Trump Steaks. Trump Airlines. Trump Vodka. Trump University. Trump: The Game. Tour de Trump. Truth Social, the former president’s attempt at a Twitter clone, doesn’t have his name in it. But it may soon join a long, long list of failed products from someone who’s repeatedly gone bankrupt. And of course, Trump is reportedly whining like a little baby about it.
The instantly sketchy social media service had a soft launch back on President’s Day, and right off the bat things didn’t go so hot. It was only available on iOS, and only in America. There was no web version. What’s more, many of those eager to sign up were instead added to a massive queue that still, some two weeks later, hasn’t abated.
Predictably, Trump — whose attention span is famously short, whose failures outweigh his successes, who’s spent his life exaggerating his might to the gullible — is doing little but fuming to anyone who will listen. As per The Daily Beast:
In recent weeks, sources have heard the former president on the phone swearing gratuitously and asking things like, “What the f*ck is going on” with Truth Social.
He’s repeatedly groused about the negative press and the less-than-stellar optics of the rollout, these sources said. And he’s demanded to know why more people aren’t using it—why the app isn’t swiftly dominating the competition.
Sure enough, the numbers so far aren’t promising. Trump may have inspired a legion of copycats, but now he has to compete with a packed playing field of competitors following in his footsteps. For instance, Gab — the “free speech” service beloved by Nazis and other white supremacists — averages about 650,000 visitors a day. Truth Social kicked off with two million, but it’s already sunk to about 300,000. That puts it on par with Gettr, the platform run by former Trump aide Jason Miller.
Moreover, the Truth Social app was, as of Friday, the 72nd most popular app on the Apple AppStore. For contrast, Facebook is 5th and Twitter, his former favorite hangout, which permanently banned him over a year ago, ranks 22nd. The light traffic may be explained by the persistent long lines to get an account. But once the kinks are belatedly worked out and the soft launch builds to a regular launch, we’ll bet Truth Social will be as much a success as Trump Ice.
(Via The Daily Beast)