[CPU] Rather Urgent Update Regarding Twitter

...y'all aren't gonna believe this (or maybe you will)?

Greetings, Programs!

I know, I’ve been trying to stick to just emailing you once a week - and I opted to send this week’s update yesterday to make you aware of the 3D printer giveaways we’re doing on MakerDeck tonight (seriously, 3D printing is the geekiest thing I’ve done in ages).

You already know I’ve been bullish on migrating my social graph to Mastodon - and I’m very happy to help any of y’all figure out how to make the move as well (if you haven’t done so already). It’s really not that difficult, especially if you suffered through the early internet days with dial-up and Trumpet Winsock.

However, the reason I’m emailing you now is to make sure that you’re aware of a brand new (seemingly-capricious) Twitter policy that strictly prohibits linking out to services it deems as competitive - which includes to link aggregators that many creators like myself use to better stay connected with y’all across the socialverse:

The current short list of banned platforms may not include your favorite social media platform (yet), but that can - and may very well - change at a moment’s notice.

How long will it take for them to suspend you from linking out to, say, YouTube if Twitter (itself, as its new owner has suggested) starts helping creators generate revenue on-platform?

How long will it take for them to ban you from linking out to Twitch since they already operate both Spaces and Periscope on-platform?

I believe Twitter is becoming a self-inflicted silo - and that may be the entire point.

This is the [blue] canary in the coal mine.

So, sure… you can absolutely keep following me on Twitter, but you should also recognize that it’s not the place it was just a few short months ago (and certainly not what it was when I signed up in an earlier decade). I will use it differently moving forward, and had already shifted my engagement patterns there.

If you really wanted to follow me on a social media platform, there’s no ads, no algorithms, and no tracking on Mastodon. You could keep subscribing to this email newsletter, too - but a newsletter wasn’t designed to work like a social network.

Yes, John Mastodon welcomes you with open arms…