Why Do We Keep Building Murmel?

People keep asking me why I invest time and efforts in building Murmel if Twitter has already created its solution. Indeed, Top Articles became available to the US and a few more regions last year under Twitter’s paid subscription tier Twitter Blue. I think rolling Top Articles worldwide is only a matter of time, and I don’t see Murmel’s worldwide availability as a serious competitive advantage.

So what is it then?

TL;DR: it’s the people 🤫

Despite the two services fulfilling a similar purpose, they target two different audiences. For Twitter, Top Articles makes people invest even more of their time and attention into the platform. No surprise that it got bundled among the other features in Twitter Blue. If you’ve taken the extra step of paying for Twitter Blue, you’re seemingly doing so to spend more time on Twitter, not less.

Murmel’s goal is different; therefore, our audience differs too. We believe many people spend too much time and attention on social media - resources they could have spent in a million more valuable ways. Murmel is for them. Those who want to stay up-to-date without having to dig through for hours or get provoked to participate in interactions they did not intend to. Busy individuals who read their Murmel digests in the morning and start their days without further distractions. Professionals who use Murmel to support their daily work as knowledge workers - journalists, marketers, researchers, you name it.

All of them trust our service and invest in its financial sustainability. On our end, we strive to do our best to protect the sanctity of their time and attention.

Are you one of them? See for yourself.