As Elon Musk tweeted, Twitter is going to "purge" accounts that haven't been active in the past few years.
We’re purging accounts that have had no activity at all for several years, so you will probably see follower count drop
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 8, 2023
His message didn't include any additional details, so of course users began to wonder how exactly this would play out. When asked by John Carmack (yes, the one) if this meant that such accounts would be completely deleted, along with their tweets, Elon Musk replied that they would be "archived" and that such a move was necessary to free up abandoned names.