Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours

Re:Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours by poomer on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @09:58PM (#36610015)

I'm very skeptical that this will succeed. As with other extremely hyped social medias (anyone remember Clubhouse?) it's already filled with influencers and e-celebs trying to get in early, but these people always poison the well with insincere, low-quality, monetization-oriented content. AFAIK, every successful social media platform grew more or less organically and only had these folks latch on later (usually causing the degradation of the platform when they did).

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Re:Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours by minimaxir on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @10:05PM (#36610079)

Clubhouse is a bad example as it was the result of entirely unintentional luck due to the pandemic creating a perfect audience. No one outside of a16z thought it had staying power.

In Threads's case, there's some luck with Elon burning Twitter down, but atleast this launch is intentional.

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Re:Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours by SecretDracula on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @10:04PM (#36610062)

I agree, but I also think that, at this moment, the conditions are right. People are hungry for a twitter alternative and this could lead to a lot of sincere and authentic users joining Threads.

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Re:Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours by afavour on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @10:04PM (#36610064)

I’m amazed they didn’t provide a feed of only people you follow. Not doing so made the garbage influencer stuff inevitable.

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Re:Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours by Turskarama on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @10:07PM (#36610099)

Showing you more content you're not interested in is how they get you to scroll past more ads, it's how they make money.

Traditionally they don't need to care about showing you good content to keep you interested, you're generally logging in anyway.

The proof is in the pudding: if you want a curated feed go to Tumblr or Mastodon. These spaces exist yet they're significantly less mainstream.

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Re:Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours by afavour on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @10:18PM (#36610188)

> if you want a curated feed go to Tumblr or Mastodon. These spaces exist yet they're significantly less mainstream.

Why would we ignore the very mainstream Instagram as an example?

> you're generally logging in anyway.

When an app is established, sure. But providing new users a shitty experience in order to prioritise revenue is how new social networks fail.

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Re:Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours by melling on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @10:19PM (#36610196)

yes, that’s usually the first thing people say. It’s easy to be skeptical. The odds are often in the skeptics favor.

Personally, I don’t see any value in debating it.

Here’s a classic article explaining why Apple opening retail stores will never work.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2001-05-20/commentar...

My advice: Skip the worthless debate.

All those people who said Tesla would fail around the time of the Model 3, pretend like they weren’t wrong.

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Re:Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours by qbasic_forever on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @10:18PM (#36610189)

OTOH Twitter is actively imploding and a toxic place for corporate comms and brands, marketing, etc. A meta/FB/Instagram alternative is exactly what those entities want to move towards and rapidly exit the sinking Twitter/Elon ship. I think it's going to do well.

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Re:Threads has passed 2M sign ups in the first 2 hours by Despegar on Wednesday July 05, 2023 @10:17PM (#36610183)

Bluesky is the only one that feels like early Twitter

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