Almost Half of Environmental Twitter Left X After Musk's Acquisition

Nearly half of environmentally-inclined users have quit using X after Elon Musk took over the company in 2022, new research shows.

Climate Discourse Lessens After Musk

In a study published in the journal Trends in Ecology & Evolution, it showed that nearly 50 percent of 380,000 environmentally-oriented users have become inactive after Musk acquired Twitter in October 2022.

Research showed that one of the primary reasons for this inactivity was due to Musk's changes in content moderation within the platform. Since then, there has been a rise to abuse and hate speech making the user's question the integrity of Twitter as an information disseminating platform.

Prior to Musk's ownership, Twitter is known as an important tool for environmental researchers and advocates. On the contrary, Musk's leadership has significantly impacted the climate policy sphere and future disaster response after extreme weather events.

Climate Misinformation in X

Various accounts have been using X to spread climate misinformation with #climatescam doubling in tweets a month after Musk took over the platform. This situation might be one of the driving force for the environmental accounts to leave the platform forever.

For instance, climate scientist and water expert, Peter Gleick, announced that he will no longer use the X and will instead post updates on Mastodon, Instagram, LinkedIn, and other platforms. He also cited that "justice, respect, and ethical perspectives now utterly abandoned here," pertaining to X's current landscape.

In May, Musk closed the book on academic research after it ended the free API access and launched it as part of paid tiers.