I was in train when my phone pinged with a Whatsapp notification.
It was an online friend asking if I was dead. I was not dead, so I asked what lead to the question. Turns out someone had created an account to celebrate my absence from twitter about people missing me and shit. Then another friend pinged me. Another sent me an email. No one called, so that's okay.
The person in question soon after deleted that account, for whatever reasons.
Twitter has changed in recent years. Or better, it's a constantly evolving community.
It was a good community once upon a time, but then people got followers, a lot of followers, others started to get jealous of them, egos clashed and now it's like a murky pool of shit where select few are rolling in the filth and others can't help but get splashed by it.
There are people hiding behind their anon handles, posting all kinds of shit, heck, people with real names and real pictures are doing it too, it just doesn't matter anymore. You get exposed to their stupidity and venomous agendas no matter how many you mute, block or unfollow. You just can't escape it.
The only escape is buying a fucking notebook and writing all your tweets there. Because people will always have more free time than you to raise their pitchforks over some inconsequential bullshit.
In a way, it's become like facebook, but with strangers.
What's the fucking point?
Twitter isn't improving our life at the end of the day. It's good for a laugh or two, but after a while you become numb to that shit too. It's just lot of people cribbing and then you start to mirror them too. You might be fine with mondays, but you feel a general discomfort at not tweeting how mondays suck. You can be aloof and distant, but you see, read, listen to all that shit, and who the fuck are these people? Strangers behind fucking handles? You see their lives, their happiness, problems, bullshit they go through, everything, what's the fucking point? That's all I am asking.
Social networking? A gang to hang out with on weekends? Tech-advice? Contests?
Why?
My tweet count runs close to 2 lakh and frankly, if I was the kind who'd get embarrassed by this kind of shit, I'd be embarrassed. But that's not the reason for leaving twitter. It used to be funny once upon a time, but then everyone jumped on the bandwagon and now it's fucked up in a very very shitty way.
Sure, you can say unfollow them all, follow only a select few, you don't have to read what everyone is writing, but you're in the mix, how the fuck can you not participate? I am not going to half-ass something, if I am doing it, I am going all the fucking way. And doing it all the way has become fucking painful.
So why should I do it anymore?
I asked myself this question time and over again. I left Facebook for same reasons I don't feel like tweeting anymore. Maybe once the crowd loses interest, and twitter gets bought by Google or Apple. Maybe once the trolls die out. Maybe once I feel angry enough about something to tweet again.
Till then, the account is locked, and I am not going on that website/app anymore.
If you need me for whatever reason, you'll find a way to get in touch.
But all that above is just bullshit, I am just too sad to tweet anymore.