A few days ago I was suspended from Twitter (twice). I was soon unsuspended after appealing and contacting their corporate counsel, and was told it was a mistake. However I was quite disappointed with the site, as I will deal with in a forthcoming article. It caused me to review the benefits I derive from Twitter.

I realised I barely use my personal Twitter account, so I decided to deactivate it. I use other social media to speak to my friends. My parody bot account is also unused.

I have renamed and deactivated @sam_c_smith. I have deactivated @BigFriendlyHat. These accounts will be deleted in due course.

@MHWitchfinder has also been unsuspended but I have renamed it as I am considering retiring it and ceasing to use Twitter. Although I do get some traffic from Twitter, I get much more from repeat users, friends and better sites like Reddit and Voat. The aggravation, with trolls and arbitrary suspension algorithms is also much greater with Twitter leaving it with a very low cost / benefit ratio.

As I am free to rejoin in future, I say ‘taking a break’. In reality Twitter will need to work to entice back the users it is losing and given its recent financial performance, there is a possibility that it will simply not be there.

As it happens, I am presently working on my own social media application, which will be free-speech friendly and is coming soon.