David Shiffman, a marine biologist and conservationist, was an early power user who trained more than 2,000 early career scientists to use Twitter for networking, sharing papers, and public communication. Elon Musk’s 2022 purchase and the platform’s renaming to X coincided with algorithm and moderation changes that pushed Shiffman to seek alternatives such as Threads, Post, Mastodon, and Bluesky. Shiffman joined Bluesky early and found features reminiscent of Twitter’s earlier utility. News coverage noted growing complaints and migration among science professionals. A scientific survey confirmed that many science communicators have largely abandoned Twitter, with Bluesky emerging as a favored alternative.
Marine biologist and conservationist David Shiffman was an early power user and evangelist for science engagement on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. Over the years, he trained more than 2,000 early career scientists on how to best use the platform for professional goals: networking with colleagues, sharing new scientific papers, and communicating with interested members of the public.
But when Elon Musk bought Twitter in 2022, renaming it X, changes to both the platform's algorithm and moderation policy soured Shiffman on the social media site. He started looking for a viable alternative among the fledgling platforms that had begun to pop up: most notably Threads, Post, Mastodon, and Bluesky. He was among the first wave of scientists to join Bluesky and found that, even in its infancy, it had many of the features he had valued in "golden age" Twitter.
Collection
[
|
...
]