(Austin, Texas)

X is a place to connect with other people, a wonderful way to find up to the second news about what’s happening almost anywhere on Earth. The good thing about X is if a post is misleading then directly under it, you will see a Community Note and a link, explaining the context. If you happened to view that post, say, at 6pm and it had no Community Note at that time, then you will receive a notification on X that the post you saw now has a Community Note on it.

In this way, there is no other source for news with more truth than X.

ORGANIZING, STORING

X is free to use and I’d also recommend that once you get established and understand how it works that you try X Premium, which will allow you to store valuable information in multiple bookmarks that you label.

I think of these as my digital file cabinet. I use these files to store information, images, and videos, which would otherwise get lost. I use this information in articles that I write and for research, similar to the old-fashioned galvanized steel file cabinets.

DAILY DOSE OF HUMOR

X is also the right blend of humor, hard-core research, and cutting-edge information from some of the world’s smartest people.

The reason why humor is so important is it provides us with a good balance throughout our day.

X has a default for you tab, and when you update your timeline, you get to see posts from accounts that you may not have been following. Since I like humor, I end up seeing some funny things there alongside my interests (sustainable energy, electric transportation, autonomous driving, and Starship).

YOUR FEEDBACK IS WORTH IT

There’s one more aspect I’d like to emphasize in this short article, and this is that Twitter went through different stages, and in each stage, it was difficult if not impossible to know who worked for Twitter, because they did not tweet, and if they did, we did not know who they were.

What’s interesting about X is that people who work for X who post are often popular on the app, but not in the sense of being sexy or glamorous unless the sexy and glamorous part could only be applied to being great at engineering.

In essence, I think it’s fabulous to see the work that X technologists are doing in real-time, but there’s another twist to this which is outstanding. It’s that you as a user on X can ask questions to X engineers or give them your feedback on how to make the app a better experience.

In fact, if you follow someone on X  and you have a question about how it works, I have found that most people on X are ready and willing to help others understand the app better.

As I go about my day, working hard, but also taking sporadic breaks and relaxing, I’m glad to experience X as a stream of consciousness in my life that expands my thinking. I hope my words and experience will help you to explain how X works to your friends and family who might not understand it so well.

JUST POST

The best way to understand it is just to start using it. Start posting your thoughts, and, maybe, let your first post be…

“This is my first post”

If you liked this article, give it a heart and share your feedback and follow and subscribe to Gail Alfar on X at @gailalfaratx