Everyone’s trying to be the next social media network after it’s very clear Twitter and Facebook have become the most evil of corporations, censoring people, trying to brainwash others. It’s nasty out there.
There’s a few networks that have emerged and here’s the benefits and drawbacks:
Gab – Gab has the best user interface I’ve seen, simple, twitter-like but with a little bit of Reddit functionality as well. Gab’s had its ups and downs because they used to be free speech absolutists to the point where they’d allow libel, but since then they’ve shifted and have even banned porn on the site for a friendly user experience. They have been pigeonholed a bit as “right wing extremist” since their inception, which stunts their growth, but again, the UI is light years above the others.
MeWe – Next up in the UI chain is MeWe. It feels a lot like facebook, though there’s some wonky things to it — groups are non-intuitive to use, it’s a little slower than FB when putting up images or web links, and it keeps trying to force premium on users with pop up ads. Another little thing is it takes two clicks to hit a like or emoji button instead of just one, making it a little more difficult. User base has not been huge on here is another issue, engagement is the smallest of the ones I’ve tried.
Social Galactic – My favorite experience from an engagement angle, Social Galactic is Vox Day’s network and has active people who have the best actual exchange of social information. It’s very similar to twitter and has a “clean speech” policy to where swearing isn’t even allowed (which is nice). It’s invite only — one has to be subscribed to Vox’s Unauthorized TV, InfoGalactic Burn Unit, Castalia Library or one of the like to be a part of this, which is nice because it filters out random trolls. The drawback is it’s difficult to upload images so I can’t meme like I do elsewhere, and second, it’s not going to get your neighbor/grandma/mom on board due to the nature of the invites.
Parler – Another Twitter-ish-clone, Parler is the site everyone’s been jumping to lately. In my experience, it’s been slow to load, post, get notifications and is buggy, though it is the closest thing to a true twitter experience of the group. Right now I’m watching them because they are censoring Vox Day’s blog with a “Restricted URL” warning for anyone who tries to post it. If they’re going to censor right wingers, what’s the point?
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