App Overview Topics that had 10 million re-registrations in a couple of hours

This morning the release of the new social network Threads was released.

This is the main competitor of Twitter, which will try to pull its audience to itself. After the acquisition of Twitter by Elon Mas, the affairs of the social network went downhill. A huge number of changes caused just a flurry of negative reviews.

What was it worth to monitor the number of viewed tweets per day once …

And now Instagram* decided to buy a place to sell a text social network. We have already protested the service. Talks about the pros and cons.

* banned in Russia, owned by Meta, which is recognized as extremist in Russia

What is Threads

In the first 7 hours from the release, the social network has registered more than 10 million users, as reported by Mark Zuckerberg. It performs the functions of “creating a field for communication between people”, as stated by the creators.

Pure handling Themes are very similar to Twitter. There is a shared feed with “threads” where users can post their messages up to 500 characters long. By comparison, Twitter currently has a limit of 4,000 characters.

All in all, it is a platform dedicated exclusively to communication between users around the world. Today it is available in 100 countries, including Russia (although you can use only through vpn).

How Threads works

Topics can be accessed using an Instagram* account. If you have it, then you automatically have the opportunity to log in to the new social network.

When you first log in, you will be prompted follow all the people you have as friends on instagram. You can opt out of this if you intend to use the streams for other purposes, and not use it so that someone you know can read your feed.

In the main feed there is a button for answering, reposting and the ability to quote the topic. You can also repost the post to other platforms, including Twitter. The last function has not been seen by other social networks for a long time.

Several adverse reactions to comments occur with consequences aside. Visually resembles such a Reddit solution – it is convenient for communication in one thread.

Currently here no ads and promoted posts. Looks good, doesn’t interfere with browsing accumulation. However, this is obviously not for long. Over time, advertising publications appear here.

I will note right away: There are no hashtags in topics. none at all. There is no system for searching for records by a single hashtag. They are displayed as plain text.

However, there are mentions through the @ sign. This system has been abandoned.

Also no DM here. That is, it will not work to write a personal message in some way. The platform is open in every sense. You can only hide something from those you block directly.

Well, or you can create a private profile, access to which will be for a limited number of people.

As with Twitter, you can buy a “blue checkmark” from Themes to verify that your account is authentic. Costs $10 per month.

The settings are standard, as in any other social network from Meta*. There are no frills or any special features.

How the ribbon works in Themes

It is still difficult to understand the algorithm by which the tape is built.

She looks like you the most popular publications are selected first. They may not be the latest, but lag behind others. It seems that publications from accounts with more subscribers and answers appear first of all.

Although at the same time, the creators of Threads say that the feed is built based on your subscriptions, and only then on “recommendations from authors that you have not seen yet.”

Each post can have up to 500 characters and 10 photos. Links to websites can be integrated into the publication, and especially YouTube videos up to 5 minutes long (or just links to videos).

Cons we have already discovered

First, as already mentioned above – personal messages (DM). Many users appreciated this feature on Twitter, and a large company specifically created accounts for technical support communication via DM.

Second, you can’t change the username here. In case of occurrence, for now. It is one with you forever.

Thirdly, the fattest minus. To delete your Threads account, be sure to delete your Instagram profile as well*. These social networks cover each other too tightly, alas.

Fourth, the bone construction algorithm. Although we are told that your subscriptions should be in the feed first, and then third-party ones, now the situation is reversed. My feed is saturated with “other” content, with only a post from my subscriptions leaking in between.

Finally, there are no hashtags, smart search, and GIF support. Search can be especially frustrating because I can’t find any content related to my query. Now he works only on emotional requests.

For example, I want to find a fresh Apple Park, and return only profiles with similar photo names to me. Hope this gets fixed soon.

Well, what to evaluate is not everything. There is no system for translating tweets/threads from a foreign language into Russian.

So far mixed impressions

Zuckerberg has taken many of the lost virtues of Twitter and merged them into Threads.

However, while the social network has enough of its minuses. But at least without frankly miserable restrictions from Twitter, which is good news.

it is hoped that the situation will improve in the near future. If discovered, it would be proven.

In the near future, Meta* also promises that the new social network will be compatible with other platforms that support the ActivityPub transfer protocol, such as Mastodon and WordPress.

* banned in Russia, owned by Meta, which is recognized as extremist in Russia