The former head of Twitter’s @twitter social media handle Alphonzo Terrell is pouring his skills into a new app called Spill, which he is building with a team of ex-Twitter workers, some of whom were part of the exodus at the company after Elon Musk took over.

Spill will be a potential rival to Twitter, and the name of the startup evokes the popular phrase, “spilling tea,” which is internet speak for spouting one’s truth—or dropping a little bit of gossip. Terrell, the co-founder of Spill, goes by “Phonz” and his personal Twitter handle is @phonz, where the profile picture is from the famous Lipton tea commercial with Kermit the Frog sipping tea. The Kermit image has become the epitome of the “spilling tea” meme. Now, Terrell is CEO and co-founder at Spill, which he plans to launch by the end of January, with co-founder DeVaris Brown, who was a product head at Twitter and left in 2020, well before Musk gutted the staff in November.

Terrell had been the global director of Twitter’s social and editorial team, which had a staff of 27 people before Musk fired the department in November. The team had managed all of Twitter’s official accounts.

Ad Age caught up with Terrell this week to talk about his new venture, and how Spill is partly meant to draw any disaffected Twitter communities like Black Twitter and LGBTQ+ voices, among other culturally relevant groups, who might not be on board with Musk’s changes. Spill will have some similarities to Twitter, focusing on mass communications, and it has some key differences. Terrell hopes it will reward creators from different communities giving them a greater stake, and credit, for their participation.

“We’re not trying to be the Twitter, quote unquote, alternative,” Terrell said. “What Spill really is, and what we hope to make it, is sort of the next-generation social platform for real-time conversation. There’s a lot more exciting technology now that a lot of these platforms didn’t get to utilize when they were built 10 to 15 years ago.

“We need to figure out ways to reward people, who make these platforms,” Terrell said.

Keeping receipts

Spill will focus on real-time conversation and marketing like Twitter has, Terrell said. It will also incorporate next-generation technology related to artificial intelligence to help moderate the platform. And “Spills,” the name for posts, will be generated on the blockchain, which is a digital ledger that is a big part of the Web3 movement.

Spill has not picked a tech partner for its blockchain function yet, Terrell said. The idea is that Spills will have digital receipts from the blockchain, which will show when creators started any trends that pop on the service. A lot of social media platforms have been criticized for how they underappreciate marginalized communities that have an outsized impact on those platforms, Terrell noted. With the blockchain, creators can prove they started a hashtag trend, were the first to share a new dance craze, or when they sparked a movement.

“We’re building this on a blockchain technology that will allow us to both give creators credit and to be able to do automatic revenue splits on any sort of Spills that go viral,” Terrell said. “So that you get to make money just for your great thoughts that you have. There is a public record of what people create.”

Spill posted a signup page on Friday, looking for users to start reserving handles before its official launch. Spill also released a promotional video, and credited the artist Tariq Disu with the song “W.W.Y.B.” featured in the soundtrack.

Twitter rivals bloom

Spill joins a growing list of new social media platforms, some of which have tried to take the mantle of the next Twitter, including Mastodon and a startup called Post. Internet companies including Tumblr, Reddit, TikTok and Meta are taking advantage, too, of the carnage at Twitter since Musk bought the company in October. There have been concerns about his chaotic management and moderation policies. Advertisers have fled the service, with ad agencies and brands worried about the atmosphere and seemingly inconsistent messages coming from Musk. For instance, Musk had promised advertisers that he would consult a content policy panel before making any big decisions, but then only consulted an informal Twitter poll from his own account to make the decision to unban former president Donald Trump. Musk also used a Twitter poll to decide on a “general amnesty” that reinstated accounts removed under the former leadership.

Musk has also decimated staff at Twitter, including people such as Terrell, part of mass layoffs on Nov. 4. Terrell was locked out of Twitter’s social media accounts before he could get off one last tweet, which he wound up posting to his own timeline: “Won’t get to Tweet it, but here it is, the last @Twitter tweet from my team,” Terrell posted on Nov. 4 at 4:20 a.m. ET. “Love y’all and thank you for the honor of a lifetime.”

Terrell attached a screenshot of the tweet he couldn’t get out from @Twitter’s official account, which read: “Bye literally everyone.”

Musk has claimed that engagement has soared on Twitter since he took over, and that hate speech is down, but advertisers have not seen independent evidence of that. And there are members of communities, such as within Black Twitter, that fear a wave of reinstated accounts could lead to more harassment, if those accounts were once banned for hateful speech and other offenses.

“The advertiser exodus is real [at Twitter], people are absolutely looking for other places to plug into culture and become part of the public conversation,” Terrell said, “without having to deal with what undoubtedly has been a degradation of you know, of sort of the core standards and values that a lot of people worked really hard to build up at Twitter.”

Ad Age has reported that Twitter even had trouble filling World Cup ad inventory, typically a booming time for the company to make money from brands looking to participate in the conversation around the worldwide sporting event. 

‘Power’ advisors

Black Twitter has been one of the most culturally relevant groups on the platform. The community has spurred trends that have had real-world impact, such as in 2015 when Black Twitter popularized the hashtag “Oscars so white.”

April Reign, the creator and diversity advocate credited with sparking that movement, is an advisor at Spill and is currently the senior advisor for entertainment and media at Gauge Digital Media, a search and social media marketing firm. Prominent activist DeRay McKesson and Dantley Davis, a former head of design at Twitter who is currently global VP of digital product design at Nike, also are advisors at Spill.

“We’re essentially a group of creators, power users [of Twitter] who understand how to get people excited, and connect, and generate conversation on a day-to-day basis,” Terrell said, “and especially highlight some of the more positive aspects of conversation that’s happening.”

“We're less focused on, sort of, political debates and things like that,” Terrell said, “and much more focused on the culture side, working with big brands.”

Terrell did not disclose the initial investors at Spill, or how much of the team is comprised of former Twitter workers. The startup is well-resourced to get off the ground next year and there are multiple channels for revenue and ways to share the wealth with creators, Terrell asserted. Spill will sell ads and have in-app purchases that power up the experience. Terrell pointed to a product idea called “Super Spills,” which would give more exposure to a post for a fee.  

If Spill takes off, Terrell also envisions a data and analytics business, which Twitter has, licensing access to the firehouse of public posts. “There hasn’t really been a real viable alternative to Twitter for real-time conversation for a while,” Terrell said, “so I think that that’s a big part of the opportunity in this moment.”

Terrell declined to comment on what his severance agreement was when he exited Twitter, or speculate on how Musk might react to the rival startup. There have been reports that Musk and recently laid-off Twitter employees could be in for a legal fight over severance packages, and whether Musk will pay departing staff.