The social web is changing: Twitter set up limits, Reddit alienated its users, TikTok could get banned, and Instagram has turned into an entertainment platform
An era of the internet is ending, and we're watching it happen practically in real time. Twitter has been on a steep … Bluesky: @peterabraham.bsky.social . Mastodon: @carnage4life@mas.to , @AnnemarieBridy@mastodon … , @antimnguyen@mastodon … , @joel@fosstodon.org , and @ernie@writing.exchange Twitter: @reaumie , @sociogeeks_ , @irisheagle , @paoloardoino , @davemolloy , @textually , @alexvtunzelmann , @camjpatrick , @astroehlein , and @scobie Forums: Hacker News , r/Foodforthought , r/technology , and Beehaw Bluesky: Peter Abraham / @peterabraham.bsky.social : The end of an era. Good post from @davidpierce.xyz. I agree, and I believe different communities will end up on different platforms. “We're all here in one place” is over. https://www.theverge.com/... Mastodon: Dare Obasanjo / @carnage4life@mas.to : A lot of companies have been living on borrowed time due to low interest rates and VCs with too much money and no due diligence. — COVID ending, interest rates spiking and Apple ATT tanking as businesses was a 3 hit combo that will tip over a lot more companies over the next year. … Annemarie Bridy / @AnnemarieBridy@mastodon … : Yep. This pretty much captures my feelings about the demise of the social web. For good and ill, there's just not gonna be a place where everyone is. — Reddit, Twitter, Mastodon: where are we all supposed to go now? - The Verge https://www.theverge.com/... @antimnguyen@mastodon.gamedev.place : Newsletters and email chains like it's the 90s again. Let's gooo — (Masto is fine I guess.) — https://www.theverge.com/... @joel@fosstodon.org : “Maybe we should all embrace the downfall of social networks, and maybe my (and our) need for a global water cooler is just a vestigial feeling we'll all be rid of in a few years” — So where are we all supposed to go now? · The Verge https://www.theverge.com/... Ernie Smith / @ernie@writing.exchange : Honestly, who cares if the fediverse is “ready”? It sort of feels like the goal posts will keep moving until it looks exactly like the thing everybody left. — Just use what you're comfortable with and don't worry about whether it's ready or not. … Twitter: Romy / @reaumie : “before Twitter and Reddit turn into MySpace and Friendfeed and basically disappear from my life, I find myself longing for what they once were. Still are, maybe, just not for long. I miss everybody, and I don't know if I'll ever find them again.” https://www.theverge.com/... @sociogeeks_ : interesting, but Path, rest in peace https://twitter.com/... Tim Ballisty / @irisheagle : Good summary on what's happening in the social media world (See attached). I think increasing revenue no matter what is the biggest change. Us users have a hard time going from something that's free to subscription. https://www.theverge.com/... [image] @paoloardoino : Is Facebook still a thing? Dave Molloy / @davemolloy : David's piece from last night captures a lot of what people who aren't mad into Mastodon are feeling - that nothing is recapturing the social media buzz of 10 years ago for most. Maybe it's the end of the era. Something new will come. https://www.theverge.com/... Emily Turrettini / @textually : So where are we all supposed to go now? What's next appears to be group chats and private messaging and forums https://www.theverge.com/... via @Verge Alex von Tunzelmann / @alexvtunzelmann : I appreciate this rather mournful analysis of the demise of social media. https://twitter.com/... Cameron Patrick / @camjpatrick : I'm not quite as pessimistic as this article, but the signs look bad for social media as we once knew it. And I, for one, have found stats twitter immensely valuable for professional development and also socially, especially during pandemic lockdowns https://www.theverge.com/... Andrew Stroehlein / @astroehlein : So, who are we all supposed to talk to now? People we actually know?? https://www.theverge.com/... Omid Scobie / @scobie : An era of the internet is ending, and we're watching it happen in real time. Interesting read via @Verge: https://www.theverge.com/... Forums: Hacker News : So where are we all supposed to go now? r/Foodforthought : So where are we all supposed to go now? r/technology : So where are we all supposed to go now? Misk To / Beehaw : So where are we all supposed to go now?
Context & Ripple Effects
This Verge roundup lands mid-arc: Mastodon, nostr, and other decentralized networks had already caught a wave off Twitter's apparent decline by late 2022, and the platform missteps it catalogs — Twitter's usage and API limits, Reddit alienating its own moderators and users, TikTok's ban exposure, Instagram's pivot to entertainment — are what pushed that wave. The throughline is that no single feed is absorbing everyone anymore.
The piece also sits inside a longer strategic turn: the 'shoot-first, aim-later' era of platform growth described back in 2020's Wild Wild Web analysis has given way to platforms actively constraining their products, whether via rate limits or algorithmic entertainment feeds.
First-order effects
- Twitter's rate limits and API restrictions immediately degrade the experience of its heaviest users and third-party developers, while Reddit's policy moves push moderators and communities toward alternatives like Mastodon, Bluesky, and Beehaw.
- Instagram's shift to an entertainment-first feed changes what creators and social-graph-dependent users can rely on the platform for, and TikTok's ban risk leaves its US user base and advertisers exposed to sudden displacement.
Second-order effects
- Meta positions Threads as the centralized landing spot for displaced Twitter users, though Adam Mosseri's admission of Threads' low-quality recommendation problems shows the incumbent alternative inherits its own feed-quality trade-offs.
- Migration pressure strains the decentralized side too: volunteer-run and corporate Mastodon instances absorb costs without clear revenue models, foreshadowing exits like Mozilla later shutting down Mozilla.social and telling users to export their data.
Third-order effects
- If dispersal holds, the social web reorganizes from a few congregation points into fragmented communities spread across federated and paid models — a shift MIT Technology Review ties to federated networks plus growing acceptance of paying for content improving discourse.
- Platform governance becomes the durable battleground: when access can be throttled, banned, or re-aimed at entertainment at any time, users and regulators treat platform control itself — not any single feature — as the thing to constrain.
The trend: The congregational social web of one dominant public square is fragmenting into distributed, constrained, and increasingly paid communities, with each platform restriction accelerating the exodus it tries to manage.