Twitter Fleets is gone. I can finally breathe a sigh of relief.

Twitter announced in a blog post on Wednesday 14, July 2021 that they’re saying goodbye to fleets. 

In a statement they said:

We built Fleets as a lower-pressure, ephemeral way for people to share their fleeting thoughts. We hoped Fleets would help more people feel comfortable joining the conversation on Twitter. But, in the time since we introduced Fleets to everyone, we haven’t seen an increase in the number of new people joining the conversation with Fleets like we hoped. Because of this, on August 3, Fleets will no longer be available on Twitter.

When Fleets was rolled out, I was very sceptical and disappointed in the platforms bid to copy Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp etc. 

I joined Twitter because of its simplicity. Twitter is all about news and trends. Period.

We’re constantly beaten with a barrage of info on social media each day. And it’s becoming highly impossible to focus on one thing. 

Understandably, social media platforms want us to stay longer using their products, so they can make money. But adding feature after feature just to look like the others doesn’t work.

I follow people to see what they post on their timelines. Anything they say on their status or fleet doesn’t concern me. I see that as a distraction and a waste of time. 

All posts must be on the timeline. 

Social media platforms need to stay true to their original values – why they came into existence. Also, they need to keep things lean enough to let users focus on what is relevant to them.