this post was submitted on 09 Apr 2026
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785
EFF is Leaving X | Electronic Frontier Foundation (www.eff.org)
submitted 8 hours ago by slothrop@lemmy.ca to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] merdaverse@lemmy.zip 56 points 2 hours ago (2 children)

To the people saying things like "what took you so long", I think you're missing the point. They even address this in the post:

EFF exists to protect people’s digital rights. Not just the people who already value our work, have opted out of surveillance, or have already migrated to the fediverse. The people who need us most are often the ones most embedded in the walled gardens of the mainstream platforms and subjected to their corporate surveillance.

When the ship is sinking, there's some value in someone staying behind to help people get off. That's not the same as generating value for Shitter.

[–] InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world 8 points 1 hour ago

Ppl on Lemmy don't get the preaching to the choir is not how you grow

[–] ziproot@lemmy.ml 28 points 2 hours ago

As for why they did decide to leave now, they explain that their posts are being viewed by significantly less people now than in the past, so there is basically nobody left to help off the sinking ship any more.

[–] nutsack@lemmy.dbzer0.com 59 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

an X post today receives less than 3% of the views a single tweet delivered seven years ago

the town square lmao

[–] tb_@lemmy.world 14 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

"Free speech absolutionist"

[–] Blum0108@lemmy.world 23 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

*abolitionist

[–] xthexder@l.sw0.com 3 points 1 hour ago

Damn... we all should have known elon can't spell.

[–] ripcord@lemmy.world 86 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

What the everliving fuck were they still doing there

[–] cowfodder@lemmy.world 41 points 3 hours ago (4 children)

Trying to help people that didn't know about the alternatives.

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[–] shirro@aussie.zone 5 points 2 hours ago

How long do you stay on a platform before the outreach to new people is outweighed by implicit support of the platform?

It's a tough call. It is difficult to reach out to outsiders and talk to them but it's the only way to have a conversation with them.

[–] yesman@lemmy.world 191 points 8 hours ago (5 children)

People leaving Twitter now is not very impressive. Less "seeing the light" and more "Trumpgret".

I'll remind you that the Debian project left Twitter over a year ago. So the EFF isn't as fast moving or comfortable with change like ... Debian.

[–] nathan@piefed.alphapuggle.dev 219 points 8 hours ago (5 children)

From their mastodon:

EFF exists to protect people's digital rights. Not just the people who already value our work, have opted out of surveillance, or have already migrated to the fediverse. The people who need us most are often the ones most embedded in the walled gardens of the mainstream platforms

[–] Serinus@lemmy.world 14 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

I will say that double posting is a completely reasonable solution. More orgs should be the gateway where they can be seen, and have the visibility of the big platforms, but they also offer Mastodon as an alternative. If enough orgs do that, it enables people to just... move.

It's hard for users to move when 75% of their content is exclusive to X. And it's hard for orgs to move when 75% of the users are on X. Double posting allows this to move to 10% X exclusive content, 60% content that's available everywhere, and 10% exclusive to open platforms. After the orgs move the content, it's so much easier for users to move, and after the users move, it's easier for the orgs to move.

This should be a cooperative thing. And afaik it doesn't take that much effort to post the content to two places.

[–] viov@lemmy.world 5 points 2 hours ago

That's why people have found out recently that existing on legacy and new way better platforms is good way to get accustomed to new ones. Along with to keep bringing people in to do the same of having one foot on both sides

[–] OwOarchist@pawb.social 32 points 7 hours ago (3 children)

There are plenty of mainstream platforms to reach such people on that aren't owned by (openly) Nazi billionaires.

[–] Cocodapuf@lemmy.world 1 points 1 hour ago (2 children)

There's nothing wrong with preaching to Nazis. Sure, most aren't likely to really listen, but they are the people who need to hear this most.

You don't write people off because they're wrong, you correct them.

[–] InternetCitizen2@lemmy.world 3 points 1 hour ago

More over, most of the people there are lurkers. Our comments should be directed to them.

[–] KingThrillgore@lemmy.ml 1 points 59 minutes ago

Correcting? They can't be saved when social networks amplify and surround them.

Unless you mean "Correcting"

[–] AmbitiousProcess@piefed.social 55 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

Hence why this article is about them leaving the openly Nazi billionaire's platform while remaining on other platforms that are mainstream and still provide a lot of reach :)

[–] Cocodapuf@lemmy.world 2 points 1 hour ago

Exactly, and these platforms are only mainstream now, many of them had much smaller userbases before the X takeover of Twitter.

[–] MalReynolds@slrpnk.net 33 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

Yah, it's the EFF, they get significant latitude from their history.

[–] miked@piefed.social 5 points 46 minutes ago

As they should.

A non-profit that fights daily for our electronic freedoms can leave X whenever they damn well please. They decided today was that day and I am perfectly fine with that.

EFF is one of the orgs I often donate to.

[–] brbposting@sh.itjust.works 1 points 15 minutes ago

And the argument is sound even without appeal to authority. You’re so right!

[–] marxismtomorrow@lemmy.today 10 points 5 hours ago (2 children)

Name one single mainstream (i.e. >10 million users) platform that isn't owned by a nazi pedophile billionaire.

[–] OwOarchist@pawb.social 1 points 1 hour ago

Yeah, that's why I included the word 'openly' in there.

[–] Pman@lemmy.org 2 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

X is owned by a wannabe pedophile from what the Epstein files showed, so maybe X is the only one?

[–] marxismtomorrow@lemmy.today 4 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

Zuckerberg and Gates own the only other mainstream social media sites. While the fediverse is neat, the entirety of all federated services, including the pretty failed launch of bluesky, is less than the userbase of just facebook, in just the Philippines.

And both of them are pedophiles, and while I don't know if Gates is a nazi, Zuckerberg absolutely is.

Also reddit, I guess, u/spez is a nazi, and reddit had the longest running clearweb jailbait site in world history so...

[–] Pman@lemmy.org 1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

So you're making my point?

[–] marxismtomorrow@lemmy.today 1 points 3 hours ago (1 children)

Oh I see, you think musk is only a wannabe pedophile. Grok says otherwise.

[–] Pman@lemmy.org 3 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago)

Eh he is a big failure, and failed up his whole life just like DJT. They managed to fail at being human beings with empathy, but musk is so awkward he failed to get an invite to the oedo parties.

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[–] Godort@lemmy.ca 93 points 7 hours ago (2 children)

This is not a contest to be holier than thou. It's a numbers game.

EFF stayed on Twitter because it has a larger audience and that means a larger portion of people will see their messaging. In fact, I would argue that the people that are still on Twitter are the ones most in need of seeing those messages. The people that care about what Debian is posting are almost certainly already on Mastadon.

[–] hydroptic@sopuli.xyz 1 points 40 minutes ago

This is not a contest to be holier than thou.

This is the Fediverse. Everything is a contest of "holier than thou"

[–] brucethemoose@lemmy.world 32 points 7 hours ago (2 children)

I feel like the EFF's messaging is just not going to get through to anyone still on Twitter.

Remember, it's not a fair forum; it's an algorithm. And it's not going to show the EFF to users who need to see it.

[–] NekoKoneko@lemmy.world 19 points 7 hours ago (2 children)

I feel like the EFF’s messaging is just not going to get through to anyone still on Twitter.

The problem is that the fundamental catch-22 of social networks is that the content and the users reinforce each other. Self-hating/regretting Twitter/X users exist, but they are there because there are network effects, including organizations who still also use it, they are not willing to give up. Similar organizations are there because the users are still there. And yes, I do think they still see the people they want because of follows/subscriptions, even if alt-right fascism is also being thrown into their feed by the algorithm.

It sucks so many people haven't left yet, but that's why every choice to leave is worth celebrating, because it breaks down the long-term network effects every time, even at the cost of short-term value to the users or orgs.

[–] brucethemoose@lemmy.world 14 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago) (2 children)

To illustrate what I mean more clearly, look at the top comments/replies for the NASA Artemis posts, as an example.

...It's basically all conspiracy theorists, and government skeptics.

Twitter's focusing the Artemis posts on them because it's what they want to see, and most engaging for them.

In the EFF's case, I'm not just talking about Musk's influence. The algorithm will only show the EFF to users who would be highly engaged by it. E.g., angry skeptics who wouldn't be swayed by the EFF anyway, or fans who already agree with the EFF. It's literally not going to show the EFF to people who need to see it, as Twitter's metrics would show it as unengaging.

This is the "false image" I keep trying to dispel. Twitter is less and less an "even spread" of exposure like people think it is, like it sort of used to be, more-and-more a hyper focused bubble of what you want to hear, and only what you want to hear. All the changes Musk is making are amplifying that. Maybe that's fine for some orgs, but there's no point in the EFF staying in that kind of environment, regardless of ethics.

[–] death916@piefed.death916.xyz 1 points 2 hours ago

The what you want to see is truer than u think. I'm on all the fediverse sites but still use x for sports stuff mostly. If u like a post about say wild flowers that sneaks in it feels. If u refresh suddenly its full of wildflower posts in an instant. It works so quickly.

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[–] Linken@lemmy.world 24 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

I don’t believe in Trumpgret.

Their hearts haven’t changed, they just don’t like being hated.

We are seeing this a lot with podcast/youtube people, like Alex Jones.

It doesn’t matter what they say now, they begged for him to be elected. They chose him and are responsible.

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[–] raspberriesareyummy@lemmy.world 45 points 7 hours ago

About fucking time.

[–] Regna@lemmy.world 48 points 8 hours ago (1 children)

Progress is progress. As any sane people would repeat: perfect is not the enemy of good.

[–] SaltSong@startrek.website 26 points 7 hours ago (3 children)

I missed the "X" in that title, and read "EFF is leaving the Electronic Freedom Foundation," and was very confused.

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[–] czl@lemmy.dbzer0.com 21 points 7 hours ago

ITT: people thinking that people already on the fediverse are the ones that the EFF needs to reach

[–] Arachnidbrilliant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 points 5 hours ago

Just call it Twitter

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