#RIPTwitter trends on Twitter as thousands reportedly resign from platform
Twitter / Unsplash: Dave HoeflerTwitter could be on the verge of shutting down. This final stand from the platform leading potentially one last trend on the popular social media platform — #RIPTwitter — as thousands reportedly resign from the giant after disagreeing with Elon Musk’s “Twitter 2.0” pitch, and millions of users worry.
Twitter has gone swiftly downhill since Elon Musk’s acquisition of the social media giant for $44 billion less than a month ago.
The SpaceX and Tesla CEO came in swinging, firing key staff and laying off thousands more in his first days at the company. As the numbers dwindled from around 7,500 to under 4,000 employees, the bleeding is only getting worse after his reported “Twitter 2.0” ultimatum.
With Elon Musk setting a November 17 deadline for employees to commit to the social media platform’s new future or leave, roughly 75% of the remaining 3,700 employees reportedly said no to the proposal.
Musk is now locking them out from Twitter resources and blocking card access. Employees resigning in the thousands as a result. Big names from all across Twitter have pulled the plug, and many current and former employees fear the site will break with only a skeleton crew to maintain the platform, which has approximately 238 million daily users.
Amid all the chaos with Twitter Blue’s verification fiasco, advertisers pulling out, and fears of the algorithm favoring paid users, Twitter users are resigning themselves to a world without the platform. And of course, that means potentially one last trend: #RIPTwitter.
Thousands of users are using the hashtag to share their favorite stories about the social media platform, as well as share links to other services like Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Twitch, and even new competitors like Mastodon.
Of course, there’s plenty of memes going around about the platform’s sharp downturn in the last month too. Musk himself has pointed fun at the situation. While he didn’t use the #RIPTwitter tag, he did tweet: “How do you make a small fortune in social media? Start out with a large one.”
Whether Twitter will actually die is another question entirely. Reports from inside Twitter paint a dire picture of numerous core teams leaving, and the site is just one small failure away from breaking entirely. Only time will tell.