I don't know where they went. The devs I personally know who left the platform didn't go anywhere. They just stopped using services along those lines entirely. They're an older group, though. That might matter.
> Where do you go for casual interactions with a broader range of tech-ish folk across disciplines?
I go here.
My own blog, and then having conversations with people through e-mail (strangely enough). I feel that if I just am on my own platform, nobody is going to rug-pull me in a few years to come, contributing online to social media has left a bad taste in my mouth. I don't care for the other platforms either.
Of all the social media platforms I use, X is the easiest to shape into what I want. Use muted words, unfollow and mute engagement farmers, and follow small high quality accounts. If you’re still seeing gas station fights, your feed needs further curating.
Somewhere less loathesome.
I still use it. But frequent algorithm changes is making me lose the motivation to post. No engagement. It's become full of AI slop rage and engagement baiting.
A lot of noise only works if you have a huge audience.
I can't speak for others but I just stopped. I still hang out on IRC and in a couple Discords but I mostly scroll through RSS now -- or read books.
I briefly scan X maybe once a week, but its a firehose of brainrot and view farming. My Bluesky feeds seem very politically angry and they talk about Elon more than people do on X. I feel for the anger, given the situation in the US, but it's just not mentally healthy. Mastodon is that, but worst -- share any non-mainstream thought and your replies are full of haters. I follow "famous" tech people and engineers, if it matters.
In many ways, I like it better this way. I'm forced to be bored more, and when I get the urge to check X or something, the mess that it is, curbs that pretty quickly.