Threads, the Fediverse and Everything Apps
Yesterday morning Meta’s new micro blogging platform Threads went public. And it was an eventful day in social media, for sure.
This is not an in-deep review of Threads because – frankly – there is little to review: This is not an app of a new kind or some brand new idea. Threads is essentially a clone of basic Mastodon features with a slicker UX, integrated with Instagram’s platform¹ and some sprinkles of Twitter all over it. It offers what you would expect a micro blogging platform to do, but with a very rudimentary web interface (it’s very much mobile app only at this point), no hashtags any full text search.
It is clearly not feature complete and while it works just fine as it is, it is obvious that the launch date was dictated by something else.
At any other time, such an app would have hardly caused excitement, but the timing of the launch was of course impeccable
At any other time, such an app would have hardly caused excitement, but the timing of the launch was of course impeccable: Only days after Twitter owner Elon Musk annoyed the living daylight out of even some diehard fans by limiting tweet views to 600 per day under the flimsy excuse of fighting web scraping. Dissatisfaction with twitter has never been higher, and if there has ever been a time to pick up disgruntled users from another platform, this was it.
By yesterday evening, more than 30 million² user had joined Threads. While this number is huge, mind blowing even, of course there is a catch: Being tight to the Instagram account users were not only able to switch over quickly, but also take their Instagram followers with them. Within hours some prominent users had reached a million followers, hence avoiding the bane of all new social networks: Having to built a new followership from scratch.
Will Meta play fair with the Fediverse?
Meta has promised that Threads will integrate into the Fediverse, the distributed/federated social network (often just referred to as Mastodon, its most widely used platform) by using the open ActivityPub protocol.
Threads does not yet integrate into the Fediverse but there are signs that Threads is indeed set up for that and Meta is serious about it. The signup process prominently mentions the future Fediverse integration, user profiles mention the “server/instance” the user is located on (“threads.net” in this case), and the web pathes to the user profiles appear to be Mastdon compatible.
Within the Fediverse there are obviously some uneasy feelings about that. Threads, when it joins, will be by far the largest instance in the network, any many users joined a Mastodon instance to get away from big corporate.
I myself however look forward to it: It will show how resilient the concept (and the protocol) and the scalability of the Fediverse is and it will make joining smaller instances much more attractive considering the potential outreach via threads.
There is obvious — and understandably — concern to play with Meta at all. Meta’s reputation has taken some serious of hits over the years: Massive data collection, too much focus on advertisement, the Cambridge Analytica scandal and last but not least a rather robotic CEO Mark Zuckerberg.
Some Musk’s faithful followers yesterday attacked Zuckerberg as “a Marxist” with a “left-wing agenda”, making it partisan political, which appears to be where everything Musk does nowadays ends up, an irony not lost on observers.
“Only Elon Musk could make Mark Zuckerberg like a cross between Gandhi and Turing” (@atrupar on Twitter)
An almost world-wide launch
While Threads has launched in 100 countries, it has yet to launch in the European Union³. However, despite claims (unfortunately in mainstream outlets, too) that this is because of GDPR incompatibility or even potential “EU ban”, it is most likely just another sign that the launch was a bit rushed: The brand new EU Digital Service Act puts new requirements on platform moderation, and with Meta in the focus of the EU anyway it seems reasonable that Meta wanted to consult with regulators first.
Twitter, everything or nothing?
So what will happen to Twitter now? Musk once — sort of — laid out his vision for Twitter as the “Everything App”, modelled after Chinese platform WeChat. That concept however relies heavily on reaching the widest adoption possible, something Musk — with his hateful, transphobic and right-wing embracing politics, unwillingness to deal with harassment and spam, not to mention technical incompetence - has done little for over the last few months.
We have yet to see any of the large platforms from the 2000s generation (Facebook, Reddit, Twitter) fall. Myspace of course comes to mind, and while myspace was also taken over by a politically right-wing billionaire who didn’t understand social media, it wasn’t the politics that brought it down. Twitter though does feel more like a dysfunctional platform by the day.
By the end of the launch day, Musk had not only gone into smirk mode and suggested the Threads launch were rigged (“Competition is fine, cheating is not”⁴), but his lawyers had already issued legal threads against Meta⁵.
For those of us watching social media, excitement is secured. I for one will be sticking to Mastodon for now⁶, make some popcorn, sit back and see how things turn out.
¹ Interestingly, the API responses for Threads show how closely it was modelled after Instagram, likely to save development time
² Meta’s Threads swiftly signs up 30 million users, in clear threat to Musk-owned Twitter — Reuters
³ Threads is available in the United Kingdom where the GDPR also applies, so that was not their first concern.
⁵ Twitter threatens to sue Meta over rival Threads app — The Guardian
⁶ WolfH on Mastodon — you may follow me there
