I recently left Twitter. I’d had it up to here with the fake news and trolls. I enjoyed keeping in touch with friends and exchanging brief observations about our lives. But on balance I felt it wasn’t enriching, and instead was a source of negativity and anger.
After having been off Twitter for 10 days I can say this:
I’m happier without it. I’m more focused, less distracted, and can put more energy into more satisfying interactions with the world.
That’s not to say I don’t miss some things. I have (had) Twitter friends, some of whom became real life friends. I had about 1,200 followers; about 15 were consistent online friends; about five became IRL friends. I’m foregoing that occurring again, at least using Twitter.
I learned about news events way before they were reported by mainstream news outlets. Information on Twitter easily beat CNN by hours or days.
There are many funny people on Twitter. I got a lot of good laughs that lightened the daily grind. Humor websites or Reddit threads aren’t the same. Maybe because the immediacy and pithiness is absent.
I’ll miss all of that.
The good stuff was more than offset by the bad stuff. It’s not a close call.
Could I change my mind and rejoin Twitter? Sure. But its standards and content would have to change a lot for that to happen, and nothing public so far hints at those sufficient changes. Or my standards would have to change, and of course that’s possible. But for the foreseeable future, Twitter’s business model will have to make due without my contribution.
Other articles have been written about leaving Twitter by writers more eloquent than me.
Seek Nuance 
Glad to hear it! The fun side of Twitter is quiet with many users leaving or going into lockdown. I won’t leave Twitter any time soon, but I’ve been paying more attention to RSS and IRC lately.
On Twitter, you were always my favorite.
Missing your insightful analysis on Australian & British period dramas. Plus you were my only US based tweep who I could regularly ask “Trump. Wtf?”
The missus has started another show. Australian female lesbian prosecutor in Sydney whose partner got shot by a gunman intended for her and the head cop wants her to fail but he kills himself because she discovered he was covering for another top cop who killed his wife in a mercy killing but she proved it was manslaughter and he disappeared leaving a cryptic message on his laptop then his car was found by the side of a cliff but no body and she found his son killed him because he was strict and ran a child porn business and now in season two the Australian Attorney General may be crooked too.
I know what to get W for Christmas.