its clear Meta are trying quite hard to piggyback Threads off the more palatable brand of Instagram rather than Facebook. However ultimately it's all still the same company, the same data mining and ad/influencing platform.

It's an interesting strategy, the app on the Apple App Store is published by "Instagram Inc" rather than Meta, prominently named as "Threads, an Instagram App". They could have launched it as a completely separate brand, but that would have required marketing such as "the new app from Meta", and everyone more closely associates Meta with Facebook.

It's quite surprising they never launched a microblogging network before, but I suppose they have never really launched a new network, only ever acquired them... does that show that they feel threatened, have weakening market position, and need a new direction?