Oprah WinfreyAn American talk show host and media personality. has a problem. She is one of the biggest names on Twitter - but now MetaThe new name of the company which owns Facebook and Instagram. is encouraging her to defect to Threads. If she moves, she risks losing some of her 42.2 million followers. But a lot of people are unhappy with Twitter's owner, Elon MuskA South African-born entrepreneur whose companies have included the online payment service PayPal. He now controls Twitter, renamed 'X'.. Should she stay or should she go?

Threads looks very similar to Twitter, with features such as liking and reposting. By linking it to Instagram, Meta hopes it will instantly attract millions of users. Some people, though, are concerned about privacy: the app can collect data about your health, finances and shopping habits. 

Twitter has had many problems since Elon Musk bought it in October. His lift on bans for far-right users has been particularly controversial.

People are also unhappy about changes to the way Twitter works. Until last week, anyone could look at tweets; now users are having to log in first. And on Saturday Musk introduced temporary limits on the number of posts a user could view.

Another bone of contention is the introduction of Twitter Blue, whose range of extra features is only available to people who pay.

There have also been technical glitches, making the site unavailable at times. These have been attributed to Musk trying to save money by slashing its staff.

All this has made Twitter less attractive to advertisers, and encouraged rivals such as Bluesky and Mastodon. But Threads will be its biggest challenger by far.

The stakes are enormous. There are an estimated 4.89 billion social-media users in the world, spending an average of 147 minutes a day looking at their accounts. The sites attract more than £180bn in advertising revenue per year. On average, everyone in the world owns two mobile phones - over 16 billion in total.¹

Writing in Foreign Policy, Howard W French argues that if Musk's behaviour destroys Twitter it will be a "geopolitical catastrophe" for the democratic world. For all its faults, Twitter has made information far more freely available, in a way that terrifies authoritarian governments.

But in Unherd, Ed West argues that those faults are too many. Twitter lets users with large numbers of followers get away with "extreme incivilityRude behaviour., incitement to violence and even racial hatred." Social media and democracyA system of government based on the idea of rule by the people., he suggests, are essentially incompatible.

Yes: It fuels toxic debates by giving a platform to hateful and divisive views. It also eats up time that could be spent doing constructive or relaxing things and interacting with people in real life.

No: It gives a voice to people who are ignored by the mainstream media and is a force for democratic change. It allows you to communicate with others who share your interests right across the world.

Or... There are far greater threats to civilisation - global warming, artificial intelligence and the aggression of countries like Russia and China. Social media is the least of our problems.