Last week Meta launched Threads to compete with Twitter and it launched like a rocket ship. In the first week alone over 100 million people signed up for the new micro-blogging site, making it the fastest-growing app of all time! In comparison, Twitter (which has been around since 2006) has 238 million active daily users.
While many people have issues with Meta, more people have issues with Twitter, and what it has become since Elon Musk took control of it eight months ago. People and advertisers are looking for a friendlier, well-moderated space where they can share their thoughts without fear of being attacked. As a result, they are hoping that Threads can be a viable competitor to Twitter and maybe even usurp its position in the social media landscape.
With Threads, Meta has clearly taken a shot across the bow at Twitter, hoping to leverage Instagram’s popularity to create a new destination for sharing short-form content.
Can Threads be that platform? Before we can answer that question we need to take a look at what threads is as well as what it can and cannot do.
What Is Threads?
According to Meta Threads is an app, built by the Instagram team, for sharing text updates and joining public conversations. You log in using your Instagram account and posts can be up to 500 characters long and include links, photos, and videos up to 5 minutes in length.
You use your Instagram account to log in to Threads to get started. Your Instagram username and verification will carry over, with the option to customize your profile specifically for Threads. Your feed on Threads includes threads posted by people you follow and recommended content from new creators you haven’t discovered yet.
Meta’s vision with Threads is to take what Instagram does best and expand that to text, creating a positive and creative space to express your ideas. Just like on Instagram, with Threads you can follow and connect with friends and creators who share your interests – including the people you follow on Instagram and beyond. Threads is presently offered in roughly 100 countries and 30 languages.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a Threads post following the launch:
“The vision for Threads is to create an option and friendly public space for conversation. We hope to take what Instagram does best and create a new experience around text, ideas, and discussing what’s on your mind.”
What Can Threads Do?
Meta has built Threads with tools to enable positive, productive conversations. You can control who can mention you or reply to you within Threads. Like on Instagram, you can add hidden words to filter out replies to your threads that contain specific words.
You can unfollow, block, restrict or report a profile on Threads and any accounts you’ve blocked on Instagram will automatically be blocked on Threads. Meta will try to enforce Threads’ safety by enforcing Instagram’s Community Guidelines on content and interactions in the app.
Many of the basic features of Threads are similar to those of the Twitter user interface. For instance, both use similar symbols allowing users to “like” other users’ content, both provide the ability to repost, and so on. Threads also allows users to control who can mention or reply to them within the app. Thread accounts can also be listed as public or private.
Scrolling through your Threads feed, you’ll notice blue checkmarks next to some account handles. These checkmarks mean the user is verified. Threads verification carries over from Instagram. So, if you’re verified on Instagram, you’ll be verified on Threads. One thing that has particularly irked Twitter users has been the change to paying to be verified. This has led to many to many fake accounts being created and the spread of misinformation in significantly greater volume than before.
Coming Features
Meta is working to make Threads compatible with the open, interoperable social networks that they believe can shape the future of the internet.
As of right now, there’s no way for a Threads user to configure their timeline so that it only shows posts from individuals they follow. Still, Threads has already confirmed that there will be the option to configure a timeline to only show posts from users you follow, and only in chronological order, with an upcoming update.
Presently, Threads is a relatively bare bones app. It’s still missing many of the features users like about Twitter, such as a desktop version, direct messaging, trending topics and the option to edit posts. But, Meta executives have already teased plans to continue building out Threads, and are working to eventually roll out hashtags, a more robust search function, a feed of only accounts a user follows, and direct messaging.
Meta is also planning to make Threads compatible with ActivityPub, the open social networking protocol established by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), the body responsible for the open standards that power the modern web. This would make Threads interoperable with other apps that also support the ActivityPub protocol, such as Mastodon and WordPress, allowing new types of connections that are simply not possible on most social apps today.
Meta sees the benefits of open social networking protocols as going well beyond the ways people can follow each other. Developers can build new types of features and user experiences that can easily plug into other open social networks, accelerating the pace of innovation and experimentation. Each compatible app can set its own community standards and content moderation policies, meaning people have the freedom to choose spaces that align with their values. We believe this decentralized approach, similar to the protocols governing email and the web itself, will play an important role in the future of online platforms.
Threads also does not currently run ads, but it’s likely that the platform will adopt advertisements as a way of supplementing Meta’s advertising business, a core source of revenue.
Will Threads Be the Viable Competitor to Twitter That People Are Looking For?
One of the glaring critiques of Elon Musk’s Twitter is the division of the popular feed feature, the stream of tweets and promotions that users can scroll through endlessly, into different categories. Since his taking over, Twitter established a division of the feed into a “For You” timeline, with algorithmically-selected posts, and a “Following” timeline, featuring tweets from users that you actually follow. Many users have criticized the new feed for showing more advertisements and fewer posts from users they follow.
Another major criticism of Twitter has been the alarming increase of misinformation, disinformation, conspiracy theories, and hate speech. This is a result of Musk’s approach to “free speech” which has come to be seen as a lack of content moderation.
Protections for individuals and communities and being a friendly space for conversations matters to brands, and by extension advertisers, who flooded Threads as it opened to users. Netflix and Spotify were there right away, as were news organizations. Instagram has long been brand-friendly, and Twitter is increasingly losing trust.
Mark Zuckerberg has stressed that one of the key differences is the focus on “kindness” and being “friendly”. He wrote on his Threads account: “The goal is to keep it friendly as it expands. I think it’s possible and will ultimately be the key to its success.” And, “That’s one reason why Twitter never succeeded as much as I think it should have, and we want to do it differently.” Therefore, “We are definitely focusing on kindness and making this a friendly place.”
Threads may also have a leg up in the longer term, as Instagram’s user base includes about 2 billion global active accounts. If Meta is able to leverage this user community as Threads continues to grow, it’s easy to imagine it eclipsing Twitter when it comes to overall user count.
The Bottom Line
Our conclusion is that Threads could pose a serious threat to Twitter because Twitter has become particularly vulnerable in recent days, angering its users over a temporary limit on how much content users can view each day. Users also aren’t enamored with Musk’s fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants approach to running Twitter.
But, as Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri mentioned in a video posted to the platform the challenge for new social media platforms often is not getting users to sign up, but rather keeping them engaged in the long-term. So, while we like what we’re seeing with the initial launch, only time will tell if Threads will become the true Twitter alternative that users are looking for.
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