A recent update to the X feed brought ‘Marketing Twitter’ back from the dead, exposing the immense grip algorithms hold over our daily digital lives.
by Christina Garnett July 17 2026
X (formerly Twitter) delivered what can only be described as a birthday gift to its users right around the platform’s 20th anniversary. A “small tweak” completely transformed our feeds back into what we once loved. It’s felt like forever since we saw “our people.” Over the years, bots, rage bait, controversy and noise took over the platform, dismantling what was once a digital third place for many of us across marketing, advertising and other micro-communities.
Marketing Twitter, for one, was never just a nickname we gave ourselves. When academic researchers studied the community directly, they found it functioned as a hub for informal learning and professional connection — the kind of place where people showed up to grow, instead of just scroll. Suddenly, our communities and mutuals had simply disappeared from our feeds. Many of us assumed they had left the app entirely, but they were still posting; a sea of bots and bros had just buried them.
Nikita Bier, head of product at X, posted that the platform would be rolling out a “small tweak.” Looking at the data, the team realized that people weren’t seeing their mutuals — the people they follow who also follow them back.
