Paul Graham, a widely respected venture capitalist who has been supportive of Elon Musk’s efforts on Twitter, had his Twitter account suspended on Sunday.
The suspension was followed by a tweet in which Graham wrote: This is the last straw. I give up. You can find a link to my new Mastodon profile on my site. In that tweet, he linked to a new Twitter policy that forbids users from linking to competing social media platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, Mastodon, Truth Social, Tribal, Post and Nostra.
That policy also forbids using various methods to avoid the rule, such as writing “instagram dot com/username” to avoid creating an actual link. It appears Graham’s account was suspended as he wrote, You can find a link to my new Mastodon profile on my site. This can be understood as an example of a workaround by Twitter.
Technology writer Gergely Oroz noted the suspension on his own Twitter account, writing that Paul Graham – Y Combinator founder and Elon Musk supporter had been taking a break from Twitter since the announcement of the Twitter acquisition, and suggested Visitors can find their Mastodon account on his website.
Howard Lerman, co-founder of several tech startups, also tweeted his surprise: Paul Graham (formerly @paulg) defines literally every feature one might expect from a social network.
On Mastodon, widely considered an alternative to Twitter for users tired of Musk’s chaos, Graham himself remained characteristically diplomatic, as well as wanting to learn more about Mastodon about the way things are going.