The same reason 2016 happened. Lots of mentally broken people in this country. Just watched a manager, old guy, at work, go off to another old co-worker about "did you hear about what they're doing to skittles? With the fucking trans colors!?" knuckle dragging rabble rabble THEY WERE ALREADY A RAINBOW.

Honestly with how fast threads, brand new, was able to jump into this compared to the growth of mastodon, I'm convinced the only thing that can convince most people to stop using a corperate bloated social media site from hell is a new, slightly less bloated (so far) corperate social media site from hell.

Twitter won't die all the way until we have something else we want to die

The removal of the capability to make money on it as a platform.

Honestly, I'm constantly asking this question regarding most social media platforms. What will it take for people to stop using platforms they don't like? It's not just the support, it's the actual monetary value of their interactions with those platforms -- you're handing those companies money by utilizing their "free" platforms. I teach online undergrad courses in mass communication, visual literacy, etc. Students talk about their use of social media platforms and many complain that they don't even like them or don't like their policies. When I ask them why they continue to use these platforms they don't like, they say it's easier to keep in contact with grandma, or military member, or someone overseas (or similar response).

Is call, text, and email not covering those individual communications? Are there not other formats that could be used instead of platforms that you don't like? It's much deeper than just that "simple" question. For many, it questions their idea of how culture and society. Especially younger people, who grew up with social media all of their lives, it's difficult to picture an existence without it, to live with the "FOMO" (fear of missing out), etc.

It's honestly a really interesting topic, and it will be necessary to question our idea of culture and what's "normal" when it comes to social media usage.

Considering the company is now, according to the CEO, close to break-even and slowly beginning to bring back advertisers and anticipating profitability in Q1 '24, I think they're going to be around for a while longer.

Beyond that element, I believe that Musk wants control of the company at least until/through the next presidential election, so X/Twitter probably isn't going anywhere in the near future.

As far as people not using it, I think those that were going to leave have left already, so I don't anticipate a huge exodus.