Interhacktives is back!
We're back with a weekly newsletter ranking who's up and who's down in the world of digital media.
Welcome to the pilot installment of a fresh newsletter from Interhacktives: Hot or Not! I’m Katie Jones and each week I’ll be taking you through what’s trending in the world of digital media. From the breakthrough emerging platforms to every truly revolutionary innovation on Musk-era Twitter, we’ve got it covered. So let’s dive right in.
🧊🔽 Twitter
The chaos continues in the bird box. Twitter Blue currently has around 300,000 sign-ups – a far cry from Elon’s hopes. And US-based subscribers now have access to 4000-character tweets. As @Tom_Nicholas said, “The Venn diagram of people I want to read longer tweets from and subscribers to Twitter Blue is just two very, very distant circles.” It also looks like TweetDeck will become available for Blue subscribers, which won’t frustrate any one at all... And then Twitter went down (as did Facebook and Instagram). What is happening with the social media giants?
🧊⏬ Mastodon
Once the lifeboat from Twitter resulting in massive growth, Mastodon is now slumping. They peaked at 2.5 million monthly active users (up from 380,00) but are now down to 1.4 million. Still a significant increase. but it seems too complex for many, despite apps like Ivory aiming to make this white elephant more useful.
🔽 Podcasting
Last year saw a massive fall in the number of new podcasts. This may be a sign that the tap has run long enough to remove all the sludge and we’re left with crystal clear audio bliss. Or perhaps not. This week Axios discusses projected reductions in advertising money and new ideas. Is the traditional podcast dying? Maybe, but that doesn’t mean audio-first content is going anywhere. And certainly not if City, University of London have anything to do with it as they announced their Podcasting MA earlier this month.
🔥🔼 TikTok
TikTok has had a pretty good week. We’re finally getting the basic ability to edit a post, along with other creator features. And they’re increasing community guidelines transparency with a strike system, bringing it in line with basically every other platform. Well done TikTok, you got there eventually! They’ve got reason to celebrate over at TikTok HQ at it was the most downloaded app in the UK last year.
🔥⏫ Bing
If you’d told me when I pitched this newsletter that Bing would top my list in the first edition, I’d have laughed in your face. Well, it seems I was wrong. Microsoft have launched a new and improved Bing, now with AI. This is the next step into a metamorphosis in how search works. Bing also looks good this week because Google totally fumbled the launch of their AI offering: Bard. It got a question about space wrong in their marketing material – an answer easily fact-checked by a totally normal Google search.
That’s all for now folks. Thank you for joining me in this first installment of Hot or Not. From the hopeful highs of AI to the continued dwindling demise of Twitter, what’s ‘in’ in digital media is constantly changing. I’ll be back next week with another hot or not list. Let’s see who rises and who falls. Read more digital media news on the Interhacktives website. And I hope you’ve had a good week!
Katie Jones
@katiejeanjones_