As of the end of 2016, 24% of active internet users in America use Twitter. According to Twitter, they have 335 million active users, which is declining - thank

As of the end of 2016, 24% of active internet users in America use Twitter. According to Twitter, they have 335 million active users, which is declining - thanks largely to declines in America [2]. One can only speculate on the percent of those that are bots. By contrast Facebook still has north of 2billion monthly active users. Both sites, on top of bots, of course also have an incentive to count as loosely as possible within the realm of plausible deniability. Ultimately, if Twitter is the center of gravity of the internet, then Pluto must be the center of gravity of our solar system. The only reason I mention this is because I find people make the sort of arguments like you're making to convince themselves that they're not just wasting time on these platforms. I don't think there's been any shift in culture. There probably has been a shift in demographics as the internet has become much more common among less technically oriented individuals, but I think the real player is simply that these platforms are designed to be addictive, and they are. People keep using them even when they want to quit or do not find the time spent on them beneficial. Dopamine's a hell of a drug. [1] - http://www.pewinternet.org/2016/11/11/social-media-update-2016/ http://www.pewinternet.org/2016/11/11/social-media-update-20... [2] - https://venturebeat.com/2018/07/27/twitter-loses-1-million-monthly-users-in-q2-2018-revenue-grows-to-711-million/ https://venturebeat.com/2018/07/27/twitter-loses-1-million-m...