How Meta’s Threads could be the new social media platform to watch for artists

Jul 11, 2023

If you are not a subscriber of The Fanbase Builder, join the dozens of artists, creators and music industry executives who receive it for free.

Let’s dive into today’s topic:

After Stories (Snapchat) and Reels (TikTok), Meta introduces another new Instagram app we’ve seen somewhere else before.

Why it matters

Twitter’s extremely simple approach of short, text-based content has great potential. Threads could be the way to introduce this to a younger, trendier audience in a better brand.
For many artists and creators, Instagram is their dominant social media platform. They have much more reach on Instagram than on Twitter, so Threads could be a great addition to the different publication tools Instagram already offers.
In my opinion, journalists overuse Twitter as their main source of news. It’s healthy to have an alternative platform.
It’s not supported yet, but in time Threads will be part of the Fediverse through ActivityPub - a decentralised ecosystem where different social media can interact with each other. This could be a huge step towards open and interoperable social media. For example, in the near future, it would be possible to follow a Threads user with a WordPress account.

Threads works just like Twitter, with a few differences including:

Users log in with their Instagram account and can easily follow the same accounts they follow on Instagram.
There is a 500-character limit per post.

To tailor advertisements, the Threads app collects so much personal data from users’ devices that it does not comply with GDPR or EU privacy rules. Therefore, EU users can’t access Threads yet.
According to Meta’s head of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, EU users have to wait for a long while to use Threads. Sceptics would say that Meta could use this as a pressure method in negotiations with EU legislators.
Meta (Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp and more) is notable for censoring content. And as a US company, they’re over-puritanical and US-biased in their content regulations.
Remember Clubhouse? Looking past all the hype around the launch, Threads could just be another “app of the week.” 100 million signups in just a few days is a nice achievement, but the real number of interest is how many people are actually using the app in a few months.

Users outside the EU can access Threads at Threads.net or by downloading the app for iOS and Android.
EU users should just wait for Meta to comply with GDPR and EU privacy rules. I know there are several workarounds to obtain accounts for the US App / Play stores. For me, it’s just not worth the hassle and my data.
In the meantime, EU users could enter the Fediverse by creating an ID on another instance, such as Mastodon.