From the moment Elon Musk suggested buying Twitter, users began threatening to leave – and the Tesla kingpin’s erratic behaviour since he took over hasn’t exactly helped his case, with thousands of workers laid off and hundreds more resigning. The MIT Technology Review estimates that more than a million Twitter users have jumped ship since Musk took the reins.
Today the social network is launching a revamped version of Twitter Blue, its paid-for verification system, after a previous attempt last month was marred by a flood of imposters and fake accounts. So for those who decide not to stick around to see how this one turns out, what alternatives are out there – and are any of them any good?
Mastodon
If any platform was going to benefit from an Elon exodus, it was likely to be Mastodon, the open-source social network once touted rather triumphantly as ‘Twitter without the Nazis’.
Founded by an idealistic software engineer, Mastodon is fully decentralised.
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