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Comment by raffraffraff | Hacker News Reader

But... "if enough people and companies simply ignored Twitter, entirely" ... then that mob is just a bunch off assholes screaming into a void. So the only difference is the void.

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The void is not nothing though, it's other people, who may be influenced and then in many cases influence others on other platforms. I think ignoring a platform of 330 million users when a good chunk of those are on a witch hunt for your product or brand would be asking for trouble.

Assuming those numbers are accurate 4.2% of the global population is on Twitter. Which seems highly suspect.

But for the sake of argument, if 4% of your customers are on the platform it’s highly unlikely for those users to be influenced about your product. Aka, how much does Twitter inform people choice of paper towels etc.

Now, that possibly changes for hype or fad based industries. If you’re creating buzz around a new movie sure Twitter might be relevant.

If your customers make up almost 100% of the population of the earth then yeah you can probably ignore anything said anywhere including twitter.

But for the sake of argument, if your customers overlap significantly with that 4% of earth's population that use twitter, then it is highly likely for those users to be influenced about your product.

Aka, how much does Twitter inform people's of choice of news website, blockbuster movie, tech blog, etc.

Only something like 10% of users tweet regularly. I wouldn't be surprised if most twitter accounts are run by PR firms, bots and blue check marks. The other active ones are probably alts of power users who were self aware of their behavior and decided to be anonymous.

https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/22/21148516/twitter-suspends...

https://www.vox.com/2018/10/19/17990946/twitter-russian-trol...

https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/0...

I don't see much influencing -- it's mostly businesses caving in to the first lunies that complain - not because their bottom end was hurt due to the lunies actual influence...

> I think ignoring a platform of 330 million users

How many are active? of those how many tweet even once a month?

It's not as all encompassing as you think

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