In my mind, one alternative timeline could have seen Twitter become the Outlook for open social media: ie. focussed on front-end features (customisable algorithms, lists, search, etc) with the protocol open, like Nostr is. Sure, it would have invited a lot of competition, but it would also have *reduced* it in many other dimensions (e.g. entirely different social networks). Still not sure why that didn't happen, TBH.