Well....yeah...it was announced at Davos in the last day or two.
So....it's a ongoing initiative in Europe to launch a social media platform called W, positioned as a European alternative to X (formerly Twitter).
'W' is being developed by a group of European organizations, businesses, and former politicians, with a focus on combating disinformation/misinformation, ensuring user verification (including your national photo ID), prioritizing data privacy, and hosting servers within Europe to maintain digital sovereignty.
Naturally, you will ask about 'We' and it's meaning.....the platform's name stands for "We," with the two Vs symbolizing "Values" and "Verify."
So....does the EU financially support the development? No....at least from what I've read....it's a non-support position at present.
The W-technicians/controllers....currently emphasize free speech balanced with human verification to reduce bots and misinformation (noble-stuff, I will admit). It aims to allow easy data migration to other platforms, avoiding user lock-in, and complies with EU digital regulations like the Digital Services Act. How they comply? Not fully explained yet....more of 'trust-us' in the mix.
When it launches? Mixed conversation....some say before end of 2026.
Naturally, you would lead off asking....would Germans sign up for 'more'?
I asked Grok/AI to assemble the data:
YouTube: 65-M Germans have accounts.
WhatsApp: 53-M.
Instagram: 31-M
Reddit: 29-M
TikTok: 23-M
Snapchat: 23-M
Facebook: 23-M
Pinterest: Approaching 23-M
Twitter/X: 22-M
Telegram: 17-M
So I'll offer 6 observations:
1. Most Germans will state WhatsApp is their preferred media platform....doesn't matter on age-groups.
2. If you drag up the topic of accounts, memberships, use of social media....I believe that 90-percent of Germans are happy and satisfied with what they typically use (mostly TikTok, WhatsApp and YouTube). If you asked this group....do you really need another social media account....they'd mostly start laughing.
3. This 'We' effort....is about a decade behind the times. If they'd started this in 2013 timeframe.....they might have assembled real numbers. Presently....if started in 2026....I would imagine that fewer than 5-million Germans will engage in this....with half of them frustrated by the user-verification situation.
4. Will German politicians attempt to mandate membership? It'd be awful stupid, and probably ten-million would take an immediate hardline against a mandate situation. Doesn't matter if you ask left-wing or right-wing.
5. I am reminded historically of the US effort with 'MySpace'....that ultimately failed, but also of the German effort to create it's alternate....Lokalisten.de
Lokalisten had between 5 and 6 million members at the peak. What ended Lokalisten? I'd generally say that alternates (Apps) came around and developed....plus you had all those data-privacy laws that the German gov't put into place to protect you (a thousand times over).
I wish the developers at We luck.....we probably will get hours of introduction via public TV here in Germany.....hyping the product. Then six months later....the same journalists will admit that everyone is mostly happy with what they already have.
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