Under Musk, Twitter is handing over more data to investigators

The platform seems less stable, it fairly frequently crashes my browser now. Also they've had significant outages since Musk took over. It's not completely falling apart yet, but it definitely is less stable.

Twitter as a platform is noticeably less stable; however, I have noticed the same thing using a lot of services (google maps, instagram, youtube) from big tech companies in the last year coincidentally following the mass layoffs in late 2022/early 2023. Twitter has still probably degraded the most compared to others just based on my personal usage of the site. My suspicion is that these companies that hold such market share are making the calculation that they can get away with degraded performance in their apps because users either can't or refuse to move to alternative sites. It seems to be working too since most of twitter's user base that was reacting hysterically to Elon Musk purchasing the company has still not left.

I'm not really sure how to get statistics that aren't a bit cherry picked when it comes to any of the social networks.

I still occasionally encounter links here and accidentally click, if I had an account I would be an engaged user? For content on the platform it seems easy enough to boost whatever users remain active.

Facebook had a short period where I thought I might have to join to not miss FB only content, then twitter had a phase where you kind of had to read someone's stream of rant to get a specific piece of info directly. Both of those are completely past and they are just another way people link to primary content that remains on the real web. The only dark web that seems relevant to me, at rare times, is behind a newspaper paywall.

Twitter has become significantly glitchy. You can notice glitches more where there are new features, like long videos, etc.

Twitter recommendation algorithm has actually become better- a lot less of content that are appealing to the mass, and much more that are appealing to me. I am spending more time on twitter now.

One downside now is Blue Tick spam. Before, top replies to a famous tweet would be smart, or a good counterpoint, and now it is just dumb blue-tickers, stans, and newsletter salesmen. As twitter boosts posts of paying customers, I am also seeing poor posts appear on my feed out of the blue- it's like someone thinking in the lines of- "he's an engineer, won't he like an 8th grade math puzzle?".

I am not paying for it, but my engagement has grown (I never try).

I am seeing more posts from my follows, too.

> If by law they have to report such things

Platforms often don't have to report such things - and do anyway.

Sometimes they want to cozy up to Gov. Sometimes a desire to acquiesce to authority gets in line first. Sometimes decision makers don't know that rights can and should be protected. Sometimes speech protections are a lower priority than shareholder dividends.

A platform may also be too broke to pay it's required bills. Affording counsel to protect uses could be a tough sell there.