I’m not interested in Twitter or Meta’s Threads Service, but I thought I would pass this along for those who may be.
2 Likes
I hope they will implement ActivityPub, as promised:
We’re committed to building support for ActivityPub, the protocol behind Mastodon, into this app. We weren’t able to finish it for launch given a number of complications that come along with a decentralized network, but it’s coming.
If you’re wondering why this matters, here’s a reason: you may one day end up leaving Threads, or, hopefully not, end up de-platformed. If that ever happens, you should be able to take your audience with you to another server. Being open can enable that.
https://www.threads.net/t/CuRtcYTNY3J
Could be great for Mastodon (users like me who don’t want/have Meta accounts)!
PS: EU citizen, so cannot try Threads (yet?) if I wanted to (which I don’t)
3 Likes
I am suffering from social media exhaustion. I was growing so tired of all of it when Twitter began to implode, so the timing was perfect. Since then, I’ve read “Digital Minimalism” by Cal Newport, so that opened my eyes a little further.
Why do we all need “followings”? Why do we need to build “followings”? Why do I want to watch a 10 minute YouTube video of someone updating me on whats going on in their life? Why do I want to scroll an Instagram account where each of the 2,000 photos is a selfie of the account owner? You have nothing else to show the world but yourself every day? How’s that validation seeking going?
I feel like the entire system is 100 famous people and 100 million “regular” people trying to become famous. No, I don’t want to change over to Mastodon. No, I don’t want to jump on the Threads bandwagon so Meta can ingest more of my personal information. And no, I don’t need to see people arguing about things that will never be solved online within a social media service.
The whole thing needs to go.
/rant
…as I post this on a social media site of sorts. Eh, you get my point.
5 Likes
The death of Tweetbot was the best thing that ever happened to my mental health, not to mention my ability to focus on what’s genuinely important.
Too many toxic reply guys were living rent-free in my head.
3 Likes
As a former tweetbot user - same. I know they’ve made a client for Mastodon, but I much prefer life without scrolling through arguments and virtue signalling.
I agree, but I’m not willing to use Twitter without Tweebot. Fortunately I’ve found many of the sources I used to follow are available on RSS.
I hear ya. Twitter without Twitteriffic was a hard transition for me to make.
1 Like
“At its best, the experience of being on Twitter in the mid-2010s felt like being able to drop in on the funniest, most interesting party in town.”
Everybody loves their little corner of the internet — that is, until “Other People” start showing up.
1 Like
“Most” other people are fine, it’s the trolls that are the problem. 
1 Like
From my point of view, Threads is awful.
I open twitter and see who I follow no drama, no toxicity.
Open threads and for every post of someone/thing I follow there seems to be about 200 posts of garbage I’m not interested in.
How anyone sees this as better is baffling to me.
EDIT: in the interests of accuracy I counted, opened the app - there were 2 posts by 9to5 mac followed by 98 posts of nothing I follow or am interested in.
2 Likes
I’m there at Social Media exhaustion.
My Twitter use is almost non-existent
Facebook has declined
I’m going on “unsub sprees” on YouTube as Stories remains the pestering, chatty, low information nuisance that Tik Tok is to a large extent.
No one on Social Media is so exciting that I want to hear from them 6 times a week.
Maybe I should take up painting.
2 Likes
I find reading good books a better use of time. 
I’m reading the New York Times bestseller, Lost Connections: Uncovering the Real Causes of Depression – and the Unexpected Solution.
This isn’t usually a topic I read much about, but given the uptick in anxiety, stress, and depression among young people, I thought this might be a valuable read. One of the problems addressed is social media.
The short version is that anxiety and depression, according to the author, do not primarily originate in our heads from chemical imbalances; therefore, medication is not the primary solution. It is a good read. I don’t agree with some of the underlying presuppositions, but overall, it is a well-researched, informative read. I recommend it.
2 Likes
I could never really figure out Twitter, so cancelled my account without regard to any political issues. Mastodon only advantage I could see was that it wasn’t Twitter. So I skipped that. I intend to never get a Threads account. The spewing of content with these services demands constant attention, and I’m not willing to live on a site. This is also why I prefer Discourse over Discord (even the names suggest the civility of a Discourse server over the chaos of a Discord server). And I far prefer MPU now over when it was on Facebook.
1 Like
Threads hits 100 million users in just 5 days, toppling record set by ChatGPT.
WSJ: The Rapid Rise of Threads Appears to Be Hurting Twitter
The ultrafast growth of Threads looks like it is already taking a toll on Twitter.
Mark Zuckerberg, chief executive of Threads parent Meta Platforms, said the new microblogging platform hit 100 million sign-ups less than a week after launching. At least two third-party estimates suggest Twitter traffic has been falling in tandem, an indication that its users may be leaving it for Threads rather than attempting to juggle both …
The two products look and function in similar ways. Both focus on sharing short snippets of text but also allow users to post photos and videos. One distinction is that joining Threads requires having an account with Meta’s Instagram, which has more than 2 billion monthly users. That has made signing up easy and fast, though deleting a Threads account means also having to delete one’s Instagram account.
The strikes me as funny, from the Atlantic:
Threads might bring excitement, even hope to those who have benefited from posting short bits of online text to the world—journalists, influencers, white nationalists, #brands, et al. But those feelings may be misguided. Social media cannot become good again, because we will not let it evolve. It can merely live and die over and over, like a zombie.
The “again” part certainly made me laugh.
2 Likes
This is a pipe-dream of an article. Latest stats from Twitter reporting all-time high usage and 3.5% gain week over week:
https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1679992267111809024
Perhaps, but I suspect it is too soon to assess. A year from now we will have better trend lines, which will indicate the extent to which Threads eats into Twitter’s usage stats. I don’t care one way or the other because I don’t use either service.