We create a charming virtual universe only to eventually make it an exact replica of our own dystopian society.I have been recently reading a spate of articles about the imminent demise of Twitter. It began with stories about how Twitter is unable to monetise its business at the pace its investors expect it to. Then came stories about how Google, Salesforce and Walt Disney were all scrambling to buy out Twitter and revive it from its current coma. When these suitors backed off, particularly when Alphabet (which owns Google) refused to make an offer after consulting its bankers the rumours of Twitter’s demise swiftly multiplied. In fact, on Monday Twitter stocks plunged another 15 per cent.In today’s dog-eat-dog world, this could mean one of three things. Either someone is trying to pull down Twitter’s price so that they can buy into it cheap or possibly take it over, salvage it. Or, more interesting, Twitter itself could be scorching the earth, an old strategy to put off hostile bidders they disapprove of. This is not unlikely since the board of Twitter is reportedly split down the middle. CEO Jack Dorsey is opposed to the idea of selling Twitter while co-founder Ev Williams wants to. The Board hired Goldman Sachs and Allen & Co last September to try and see if a sale is possible. But with the founders not seeing eye to eye on the issue, both sides could be working at cross-purposes.The other reason may be simpler, much simpler, as it usually is in such matters. Twitter has been around for a while and though it is still very popular, it is certainly not growing at a pace comparable to that of its new challengers. Or, for that matter, its contemporaries. Facebook at 1.5 billion users has a population bigger than China. Twitter limps behind at 300 million. Even Instagram has left it way behind. And the newer, younger sites are grabbing more users than Twitter which has, more or less, stayed exactly where it was. I think people are actually tired of Twitter now and are migrating to more adventurous new places. There’s Snapchat. There’s Instagram. And of course there’s good old Facebook, that incredible revenue juggernaut growing at 44%.Such migrations are not new. Remember how Orkut, once the darling of the internet, suddenly woke up one morning and found all its users gone? In one decade. And no, it was not short of money. It was backed by Google almighty which finally shut it down in 2014. (Rumours are that its Turkish founder, Orkut Buyukkokten, now 41, is about to launch a new service called Hello out of India.)Another reason, one I think is closest to the truth, is that people are finding the world of today’s Twitter so very different from what they had originally signed up for that they are switching out. Look at what Twitter is today. The abusive trolls. The hyper-nationalistic hyperventilation. The paid-for trends, some of them absolutely ridiculous. Like MSG, every time his movie appears. And I dare say the steep fall in the level of discourse must be annoying to many of the original Twitter buffs who came on board to discover a fresh new world bustling with new ideas and the possibility of exciting new engagements with fun people, some of whom were largely unapproachable till then. I was one such buff, a tiny blip, and I spent quite a while on Twitter, talking to unknown people, sharing thoughts, ideas, beliefs and, as I still do, my writings. Most of those whom I conversed with were delightful people: funny, charming, clever and well-informed, often much better informed than me, and as I interacted with them I wondered how easy it is to make friends in an alternative world far removed from the real world in which we live.That Twitter no longer exists. Like all great success stories, it has been taken. The politicians have grabbed Twitter and tried to make it their own playground. And the government has gone a step further and cleverly used it to replace the I&B Ministry. Twitter today delivers press releases faster than Doordarshan ever can. And if truth be told, like all things global, it is far more credible. The political voice of the lone citizen is slowly getting drowned out by the loudspeakers of the government. And God forbid, you say anything that can be interpreted as anti-government, which is quite easy since those who trawl Twitter on behalf of the government are barely literate, you will be mauled in full public view.But worse than what the politicians have done to Twitter is what business has done. Sponsored trends and paid-for tweets are the biggest turn-off on today’s Twitter. What was once the world’s most charming flea market has now been hijacked by big business. With Trump loudly trumpeting his views to his 12 million followers, how can you hear the voice of the Dalai Lama who, in any case, speaks in hushed whispers?This brings me to my last question: Have we lost the ability to build and sustain new utopias? The virtual worlds we build are eventually becoming an exact replica of our own dystopian society. In the fall of Twitter lies that tragic realisation.Of what use is then trying to revolutionise space travel and find new worlds in outer space (as Elon Musk and others are doing) if, at the end of it all, we will be only replicating this flawed world of ours.What we need is alternative realities, more humane societies. Not more of the same.