Congress MP Shashi Tharoor has raised concerns about a potential issue with his X (formerly Twitter) account, suggesting that he may be facing a "shadow-ban" after years of unexplained follower count inconsistencies. Tharoor, who boasts over 8.4 million followers, revealed that his follower count stubbornly hovers around 8.495 million, never surpassing this number despite significant online engagement.
The Thiruvananthapuram MP shared that many of his followers have raised questions about the strange pattern, with new followers consistently gained but others unfollowing at the same rate, resulting in no significant increase in his overall follower count. Tharoor even reached out to X CEO Elon Musk in an attempt to resolve the issue but was met with an unhelpful response: a lawyer's letter denying any problems.
In a recent post, Tharoor explained that a source from the old Twitter India had analyzed his account and suggested the issue might be an algorithm glitch. The source noted that Tharoor's account is not recommended to users and that many of his followers report not seeing his posts in their timelines. This led Tharoor to suspect that he might be "shadow-banned," meaning his posts are intentionally hidden or restricted from a wider audience.
Good question. This has been the case for four years! A source at the old Twitter India told me there was a problem he couldn’t understand: he had reviewed my daily statistics over six months, and found a strange pattern — my followers went up by over 1000 a day, about 60 - 70… https://t.co/IpfTJpMvwt
— Shashi Tharoor (@ShashiTharoor) November 17, 2024
Despite the lack of a resolution, Tharoor expressed his frustration, stating, "There is clearly something wrong that the people in charge of @XCorpIndia don’t care about." He went on to say that more and more people had noticed the issue, prompting him to publicly address it. He also remarked that while the matter might seem trivial given more pressing national concerns, he hopes to draw attention to the problem, even if he doesn't expect any immediate action from X.
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