Prediction: Threads will be shut down in 12 months or less
twitter.com
twitter.com
On the other hand, it seems some groups manage to share ideas in a positive way (e.g. cancer survivors), so it all depends on the feed algorithm, maybe most users have a postive experience. Hard to say. In any case, some minor tweaking of the feed algorithm could be enough to improve the experience.
But in the end, I think it all boils to the network effect. Will enough users migrate from Twitter to Threads. My guess is not, network effect is extremely strong. At that point, even the most upset, anti-musk, users don't seem to be leaving (which I find quite ironic).
100 million users in less than a week
It's a place where you go see what celebrities (of any field, programming counts) are promoting and maybe follow a few interesting people who use Twitter as a medium for their writing for some reason.
It's not a place where you can change anyone's opinion and if you think that you'll have a bad time.
This desire to shape public discourse, and the decisions of the powerful, are the real stakes that drive twitter gladiators. You're right though, it's not discourse - it's "zealous advocacy" as interpreted by a peurile and distracted public.
Twitter is not all bad. This advice I concur is one of the useful utilities of Twitter.
So to summarize:
-'s will be seeded with Instagram users (who will quickly get bored)
-'s will try to attract Twitter users but fail
-'s will be shut down less than 12 months from now to protect Instagram's core business
[' is a thread icon, stripped on cut & paste to HN]
First point of the summary definitely tracks. There's a clash there. Plenty of overlap between the platforms (Twitter vs Instagram isn't like Sports, you can support both teams) but each platform certainly has different core purposes. News/Politics vs Lifestyle/Ecommerce in this case. So, yeah I can see why the Insta seeding will be effective at first and then drop off.
I do wonder if Meta will start adding Quality of Life changes to Insta/Threads to auto cross-post text from Insta to Threads, with linkbacks to the image content. Then they can claim higher MAU stats for the people who leave the cross-posting on. They may be bored by Threads but they may still post to it if it's automatic.
On the 2nd point, I think they will get a decent chunk of the Twitter's users. They'll attract broadly and downplay any one type of content as being their aim. That will hamper them from getting some people. Ultimately though if they get the big voices the followers will come and they can 'seed' verticals by going after those voices. They don't even need to ask for exclusivity. We've seen in recent years that Twitch and its competitors are happy to pay big bucks to grab big names. Twitter/Threads may be older concepts in social media but they can mimic the tactics the streaming platforms have been developing. I wouldn't be surprised if we start hearing about big names picking up 'deals' to move to Threads (if they haven't already) and even exclusivity deals.
On the 3rd point. I don't think Instagram has anything to fear from Threads. If anything it adds to their model by exposing more people to Instagram content by cross-posting. Sure, it's lower quality traffic for Insta than its core users, but a trickle of extra revenue from Threads is the exact kind of optimisation these giants hunt for. Coca-Cola doesn't plaster the world in multi-million dollar ad campaigns because they see a 10% increase in revenue, they do it to maintain dominance even if that cuts into their margin. Threads doesn't need to turn a profit if it helps maintain Insta and helps speed the demise of Twitter.
twitter never worked for me, but i can see its appeal to those who did like it. it was engaging. it was the best opportunity ordinary people had to interact with celebrities. it had an irreverent quality that invited whimsy.
(all that stuff is either completely destroyed now, or almost so, but that's what it had in its heyday.)
my prediction is that there will be no "new twitter." it was the product of a particular time and place that will not be repeated. its users will disperse to a lot of other platforms, none of which will fill the exact same niche that twitter did.
What makes you say that? The current alternatives seem a bit of a joke for anyone but the most extremely opinionated (in a very specific way) users when you compare them side by side.
Didn't it break engagement records twice in the past few months.
"engagment records" ... yeah, i am pretty sure we have nobody's word for that except musk's, and he lies constantly. and even if that's true, so what? it is probably gawkers, just amazed, hardly believing what they're seeing. (in the few times i've paid attention to twitter lately, that was always my reason.)
likewise, people are pointing to the millions of sign-ups on threads.net as if that is proof that it will succeed. i don't think it proves any such thing. zuckerberg's long history of sucking the joy out of everything will ensure they will all get bored and leave.
Personally I’ve found it funnier and more engaging than ever before while Bluesky feels already dead and Threads is just brand cringe. Twitter doesn’t feel in danger at all after seeing what the best the competition have to offer.
My prediction is 4-6 years. It will linger around until then and instagram people will stay on it until the end. But just like instagram, you need an account to view content so it won't see any traffic from outside sources. Like if anyone posts a link to threads I am sure they will get downvoted every single time on HN or reddit/lemmy. Twitter on the other hand, I have it all over technical documentation even and now I have to worry about broken links all over thanks to another billionaire's massive ego.
I remember begging infosec people to stop using twitter and slack over a decade ago.
Slack was launched August 2013, though
At least prediction markets let people bet resources on different outcomes.
If OP is reading this: how sure are you about this prediction? How about you commit to donating $1000 to your favorite charity if you're wrong? I'd take someone way more seriously if they committed real resources to back up their claims.
On the other hand, Musk saved twitter a bunch of money. However that doesn't really benefit users.
Fortunately, or unfortuantely, depending on your POV, twitter's network effect is so large that even such a move by Musk is not going to break twitter - at least, not in the short term. There's just too much momentum, too many users that currently rely on twitter as their source of information.