Facebook has tried to compete with Twitter in numerous ways over the years, including copying signature Twitter features such as hashtags and trending topics. But now Facebook’s parent company is taking perhaps its biggest swipe at Twitter yet.
Facebook has tried to compete with Twitter in numerous ways over the years, including copying signature Twitter features such as hashtags and trending topics. But now Facebook’s parent company is taking perhaps its biggest swipe at Twitter yet.
It sounds like a lot until you realize that Threads is basically just a DLC pack for Instagram, which already has one of the world’s largest user bases as it is - something like ~2.5b users, I believe.
I find it hard to consider any user count on Threads to be “growth”, when the accounts have already existed since before Threads launched. It’s like if a bakery sold cakes to 500 customers a day, and then decides to start selling pies, as well. If the same 500 cake customers come back and buy pies, the restaurant didn’t gain any new customers; it’s just the same customer base enjoying a different product being offered now. Maybe this is just me being pedantic, maybe this is just me reaching for a reason to downplay Meta. I dunno.
This is exactly my feeling as well. I like the design of it, but it doesn’t feel like it’s own thing. It feels like alternative content from the people I already follow on Instagram. It’s like an echo chamber in an echo chamber.
I’ll be curious to see if they ever decide to open it up to non-Insta users. I turn to Microblogging like Mastodon/Twitter for a completely different social media experience, not a different side of the same coin.
But in your metaphor there is an important part missing. Twitter, the pie shop around the corner, just lost a chunk of customers to the bakery. Now I’m not saying this will kill twitter, I think Elon manages just fine on his own. But it’s going to contribute to its death, as it gives people an easy alternative.