Lithium Technologies to shut down Klout website and the Klout score on May 25, is planning a new social impact scoring methodology based on Twitter
Remember Klout? — The influencer market service … Jason Koebler / Motherboard : Klout Dead — RIP to the “social reputation score” website. Sean Hollister / CNET : Klout is shutting down, so your score REALLY doesn't matter now Facebook: Joe Fernandez : So weird to hear that they are shutting Klout down. Tweets: Peter W. Singer / @peterwsinger : It is strange and wonderful that Klout is closing shop at just the same moment China is creating an Orwellian version required for every one of its citizens... http://www.theverge.com/... Belinda Barnet / @manjusrii : “Klout as a standalone service is not aligned with our long-term strategy” Translation: we couldn't monetise it and the General Data Protection Regulation stuff makes it too too hard so bye http://twitter.com/... @klout : To all of our fans: after careful consideration we have decided to shut down the Klout website & the Klout Score. This will happen on May 25, 2018. It has been a pleasure serving you, and thank you for your ongoing support over the years. Details here: http://community.lithium.com/ ... Alex Howard / @digiphile : Today in corporatese: “The Klout acquisition provided Lithium with valuable artificial intelligence (AI) & machinelearning capabilities but Klout as a standalone service is not aligned with our long-term strategy."Translation: no one cared enough about Klout scores to keep 'em. http://twitter.com/... Ted / @tedonprivacy : small brain: GDPR compliance by fixing your shit big brain: GDPR compliance by locking your EU users out galaxy brain: GDPR compliance by shutting down your service entirely http://twitter.com/... Seth Fiegerman / @sfiegerman : For a brief, wonderful moment, a generation of internet users was able to judge itself not based on the content of their character, but by a seemingly arbitrary number generated by a pointless website fueled by millions in venture capital — and a dream. http://twitter.com/... Maya Kosoff / @mekosoff : klout shutting down is a good time as any to reshare the story about the time in jschool when my professor for a social media management class decided to grade us mainly on two things: filling posting quotas on various social networks, and our klout scores http://twitter.com/... @thatprimeguy : *Eddie Murphy pointing at skull* Can't miss Klout if you never had any to begin with. http://twitter.com/... @hunterwalk : Klout's score explainer page is perfect snapshot of simpler times2018 version is Trump, Twitch streamer and a pepe avatar http://twitter.com/... Sarah Kendzior / @sarahkendzior : LOL Klout. Once I had a viral tweet about McDonalds mistreating its workers and Klout sent me a coupon for Chicken McNuggets.
Context & Ripple Effects
Klout's shutdown has been a slow unwind rather than a sudden collapse: Lithium Technologies already pulled the plug on Klout Perks back in 2015, removing the discounts-and-perks economy that gave the score its consumer pull while honoring outstanding commitments. What remains today is the score itself — and with it Lithium's stated plan to rebuild social impact measurement on top of Twitter data.
That Twitter dependency is the interesting part of the arc. The related coverage shows where platform data access has gone since: Twitter has since moved to end free API access, banned third-party clients in its developer agreement, and wound down legacy verification — each step tightening who gets to compute reputation from the firehose.
First-order effects
- Klout users lose their scores and profile pages on May 25, and any brand or agency workflows built around Klout metrics lose their data source overnight.
Second-order effects
- Lithium's replacement methodology is hostage to Twitter's own terms: the same company that later cut off free API access and barred third-party clients controls whether an independent influence score can exist at all.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, influence measurement migrates from independent scorers like Klout to signals the platforms themselves issue — a shift already visible in Twitter retiring legacy verified checkmarks and Meta reshaping distribution toward unconnected recommendations.
The trend: Third-party reputation scoring built on open social data is collapsing into platform-controlled signals, as owners of the underlying APIs decide who may measure influence at all.