How to Decide Whether You Should Quit Twitter
You may be thinking of quitting Twitter for any number of reasons. These reasons could be inspired by recent events, fundamental issues with the platform, or simply sheer boredom.
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1. Decide Whether Paywalled Features Are a Dealbreaker
Twitter, like many other social media sites, offers a number of paywalled features. This number can fluctuate over time depending on the user base feedback and how much the CEO of Twitter cares to listen to it, but perhaps you have a problem with the idea of paywalled features as a whole?
This would add weight to the idea of quitting Twitter. You wouldn’t have to feel restricted from their paywalled features again, provided you can find a similar community which doesn’t also have paywalls in place.
2. See Whether You Can Gain a Following Elsewhere
Perhaps you use Twitter and other social media sites for your personal brand? Or perhaps you’ve found yourself as part of a community on Twitter and don’t want to give that up. In either case, you’ll want to assess whether you’re able to gain the same followers elsewhere.
If you could, then that means you have less to worry about when quitting Twitter. If you can’t, you need to weigh up how much you care about having those pre-existing followers, and whether that outweighs your motivations to quit the platform.
3. Ask Yourself if You’re Happy With the Platform’s Direction
If you use the Twitter personally and don’t enjoy the direction it’s taking, you can probably find another free community. If you use it professionally, in most cases you’ll be able to carry on your personal branding efforts.
Assessing whether leaving Twitter due to the direction it is taking is really a balancing act. You need to ascertain whether that unhappiness trumps the benefits (if there are any) you receive from being active on Twitter. This is a choice you get to make, but don’t overthink it.
4. Decide if You Want to Show Support to Musk
Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter has undoubtedly proven to result in more divisiveness within the user base. Across the internet in general, if we’re being realistic. Elon Musk is a polarizing character, and there are justifiable opinions thrown across from both his supporters and critics.
If you decide that you don’t want to show support to Musk’s platform, you’d probably want to do a quick audit of the platforms you use and who owns them just to be safe. There’ll be alternatives available for every type of social platform you can think of, so you’ve always got options if you don’t want to show support to certain businesses because of their owners. If not, there’s always the chancesomeone else could run Twitter after Musk.
5. Check Whether There Are Viable Alternatives
There are plenty of Twitter alternatives available, but you’ll need to see whether any of them meet all your needs. It’s advisable to do a little research into theTwitter alternatives worth tryingbefore picking one as there’s little point in creating an account for all of them if you don’t need to.
The good news about Twitter alternatives is that they could increase in user base as time goes on. It’s essentially a gamble on which one to hone in on, but if you have a Twitter audience and want to move it over, you could test your influence by trying to bring them over to the Twitter alternative you choose. If you only use social media personally and switch to a Twitter alternative, then you can get an early start.
6. Decide if You Want To Unplug From Socials
How many social media platforms are you actively using? AsDataReportalreported, data shows that typical users tend to be using 7.2 different social media platforms monthly. You may have to ask yourself how many of those you really need to be on.
If you’ve decided to have a bit of a detox and realized that you don’t really need Twitter, then good for you. This allows you to focus on the more important platforms to you, it could potentially help you reduce your screen time, and it just takes up less mental bandwidth. There’s a lot to be said about digital minimalism, and you should always be looking for any signs that you’re on a social you’d be better off deleting your account from.
7. Ask Yourself if You Have Something to Gain From Leaving
This is a simple re-framing but can work well: rather than focusing on what you have to lose from leaving Twitter, ask yourself what you have to gain. For instance, perhaps you gain more focus and time back. Perhaps you stop seeing content that annoys you from people you don’t like. Perhaps you gain little from leaving, but were gaining even less from staying.
Looking at what you could gain can be a good catalyst for making a decision on whether you’re quitting Twitter. This is helpful if you’ve found yourself indecisive for a long time on whether you should quit and just need a little push in either direction.
8. Wait and See
Twitter changes and updates frequently, with update reversions also becoming commonplace since Musk’s acquisition. This could make you want to wait and see what happens with the platform rather than jumping straight into a decision.
It largely depends on how long you feel you’ve been ‘waiting and seeing’ in regard to the platform. Only you can answer that for yourself, but a measured approach may make you feel more decisive about leaving Twitter. In which case, you could delete the app from your phone but keep your account. This way you can simply come back online on it with nothing lost if you decide to return.
Don’t Overthink Your Decision
The decision to quit a popular social media platform can be more overwhelming than you might expect. Doubly so if you rely on social media in general for professional purposes. However, it is always best not to overthink too much. If you have enough reason to quit and feel you want to do that, do that. You can always create a new account if you decide you would like to be on the platform again.
Hopefully you’ve been able to come to a decision on whether you should quit Twitter. So long as you’ve considered the points covered, and considered the positive aspects of Twitter, then you should have everything you need to make a decision.
Want to use Twitter without creating an account? Learn all the ways to browse Twitter without signing up.
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