The mighty fall of Twitter
Twitter is an amazing service with a simple idea, as all of you know. It is an amazing way to spread news. It is very easy to use, very fast and very open. It is exactly what a free-minded, truth-seeking global individual would want from any news source. However, this is exactly why Twitter is losing its edge and relativity globally. Twitter declined 4.6 percent to $17.02 at the close of trading in New York on Jan. 25. The stock has lost about half of its value in the past 12 months and is the third-worst performer on the Russell 1000 Technology Index so far this year, after FireEye Inc. and Western Digital Corp., according to Bloomberg Business. Twitter Inc. fell after the company lost four members of its executive leadership team, including its product and engineering chiefs, signaling any attempts to boost growth at the struggling social media company will be delayed.
Twitter is losing its user base and profits. Companies do not want to advertise on Twitter anymore because the cost per user is extremely high compared to other social media outlets, and this makes it very unfeasible for e-businesses who are competing for every nickel.
Unfortunately, citizen journalism is dying out, too. There are some amazing examples such as 140Journos, which I believe is way better than many regular news outlets. However, some good examples are not enough for masses to turn to Twitter regularly.
Even when the intentions are good, citizens are not journalists, and they do not carry the responsibilities of false blame and misdirection. Masses are passing around judgments by just looking at a tweet for a few seconds before taking action as they see fit. They do not really care about the person or the company in question. They just accept and pass on the information without really asking themselves if what is written is true or false.
What is worse is that some people do this intentionally – trolls. We have seen trolls during election times in Turkey. Now, Twitter is taking action against them so that we can enjoy Twitter as it was intended to be enjoyed: a platform of free speech where people are respectful of each other.
Twitter announced the formation of a trust and safety council to ensure people can continue to express themselves freely and safely on Twitter. They wrote on their blog that “we must provide more tools and policies. With hundreds of millions of Tweets sent per day, the volume of content on Twitter is massive, which makes it extraordinarily complex to strike the right balance between fighting abuse and speaking truth to power. It requires a multi-layered approach where each of our 320 million users has a part to play, as do the community of experts working for safety and free expression.”
We will see if these actions by Twitter are enough to get people back on the site or not.