X marks the spot?

Like most people on Twitter, I had a love/hate relationship with the platform. Loved the community/hated the way even my friends would miss my posts. Loved keeping up with the news/hated having to be so careful to recognize rogue news sources (and actively work to keep their headlines out of my head). Loved knowing what was going on in kidlit/hated trying to figure out which cancel-culture campaigns were warranted and which were unfair pile-ons.

Then Musk bought Twitter and took it private. Strike one.

He hosted Ron DeSantis’ presidential campaign event. Ugh, strike two.

Then he welcomed Tucker Carlson. Strike three, I’m out.

Well, most of the way. I sign on very rarely, and only with a specific purpose. But I hold on to my handle with the hope that this too shall pass, the company will again be held publicly (and held accountable for doing more rather than less to keep the site relatively truthful and safe), and I can again in good conscience enjoy the community of those I follow and those who follow me.

Of course, now that Musk has gone off the deep end (I assume—I have not sought out his explanation) and thrown away the Twitter brand, replacing it with X, my doubts about the future of the platform outweigh my hopes. One day I may feel required to delete my account completely. I’m not sure what it would take, but I expect I’ll know it if I hear about it.

Meanwhile, I miss Tweeting. I always composed more Tweets than I posted, often just in my head, no keyboard involved. But it occurred to me, I do have THIS platform. My own, that I pay for every year anyway. So, in addition to posting the occasional essay, I’ll start using this blog space for micro-observations and life updates as well.