The Trouble with X

I first opened my X account in 2007. It was a lot of fun at first, conservatives dominated the dawn of social media with the #DontGo movement, #TCOT, and then the tea party.

The left created an annual conference called NetRoots as a way to help counter the right’s digital surge. Theft didn’t grow online until they convinced the left-leaning proprietors of various digital platforms to incorporate suppressive algorithms to level the playing field. From there it only got worse.

Before Jack Dorsey, who sold Twitter to Elon Musk in 2022 when it was renamed X, I noticed increasing suppression of my content. I would routinely discover that I was no longer following certain accounts that I’d never unfollowed. My engagement, which was best previously described as rapid-fire, suddenly shifted to a ghost town virtually overnight. I lost approximately 30k followers one evening and a few days later another 60k. I thought maybe it was perhaps a move to clear out bots, but it kept happening for a period of several months until the deductions began numbering in the hundreds of thousands.

It got exponentially worse after the Parkland massacre. I was routinely mass-reported by the left any time I anything about firearms — policy, law, correcting false reporting. My follower count also froze and didn’t change for nearly two years, not even a loss, which seemed odd. Surely, someone would unfollow me at least, right?

I began taking screenshots of my follower count and post engagements multiple times a day for the past several years after I repeatedly 30k and 60k followers overnight within the same week. A shot of some of the files in my folder.

Since then my follower count has mostly remained frozen. Only recently have my posts started seeing light of day again, but the suppression is still fairly noticeable. It’s definitely hurt me professionally, negatively limited my reach, and neutered my ability to distribute my content to the extent that I was able to before. The left was successful in suppressing my visibility.

X kindly grandfathered in the verification badge on my account when ownership transferred (as opposed to asking me to pay for it), which was immensely helpful as there are always people who try impersonating me on social media and somehow convince people into believing that it’s really me, after which point those followers are subsequently and immediately hit with solicitations in DMs for cash, inappropriate photographs, or personal data. Sometimes the fake accounts just say crazy things in the hope that some press outlet picks it up and runs with it, thereby damaging my credibility. The verification badge does help to differentiate and protect against these things.

What also helped was an older version of a third party desktop client that previously worked with Twitter, called Tweetdeck. I believe I’m what they would call a “power user,” meaning I regularly use the service to curate content for my show as much as I engage. It’s like a modern news wire. Tweetdeck allowed me to organize content into vertical columns that auto-refreshed and easily follow topics or discussions. I’ve used it for over a decade or longer, definitely since its inception. After Twitter became X, X incorporated the Tweetdeck multi-column configuration into X Pro, which was accessed if you had a badge. It was fantastic and worked better than before. Unfortunately, out of the blue today it’s gone and I got this message when I went to work this evening to prepare for tomorrow’s show:

If I pay $40 a month, I can maybe access it again (I’m not certain that it’s still the same configuration or service anymore without paying to see). The price varies depending on your account. If there was a notice to users about the change I didn’t see it or receive an email about it.

Were my account not throttled and my visibility still limited, it wouldn’t be a difficult choice, as I do use the service. However, I can’t justify paying $40 a month for a service that limits my visibility and suppressed my reach, especially with no guarantee that even paying for the service would remove those penalties. I’ll gladly play for good service, I won’t pay what feels like an extortionate fee just to not be abused by a service while using it.

I’ve never been able to reach anyone at X to remedy the issue so it just sort of … is. There isn’t anything I can do but just endure it and struggle along. This last change definitely means I will be using the service less. Instead of multiple columns and saved searches you have one chunky, giant feed to dig through. It’s impossible to track things as quickly or as easily.

It is what it is. I’ve already given up and have begun migrating my usage to other platforms, though they aren’t nearly the same nor serve the same purpose. I hope one day that all of the layers of putative algorithms will be removed, no easy task. My account will remain on X but I won’t be there nearly as much anymore.

You can also find me here, also on Facebook and Instagram.

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