As former President Donald Trump's Truth Social experienced trouble in the past few months, the company's head of engineering announced his resignation, which dealt a significant setback to the social media platform.
Resigning From Donald Trump's Truth Social App
President Donald Trump's Truth Social app head of engineering, Alex Gleason, told Reuters on Monday that he had resigned from the company.
According to the outlet, his departure adds to the ongoing uncertainty surrounding Trump Media & Technology Group (TMTG), which launched Truth Social as a way for the former president to connect with his supporters after he was banned from several social media platforms following the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters.
Gleason, who happens to be the founder of Soapbox Technology, is involved in providing open-source technology for "decentralized" social media platforms. These platforms operate on independently-run servers and aim to offer an alternative to Twitter and Facebook.
Gleason revealed to Reuters his decision to depart from TMTG to work on Soapbox full-time. He also shared his plans to focus on developing technology for connecting several decentralized platforms.
In January 2022, TMTG hired Gleason to adapt Soapbox's technology for its own specific needs. Eventually, the company integrated Soapbox's technology as the front-end for the Truth Social app, which users directly engage with and interact with.
Truth Social Is Facing Uncertainty
Since its launch in February 2022, Axios reported that Truth Social had faced challenges in achieving significant user growth.
It started when the company agreed to merge the social media platform with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), called Digital World Acquisition Corp. (DWAC), at around a $3 billion market cap in October 2021, or months away from the app's launch.
Following the merger's announcement, discussions took place between DWAC's CEO and Donald Trump regarding a potential merger even before DWAC went public, which could have violated federal securities laws.
Soon enough, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Justice Department initiated investigations. In July 2022, all DWAC directors received subpoenas from a federal grand jury in New York as the company was unable to obtain SEC approval.
Independent reported that Truth Social's merger partner had already reached an $18 million settlement with the agency. Truth Social maintains its small and specialized user base compared to other platforms.
Despite being the most popular account on the platform, Donald Trump has only amassed 5.4 million followers, which represents a mere 6% of his follower count on Twitter.
