Non-user friends have often asked me why I’m on Twitter. My answer was always “news” and I meant it. It provides a choose your own adventure experience where you can dive in as shallow or deep as you’d like on a topic. But there was so much available to learn. To me literally the only social platform that got close to the promise of the tech. Connecting strangers, whether that be on shared interests or varied. It provides a digestible amount of content and the user can decide if the topic is worthy of more or not. And if it is you can discuss with those strangers who also felt compelled enough to also dive in. If you aren’t that into it, read and move on or go past entirely. No other platform provides this, with the central theme not being “me me me” but rather the world at large. Personally, Twitter is where I found Jason Jacobs around the same time Covid started. Finding MCJ reignited my climate change passion and I’m nowhere close to where I’m at today without it. Would never happen on Facebook or instagram.
The reason I got on Twitter was to be more politically active by paying attention to what was being tweeted by various politicians etc. Once I was on, I realized there was a whole community of climate scientists, journalists, and activists on Twitter and knowing there is a huge community of people who actually care about climate change and are trying to do something about it has helped me to stave off despair. Through twitter climate people -- I ended up in a climate book club with Leah Stokes, then I read her book. I think that Twitter is where I first found out about the Heated newsletter way back when, which led me to join an All We Can Save Circle -- a group that we have recently restarted to read more things and take actions to mitigate climate change. Way before I joined Twitter, I was concerned about and participated in actions to protect the environment and fight climate change, but being on climate Twitter has given me even more info about actions I can take and inspiration to go on, knowing that there are a lot of people out there taking action on climate change.
Twitter is how I found you & this newsletter & how I have learned so much about climate change, and become a much more climate-conscious person. Thank you for using Twitter & I hope we all can continue to do so!
I learned about Heated by having a friend forward the newsletter to me, and I subscribed directly on Substack. It wasn't 'til later that I followed Emily on Twitter. I've been on Twitter since 2010, but have always felt conflicted about it and, so, engaged sporadically. For me, spending time there can be highly entertaining or deeply anxiety-inducing (often both). Still, I stay, because I'm a journalist and that's where the journalists are. I think it's important to remember that only ~20% of Americans are on Twitter, and there are plenty of other ways to reach folks who care about the climate. You're doing good work, regardless of where it gets published and promoted.
Just a short plug for Project Mushroom 🍄 which we're building specifically as a safe place for climate justice organizing and accessibility — with strict community-driven moderation tools to keep out the Nazis.
We will offer at least four types of creator services:
-Newsletter hosting/publishing (including setup, maintenance, discoverability, creator tools via Ghost)
-Live events hosting (audio, video, in person, and creator support)
-A curated Mastodon-based social media network
-Onboarding assistance for your followers to join you
Twitter has been a place I go to find information and news from climate experts and writers and analysts I trust, like you, Emily Atkin! I also post my favorite climate news there for others. I'm very conflicted about what to do now, honestly.
I was a very heavy Twitter user - until Musk took over. I immediately downloaded my data and deactivated my account.
There is *NO* fight to save Twitter. Musk controls the algorithm and can boost/bury whatever he wants. This isn’t like real-world territory where you can fight back (like Ukraine). There is only what Musk allows.
I believe the only way forward is to rebuild our communities elsewhere. I choose Mastodon - and encourage others. We built the community once, we can do it again (free of any tech bro control).
In the meantime, “fighting for Twitter” just means Musk can use your user count to sweet talk advertisers. So, LEAVE and encourage others to go. We need to strip Twitter of its reputation as a “public square” and prompt the sane people and advertisers to flee.
Emily - PLEASE set up a Mastodon account and spend the rest of the year on Twitter encouraging people to move. Then deactivate your Twitter account. You’ll be glad you did in 6 months.
I get to mostly ignore the cesspool aspects of Twitter. I only see them when someone I follow quote-tweets them. I never click on an ad there, so I see myself as bringing down their advertising click-through rate.
I get a lot of value from being connected on Twitter to many like-minded people and a healthy well-curated mix of people with different perspectives from mine (no bad actors — I don’t need their malarkey!).
If Twitter goes down in flames — entirely possible since either
- Musk is in over his head, but because he’s the type of person that nobody can tell anything to that he doesn’t want to hear, the site will drown in incompetence; or
- alternate possibility, Musk is intentionally driving Twitter into the ditch to please China and/or his own ego.
I would miss it greatly — but we can hope that in that case, a new social media player would emerge with a better business model and a commitment to bringing people together, not driving them apart.
I've largely ignored and turned up my nose at twitter, it, like facebook, being an instance of what I didn't want the internet to become. That is to say it's public infrastructure controlled by a single company.
So if you know about Mastodon you might think I'd like that, but when I tried it I had a bad experience. Most of the comments were uninteresting and I found myself scrolling for hours trying to find the next good comment if any. Seemed to be geared for addiction, so I've steered clear since. Did they copy twitter and inadvertently pick up the work of unscrupulous psychologist UI designers?
You're not the first reporter I've read who sees twitter as important. Funny sort of asymmetry that. (But I see other readers value it.) For what it's worth I discovered you from Walt Hickey's numlocknews, his Sunday interview with you. So far substack is a piece of single company controlled internet infrastructure I don't have a problem with.
I don't use Twitter nearly as much as I used to. But I also don't believe in the concept of ceding a tool as powerful as Twitter to the right. In the absence of meaningful legislation to regulate social media as a public utility, the fight against climate denial and other regressive viewpoints on Twitter is one worth fighting.
Glad to see all this ferment aiming to sustain this platform’s enormous value to those trying to build a safer relationship between people, climate and energy. I’ve explored a host of unique attributes of Twitter in several posts, including on @snowman’s work at Twitter helping Indonesians build a flash flood detecting and warning system using Twitter live data, and of course @jacquelyngill’s brilliance and @ed_hawkins’s climate stripes visualizations and more. Keep up the fight, all. https://open.substack.com/pub/revkin/p/all-hail-elon-musk-the-greatest-spur
Non-user friends have often asked me why I’m on Twitter. My answer was always “news” and I meant it. It provides a choose your own adventure experience where you can dive in as shallow or deep as you’d like on a topic. But there was so much available to learn. To me literally the only social platform that got close to the promise of the tech. Connecting strangers, whether that be on shared interests or varied. It provides a digestible amount of content and the user can decide if the topic is worthy of more or not. And if it is you can discuss with those strangers who also felt compelled enough to also dive in. If you aren’t that into it, read and move on or go past entirely. No other platform provides this, with the central theme not being “me me me” but rather the world at large. Personally, Twitter is where I found Jason Jacobs around the same time Covid started. Finding MCJ reignited my climate change passion and I’m nowhere close to where I’m at today without it. Would never happen on Facebook or instagram.
The reason I got on Twitter was to be more politically active by paying attention to what was being tweeted by various politicians etc. Once I was on, I realized there was a whole community of climate scientists, journalists, and activists on Twitter and knowing there is a huge community of people who actually care about climate change and are trying to do something about it has helped me to stave off despair. Through twitter climate people -- I ended up in a climate book club with Leah Stokes, then I read her book. I think that Twitter is where I first found out about the Heated newsletter way back when, which led me to join an All We Can Save Circle -- a group that we have recently restarted to read more things and take actions to mitigate climate change. Way before I joined Twitter, I was concerned about and participated in actions to protect the environment and fight climate change, but being on climate Twitter has given me even more info about actions I can take and inspiration to go on, knowing that there are a lot of people out there taking action on climate change.
Twitter is how I found you & this newsletter & how I have learned so much about climate change, and become a much more climate-conscious person. Thank you for using Twitter & I hope we all can continue to do so!
I learned about Heated by having a friend forward the newsletter to me, and I subscribed directly on Substack. It wasn't 'til later that I followed Emily on Twitter. I've been on Twitter since 2010, but have always felt conflicted about it and, so, engaged sporadically. For me, spending time there can be highly entertaining or deeply anxiety-inducing (often both). Still, I stay, because I'm a journalist and that's where the journalists are. I think it's important to remember that only ~20% of Americans are on Twitter, and there are plenty of other ways to reach folks who care about the climate. You're doing good work, regardless of where it gets published and promoted.
Twitter is what led me to your excellent work Emily, so as a climate person that means everything, and I'm thankful for that.
Whatever happens with Elon in charge, I'll stay on it because of the accounts I follow like yours and Dr. Leah Stokes, who do great work every day.
I know I've said this a million times at this point, but thank you so much for all the awesome reporting you do.
Just a short plug for Project Mushroom 🍄 which we're building specifically as a safe place for climate justice organizing and accessibility — with strict community-driven moderation tools to keep out the Nazis.
We will offer at least four types of creator services:
-Newsletter hosting/publishing (including setup, maintenance, discoverability, creator tools via Ghost)
-Live events hosting (audio, video, in person, and creator support)
-A curated Mastodon-based social media network
-Onboarding assistance for your followers to join you
https://newsletters.projectmushroom.xyz/about/
I too am sad that Twitter is in its death throes. I'm @climatebrad@mastodon.social
I closed my twitter account months ago and I'm allergic to cats...
Twitter has been a place I go to find information and news from climate experts and writers and analysts I trust, like you, Emily Atkin! I also post my favorite climate news there for others. I'm very conflicted about what to do now, honestly.
I was a very heavy Twitter user - until Musk took over. I immediately downloaded my data and deactivated my account.
There is *NO* fight to save Twitter. Musk controls the algorithm and can boost/bury whatever he wants. This isn’t like real-world territory where you can fight back (like Ukraine). There is only what Musk allows.
I believe the only way forward is to rebuild our communities elsewhere. I choose Mastodon - and encourage others. We built the community once, we can do it again (free of any tech bro control).
In the meantime, “fighting for Twitter” just means Musk can use your user count to sweet talk advertisers. So, LEAVE and encourage others to go. We need to strip Twitter of its reputation as a “public square” and prompt the sane people and advertisers to flee.
Emily - PLEASE set up a Mastodon account and spend the rest of the year on Twitter encouraging people to move. Then deactivate your Twitter account. You’ll be glad you did in 6 months.
I get to mostly ignore the cesspool aspects of Twitter. I only see them when someone I follow quote-tweets them. I never click on an ad there, so I see myself as bringing down their advertising click-through rate.
I get a lot of value from being connected on Twitter to many like-minded people and a healthy well-curated mix of people with different perspectives from mine (no bad actors — I don’t need their malarkey!).
If Twitter goes down in flames — entirely possible since either
- Musk is in over his head, but because he’s the type of person that nobody can tell anything to that he doesn’t want to hear, the site will drown in incompetence; or
- alternate possibility, Musk is intentionally driving Twitter into the ditch to please China and/or his own ego.
I would miss it greatly — but we can hope that in that case, a new social media player would emerge with a better business model and a commitment to bringing people together, not driving them apart.
I've largely ignored and turned up my nose at twitter, it, like facebook, being an instance of what I didn't want the internet to become. That is to say it's public infrastructure controlled by a single company.
So if you know about Mastodon you might think I'd like that, but when I tried it I had a bad experience. Most of the comments were uninteresting and I found myself scrolling for hours trying to find the next good comment if any. Seemed to be geared for addiction, so I've steered clear since. Did they copy twitter and inadvertently pick up the work of unscrupulous psychologist UI designers?
You're not the first reporter I've read who sees twitter as important. Funny sort of asymmetry that. (But I see other readers value it.) For what it's worth I discovered you from Walt Hickey's numlocknews, his Sunday interview with you. So far substack is a piece of single company controlled internet infrastructure I don't have a problem with.
I don't use Twitter nearly as much as I used to. But I also don't believe in the concept of ceding a tool as powerful as Twitter to the right. In the absence of meaningful legislation to regulate social media as a public utility, the fight against climate denial and other regressive viewpoints on Twitter is one worth fighting.
Glad to see all this ferment aiming to sustain this platform’s enormous value to those trying to build a safer relationship between people, climate and energy. I’ve explored a host of unique attributes of Twitter in several posts, including on @snowman’s work at Twitter helping Indonesians build a flash flood detecting and warning system using Twitter live data, and of course @jacquelyngill’s brilliance and @ed_hawkins’s climate stripes visualizations and more. Keep up the fight, all. https://open.substack.com/pub/revkin/p/all-hail-elon-musk-the-greatest-spur