12mo ago

Trump’s Truth Social network records second-worst audience decline

www.theguardian.com

User drop suggests ‘rejection of harsh rhetoric’ spewed by the former US president, rightwing media analyst says

Donald Trump’s Truth Social platform experienced a third straight month of audience decline in June, a leading analyst of rightwing media said, detecting signs of “trouble at the ballot box” for the Republican presidential nominee.

“The diminishing audience levels for Truth Social suggest a rejection of the harsh rhetoric expressed by the ex-president and his political allies that is one of the hallmarks of the two-year-old platform,” Howard Polskin said.

“If this softness persists, it might portend trouble for Mr Trump at the ballot box in November.”

Polskin is president of TheRighting, a site that seeks to “inform middle-of-the-road and liberal audiences about stories and viewpoints not on their radar that are shaping political opinion across a wide swath of America”.

30 comments

It's simply fucking amazing that anyone could be up against Twitter (excuse me, Xitter) and still fail this bad.
- Despite him having been the star of a different 2000s reality show, Trump truly is The Biggest Loser.
  
  He bankrupted a casino. I'm not surprised!
- It's just redundancy. Xitter already captured the right wing/fashy crowd as its target audience, Truth Social is basically just the same thing with a smaller audience. Why use both? ...Or either, if you're a reasonable person.
  
  Like most things with fascists, it's a show of loyalty. Sure, it's not dressing up in Hugo Boss and marching through the streets, but for 2024, 'Oh, I use Truth Social' is more or less the same kind of indicator.
- Honestly, I think that's part of their problem. That Twitter is edging into their territory.
User drop suggests ‘rejection of harsh rhetoric’ spewed by the former US president, rightwing media analyst says
They are sick of how it is being said, not necessarily what is being said.
- I'm assuming it's a defense mechanism. If they see what trump posts unfiltered they might accidentally interpret it exactly how it sounds. If they don't read it right away, they give the propagandists time to fluff it up a bit so it's easier for them to swallow.
- This. Conservatives want their politicians saying immigrants are hurting american jobs. Saying immigrants are "vermin poisoning the blood of the nation" is a bit too mask off/hood on for most.
- Nuance for the win!
I imagine the degree to which xitter has shifted to the right and the rate that they're introducing features to make it easier than ever to be a shitheel is splitting the audience's time. People can only type messages about being cut off by their friends and family so fast.
Somebody (cough SEC) may want to watch the share price before and after the lockdown expiration period.
- Has the supreme court stripped the SEC of its powers yet (unconstitutional!)? Did it ever have any, besides slap-on-the-wrist fines? Garbage like DJT couldn't even exist if we had halfway decent regulations.
Is it because they're dying? I mean a lot of them are pretty old.
- Yeah I was going to say that this is either from Americans dying of the new covid strain/being really old or Russians being sent to Ukraine. That is what's shrinking his followers. They're not getting less racist.
- A lot of them are too old to understand how to use Truth Social in the first place.
- It's the guy from death note just writting down usernames one after the other
His supporters have returned to X instead.
Buy low get rekt!
Oh no!
Lol
I think they mean second best

30 comments