The sudden increase of inactivity from users on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, has encouraged the rising popularity of a new platform run by Instagram, Threads. In return, this sparked fierce competition between the two companies.
“Twitter is barely usable in many cases,” junior Seven Martin said. “I really only go on Twitter for specific content creators … other than that, there’s no reason to be on the app anymore.”
Competition between different platforms has always been a thing, but rarely does it become such a major issue that mass amounts of people stop using one or more of them.
Freshman Jackson Essex doesn’t care for most of the platforms, nor does he care for the drama occurring between them. However, he does believe there’s something strange with competing platforms.
“I do not care for the competition,” Essex said. “I think it is a ploy to get more users.”
Additionally, freshman Chloe Bowman thinks the competition between apps is unneeded. She says that platforms shouldn’t be copying each other since there is no real point in doing so and thinks that if an app gets created, it should be original and have something that no other platform has.
Martin has expressed similar views to Bowman’s, as he believes that the reason platforms copy each other’s formats are for their own benefit.
“It really annoys me the way that apps like YouTube are trying to ‘Tiktokify’ themselves in the form of shorts … ,” Martin said. “This is a classic move by capitalist corporations to try to make as much money as possible by covering every single challenge they can.”
Even with platforms competing with one another, students still plan on using some of them to connect with friends and family along with finding things they enjoy.
Overall, while some students are annoyed by social media platforms competing, they still plan on using them for the connections they allow them to have since the feud has no overall effect on them.