Twitter Monthly Users Count Drops By 1 Million After Recent Ban Waves

• Twitter revealed its new monthly user count in their Q2 2018 earnings report after following recent ban waves against bots and spam accounts.
• The microblogging platform has dropped from 336 million monthly users to 335 million users over the last quarter.
• While a decline in users can put off shareholders, it does improve the platform’s long-term health.

With Twitter suspending over a million accounts per day since April, analysts predicted a massive drop in the number of monthly users. The social media site starting conducting its ban waves due to criticism from US Congress officials over bots hate speech, fake news and scam accounts on the platform. The recent ban wave dropped the number of monthly users by one million as per the latest quarterly earnings report.

The recent bans have not removed ‘real’ users, but it can concern shareholders who judge the performance of the platform based on metrics. Despite a decline in numbers, Twitter taking action against suspicious profiles and API-breaching apps is a means of ensuring a safer and more informative social space.

The company expects to lose more users in the coming months as it continues to conduct ban waves. New technology has helped speed up the ban wave process, and the company will not be stopping until all bots, and spam accounts have been removed. While bot accounts help inflate the numbers for the social platform, it worsens the experience of actual users.

Right after the earnings report was published, Twitter’s shares dropped 16% in value. A spokesperson revealed that the ban waves are not the only contributors to the user count decline and there are other internal factors involved as well. Despite the drop in monthly users, the number of daily users has increased. The company also continues to be profitable three quarters in a row for the third time in its history.

Earlier this week, the company was forced to prevent unverified accounts from changing display names to Elon Musk following cryptocurrency scams running on the website. If the microblogging site manages to iron out kinks in the platform, the overall user experience should improve dramatically.

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