Gab may be shitty, but at least it's got a big enough population, and it works decently enough. The fact that there's a lot of people there and you can speak freely with minimal concerns about being shut down for what you say is a huge plus. Telegram's great as well.

A big problem with Gab is that it's almost entirely a political place, whereas Twitter is a main/general communication place. There's artists, there's socializing, there's news. You could strike all the political shit off Twitter on both sides and it'd still have value. Not so for Gab.