Mark Zuck is having him a day, or a year, or a lifetime. There are some people that are able to convert users, and some that are not, and he is one that is going to wait until the right time to unveil a product, in such a way that the masses follow. Imagine knowing if you create something, millions will come. Of course, there is no telling if this will be something that will inevitably stick. There are a few issues, such that there is not a way to monetize just yet, and the lack of separation of …. not church and state, but instagram and threads. You can’t delete one without the other, and as people get wishy washy on different apps (as I’ve become increasingly wary of instagram posting and only tiktok feels safe at this point), I think that there will need to be the clear distinction between the two. But the effortless switch without having to create a username and password, and seemlessly allowing others to follow the same follows that they do on instagram was just … chefs kiss.
But ultimately, what makes the people stick?
One - it has to be a situation where everyone agrees that we are going to stick. Money is only inherently valuable because we all use the currency, and social media apps are only popular because we all stick around in one place. Many of my IRL millennial friends do not use tiktok, and its seen as a “gen Z app that’s immature”, and it appears that right now threads is probably going to be seen as “just another app that we have to convert to and learn and only going to be used for marketing tactics”. The positioning of threads at the continual downfall of twitter is most likely its saving grace of any sort of success, as it appears that the ages of another app taking off to be really slim to none. But basically an open chat room ?? Everyones loving it.
All of this boils down to human nature and the things we crave - we obviously all crave connection, but we also crave novelty, and we want that dopamine rush. On most platforms, you have to build your following. Tiktok became more successful due to the viral-ability of creators, and that kept people coming back to make their own, with content getting better and better as thats what humans do. They level up when they know theres a chance of success. Threads has that offering with the transfer of followers coming over. There isn’t the slow build of a new playing field, and there are some immediate dopamine hits.
Everyone seems to be saying the same jokes, and the marketing teams are probably going nuts right now on what to do and how fast to do it. 30 million downloads in the first few hours is absolutely insane, but twitter has 450 million active users, so there is still a long way to go until its a viable competitor. I think the fact that both Elon, and the CFO have made a tweet about it shows that the threat is there.
Zuckerburg releasing this also plays into the way in which twitter has become inherently political as Elon swears that he’s not choosing sides, but yet posts alt-right verbiage on the daily. Zuck keeps his political leanings very tight to his chest, and he “tries” to keep his platforms neutral, even if they carve their way into certain camps (such as facebook ending up being more primarily republican boomers after awhile), but the leadership of these companies don’t choose sides. If they do, like parlor and truth social for a big obvious, they are alienating half of the population and are not going to be as successful. The only time that you will find a liberal on those apps is if they are trolling.
Social media is such a curious thing, and I find it quite fascinating on a sociological, anthropomorphic level. It teaches us a lot about ourselves. We all want to have fun together, commune together, and we all want something new that we can enjoy together. But if people come in just trying to capitalize and control, then it wont be a fun playing field, and everyone will scatter quickly.
Only time, money, and Elon’s erratic behavior to follow….