What’s new is the Trump episode demonstrated these companies’ herd mentality: first no one could afford to act against his social media accounts because it would mean losing eyeballs. And then all of a sudden no one could afford to keep his account standing. [2]
This means online personalities can’t rely of any of these platforms as an alternative to the others. Now that the platforms have acted in unison once – rather effectively – they’re likely to be more aggressive in the future. It’s like being cancelled, but by entire platforms.
So the next megapersonality isn’t going to be primarily on Twitter or Facebook or YouTube or even Telegram. They are going to own their presence. They may publish and engage on all of these platforms, but their home, their fortress, is going to be an independent online presence.
Two types of such online presences will proliferate among influencers: One, state controlled or state influenced online media for national political leaders. The internet equivalent of state TV and Radio. China leads the world here.
Two, independent online properties. We discussed this earlier in the context of Trump’s options:
This Vox article shows how other right-wing personalities like Alex Jones have their own website and online radio show have an audience independent of social media sites. While they also have also suffered in their ability to reach people after being shut out from media platforms, they have survived, even thrived. For Trump, who hasn’t bothered spending any time investing in any platform his own, there is suddenly no way to reach out to his followers. Every political leader, every entertainer, every tech personality has seen this unfold.
Trump may have been the last Twitter megapolemicist, but it’s likely he’s going to run one of the first personal megaplatforms. I’m looking forward to how quickly it happens and what form it takes.
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[2] The point of this is not about right or wrong. For the record I think Trump’s Twitter account was a disgrace to online decency.