviser in the history department of the University of Minnesota. Follow him Twitter. His views do not reflect those of the author. More information on SME.

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Twitter deserves to be praised, not buried. Yes, I know that’s not how the line goes, but Twitter is a space where we meme, where we take the familiar and remix it, where we make self-referential loops of meta-commentary that somehow – for me anyway – has always added up to so much more than the sum of its parts. My life was transformed by Twitter in profound and absurd ways, professionally and personally.

The whole thing seems to be in danger of falling apart due to the chaos and cruelty that is often the mark of a billionaire.

Twitter is actually pretty small, with hundreds of millions of users – which may sound like a lot, but is actually many fewer than the billions who use Facebook, Instagram and the new kid on the block, TikTok. But those bigger networks tend to keep us siloed, whereas Twitter always has the potential to connect people, ideas, events, concepts and more in ways that I haven’t experienced elsewhere.

These can make life so much easier. It has helped build relationships, created social movements and built communities. I’ve found so many amazing ideas and people, been lucky to hear new perspectives, grown not only as a writer and historian, but also as a citizen, as a person. I’ve found new friends and collaborators. This ability to connect can be terrifying as well; on Twitter, I’ve been exposed to layers of hate that have left me shaken. I know I’m not alone in that.

But as the tweets of farewell, the “find me on Substack or Mastodon or Instagram” posts, continue to pile up, it feels as if so many people on Twitter – whether it collapses entirely or not – feel an immutable urge to say “thank you,” “you mattered,” “I was here.”

Perhaps the reason why is the fear that, in addition to losing this way to connect with …read more

Source:: Social Media Explorer