Scientists leave the social network
Meanwhile, the exodus of scientists from Twitter has begun, which has now become ‘X’ to all intents and purposes: according to a survey by Nature, thousands have already reduced their use of the social network or even abandoned it in disagreement with the new management of Elon Musk, which in the opinion of many would leave more and more room for fake profiles, haters and trolls.
The first doubts had already emerged last autumn after the acquisition of Twitter by the owner of Tesla e SpaceX (video) . Many, even on the pages of Nature, wondered what the fate of the microblogging platform would be, which in the last decade had brought about a major change in scientific communication, favoring interactions between researchers and facilitating a direct relationship with the public. The concerns of many have then found confirmation in the new and controversial policies imposed by Elon Musk, such as the cuts for content moderation activities, the paid blue check and the maximum limit on the number of tweets that users can read each day.
Less users sensitive to the climate crisis
Now that Musk has nearly completed the transition from Twitter to X and ‘twitters’ have been replaced by posts, the results are starting to show. A few days ago, a study published in the Trends in Ecology & Evolution magazine highlighted how the new management of Twitter-X had alienated almost half of the users attentive to climate and environmental issues, reducing the role of the social network as a virtual square where to raise awareness public opinion and organize mobilizations.
A similar tendency to escape is also being registered in the scientific community, as evidenced by the survey conducted by Nature of almost 9,200 scientists who use Twitter-X. The results show that more than half of them have reduced the time they use the platform in the last six months and almost 7% have stopped using it altogether.
«The motivations given by the participants are varied – reads the Nature website – but many of those who have markedly reduced or stopped their activity on X mention Musk’s management of the platform. Many say they have noticed an increase in the amount of fake accounts, trolls and hate speech on the platform.” 46% of those interviewed have already opened a profile on other social media such as Mastodon , Linkedin, Instagram and TikTok , while there is a growing fear that this fragmentation will cause the scientific community to lose cohesion which had established stronger relationships through the old Twitter.
2023-08-18 19:41:15
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