November 19, 2019
Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales has launched an ad-free social media platform, positioning it as ‘The Anti-Facebook.’ It’s major differentiator? It will not run on an ad-funded model. Rather, Wales aims to fund it on donations, similarly to Wikipedia.
Introducing WT:Social
The new social platform hopes to combat ‘clickbait’ and misleading headlines, giving its members the ability to edit inaccurate headlines.
Users will see articles in a similar timeline format to Twitter and Facebook, but newer links will be prioritised first, rather than those with the most engagement.
Since launching last month, WT:Social is approaching 50,000 users, doubling in the past week alone. The social platform is free to join, but at the moment, users either need to join a waitlist, donate or invite friends.
What does it mean for your brand?
This network is definitely something to watch – but it would need to grow its number quickly to compete with the social media heavy hitters.
Users have adapted to social media being free, so a donation-reliant model could be a difficult sell for audiences.