Here we go. What the heck was the point of checking every single account I followed 1 by 1 to unfollow the inactive/automated/non-engaging people? Well... A few things really. We've had multiple large exodus style events happen here on Twitter thanks to the new head twit. The algorithm change was the most brutal thing to happen to the writing community, as outright follower count means nothing now. But I uncovered some proof that shows following/follower ration still matters a little. That was the inspiration behind the colossal undertaking of visiting 14,289 accounts to vet them. I unfollowed over 11,500 of them. (And no, we're not talking bots. I was able to filter those long before the current crap we're dealing with.) If I had to estimate, about 9,000 of those accounts had no real activity in 2025 (my threshold was 10 posts in 2025). Making them inactive as far as I'm concerned. Of the 2.5k or so others, it was clear a lot of them were trad authors that don't engage. (No reposts, no liking, no comments, nada. And an earlier convo on that topic uncovered that the behavior is likely due to contractual reasons or just publishers putting up automated accounts.) While real, I culled those accounts because the current algorithm really pushes using those engagements. Commenting, Liking, Reposting, Quote Posting. Those things tell the algorithm you're using the program, and thus you shall receive the boost. This means the algorithm does punish clean accounts who only post their stuff. And that's entirely evident with the number of views on the posts from those profiles. Single digits to maybe 30 views at best. (And that's really bad. I'm here to get seen) The unfollowing project took a week, and I finished it on June 25th. Even then I was seeing a pretty significant boost from the algorithm regarding my reach. Now, I did take it a step further. I went back through the remaining 2,400 accounts I'm still following and reposted every pinned post I could find that was bookish (minus some pinned posts for free promotions that ended years ago, and similarly out of date things (There were a lot of those. I said it twice, I'll say it again, update your dang pinned posts PLEASE, free promos back in 2019 are long over and done).). That spree of profile visits, reposts, and use of other engagements has seriously kickstarted my impression counts, and I gotta tell ya... I haven't seen view counts like this since before Musk came and wrecked it. Really the past 5 days alone have accounted for over 10% of my total views, and really every single engagement metric (not counting engagement rate) for the past 365 days! That's... a kaiju size jump. But uh, yeah... there it is... We indie authors need to be seen to do anything. And since the takeover, our community has been pretty stuck across the board. I wasn't sure what kind of boost I'd be getting but this jump has been larger than I anticipated. Take from that what you will, but I think you guys are the best kind of awesome, and it's an honor to be a part of the writing community, and yeah... stay awesome.