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Meta’s Threads Is Surging, but Mass Migration From Twitter Is Likely to Remain an Uphill Battle
Twitter’s move on July 1, 2023, to limit the number of tweets users can see in a day was the latest in a series of decisions that has spurred millions of users to sign up with alternative microblogging platforms since Elon Musk acquired Twitter last year.
In addition to a surge in numbers on Mastodon, the acquisition and subsequent changes boosted small existing platforms like Hive Social and has spawned brand new upstarts like Spoutible and Spill.
Most recently the microblogging platform backed by Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, Bluesky, saw a surge of sign-ups in the days following Twitter’s rate limit, and Meta launched its microblogging platform Threads on July 5. Threads claimed 30 million users on its first day. Even very different forms of social media such as TikTok are benefiting from what many see as Twitter’s imminent demise.
As an information scientist who studies online communities, this feels like something I’ve seen before. Social media platforms tend not to last forever. Depending on your age and online habits, there’s probably some platform that you miss, even if it still exists in some form. Think of MySpace, LiveJournal, Google+ and Vine.
When social media platforms fall, sometimes the online communities that made their homes there fade away, and sometimes they pack their bags and relocate to a new home. The turmoil at Twitter is causing many of the company’s users to consider leaving the platform. Research on previous social media platform migrations shows what might lie ahead for Twitter users who fly the coop.
Several years ago, I led a research project with Brianna Dym, now at University of Maine, where we mapped the platform migrations of nearly 2,000 people over a period of almost two decades. The community we examined was transformative fandom, fans of literary and popular culture series and franchises who create art using those characters and settings.
We chose it because it is a large community that has thrived in a number of different online spaces. Some of the same people writing Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan fiction on Usenet in the 1990s were writing Harry Potter fan fiction on LiveJournal in the 2000s and Star Wars fan fiction on Tumblr in the 2010s.
By asking participants about their experiences moving across these platforms – why they left, why they joined and the challenges they faced in doing so – we gained insights into factors that might drive the success and failure of platforms, as well as what negative consequences are likely to occur for a community when it relocates.
‘You go first’
Regardless of how many people ultimately decide to leave Twitter, and even how many people do so around the same time, creating a community on another platform is an uphill battle. These migrations are in large part driven by network effects, meaning that the value of a new platform depends on who else is there.
In the critical early stages of migration, people have to coordinate with each other to encourage contribution on the new platform, which is really hard to do. It essentially becomes, as one of our participants described it, a “game of chicken” where no one wants to leave until their friends leave, and no one wants to be first for fear of being left alone in a new place.
For this reason, the “death” of a platform – whether from a controversy, disliked change or competition – tends to be a slow, gradual process. One participant described Usenet’s decline as “like watching a shopping mall slowly go out of business.” It’ll never be the same. The current push from some corners to leave Twitter reminded me a bit of Tumblr’s adult content ban in 2018, which reminded me of LiveJournal’s policy changes and new ownership in 2007. People who left LiveJournal in favour of other platforms like Tumblr described feeling unwelcome there. And though Musk did not walk into Twitter headquarters at the end of October and turn a virtual content moderation lever into the “off” position, there was an uptick in hate speech on the platform, as some users felt emboldened to violate the platform’s content policies under an assumption that major policy changes were on the way.
What makes Twitter Twitter isn’t the technology, it’s the particular configuration of interactions that takes place there. And there is essentially zero chance that Twitter, as it exists now, could be reconstituted on another platform. Any migration is likely to face many of the challenges previous platform migrations have faced: content loss, fragmented communities, broken social networks and shifted community norms.
But Twitter isn’t one community, it’s a collection of many communities, each with its own norms and motivations. Some communities might be able to migrate more successfully than others. So maybe K-Pop Twitter could coordinate a move to Tumblr. I’ve seen much of Academic Twitter coordinating a move to Mastodon.
Other communities might already simultaneously exist on Discord servers and subreddits, and can just let participation on Twitter fade away as fewer people pay attention to it. But as our study implies, migrations always have a cost, and even for smaller communities, some people will get lost along the way.
The ties that bind Our research also pointed to design recommendations for supporting migration and how one platform might take advantage of attrition from another platform. Cross-posting features can be important because many people hedge their bets. They might be unwilling to completely cut ties all at once, but they might dip their toes into a new platform by sharing the same content on both.
Ways to import networks from another platform also help to maintain communities. For example, there are multiple ways to find people you follow on Twitter on Mastodon. Even simple welcome messages, guides for newcomers and easy ways to find other migrants could make a difference in helping resettlement attempts stick.
In this sense, Threads has an advantage over other Twitter alternatives because users sign up via their Instagram accounts. This means Threads’ social graph – who follows who – is bootstrapped by links among Instagram accounts. Users may not be able to easily bring over their communities from Twitter, but they can instantly pull follows and followers from Instagram.
And through all of this, it’s important to remember that this is such a hard problem by design. Platforms have no incentive to help users leave. As longtime technology journalist Cory Doctorow recently wrote, this is “a hostage situation.” Social media lures people in with their friends, and then the threat of losing those social networks keeps people on the platforms.
But even if there is a price to pay for leaving a platform, communities can be incredibly resilient. Like the LiveJournal users in our study who found each other again on Tumblr, your fate is not tied to Twitter’s.
From the Nothing Phone 2 to the Motorola Razr 40 Ultra, several new smartphones are expected to make their debut in July. We discuss all of the most exciting smartphones coming this month and more on the latest episode of Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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Reddit, the popular social networking platform, is starting a new contributor program, which will let users convert their Reddit gold and karma into real money. Reddit made the announcement in a blog post, alongside bringing a new simplified way to award content on its platform with Reddit gold. Eligible Redditors will receive actual money for their contributions on a monthly basis. Reddit gold is awarded by other Redditors to users for their content on the platform, while karma — the number next to a username on Reddit — is accumulated over time by posting and commenting.
Reddit announced the contributor program on Monday, promising real (fiat) money to qualifying redditors and mods for their contributions to the platform. A qualifying Redditor must be 18 years or older, live in a supported location, and must have a Reddit account. “Once enrolled in the program, redditors will receive payments on a monthly basis. The earnings a redditor receives are calculated based on the amount of karma earned and gold received on their eligible contributions,” Reddit’s blog post said.
The contributor program is now rolling out in the US across Web, iOS and Android Reddit apps. Users can head to the program via their profile menu, where eligible users can tap the ‘Get Verified to Start Earning’ button to enrol in the program. Reddit has not revealed details about the payout for users.
The company has also brought a simplified way to give away Reddit gold to users. With the new gold system, users can long press the upvote icon on mobile (or hover over it on desktop) directly within the post or comment they want to reward and select from a pop-up of six gold awarding options, ranging from $1.99 (roughly Rs. 165) for one gold to $49.00 (roughly Rs. 4,077) for 25 gold. This will result in a golden upvote in place of a regular one. This feature is only available in select communities on Reddit’s native mobile apps and will reach other communities in the coming weeks. The new gold system will be available on Web later this year.
Reddit’s new gold system
Photo Credit: Reddit
Reddit is making efforts to reward its contributors months after thousands of popular subreddits went dark in protest against the company’s plan to charge for access to its data. Reddit now charges third-party app developers for access to its for its application programming interface (API). As a result, many popular third-party apps for the platform, including Apollo, have had to shut down. Apollo had said, with their current usage, the charges would cost them more than $20 million (roughly Rs. 160 crore) a year.
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X, formerly known as Twitter, has been promised to get an audio and video calls feature. Last month, Elon Musk, who took over the social media platform in October last year, had tweeted that a voice and video calling feature was coming to X, confirming that calls would work on iOS, Android, Mac & PC and would not require a phone number. The much-awaited audio and video calls feature, however, might not be available to all X users. According to leaked screenshots of part of X’s code that pertain to the feature, only X Premium subscribers could have access to audio and video calls.
Investor Chris Messina posted screenshots of X’s code on rival app Threads (first spotted by TechCrunch), which suggests that users could be able to take audio and video calls from people in their address book, people they follow, and Verified users. The screenshot suggests that the feature would allow users to opt in or out and decide who to receive calls from. “Take messaging to the next level with audio and video calls. Turn the feature on and then select who you’re comfortable using it with,” the feature’s description says in the code screenshot.
More interestingly, a second screenshot hints that the feature could be a paid service as part of the X Premium subscription. “Audio and video calls are a premium feature. Subscribe to get access,” and “Subscribe to Premium to call,” the code appears to read under the section ‘when someone tries to DM someone and hits their rate limit.’
X Premium, that launched as Twitter Blue, adds a host of features for paying subscribers, including the verification badge, reduced number of ads on the feed, longer posts, and the ability to edit posts. On the Web, X Premium costs $8 per month or $84 per year (Rs. 650/month or Rs. 6,800/year). On both iOS and Android, the subscription costs $11 a month or $114.99 a year (Rs. 900 a month or Rs. 9,400 a year).
Musk intends to transform X into an “everything app” in the mould of China’s WeChat, offering social networking, calling and messaging, and even in-app payments. The Tesla CEO has also sought to monetize services on X. In a recent meeting with Israel PM Benjamin Netanyahu, Musk reportedly said that X would charge its users a small monthly fee to use the platform. Musk said moving towards a monthly payment system could counter bots from amplifying hate speech on the platform.
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Telegram launched the stories feature for premium users in July, which was later available for all users in August. Now, the company has added new updates to the feature, allowing users to add music and reaction stickers to the stories. Moreover, users can directly send and share media in view-once mode, which can be changed anytime. Telegram has now extended the ability to put up stories to channels. In order to do so, they need to receive boots from their users.
In August, Telegram made its Stories feature available to all users. It works similarly to Instagram Stories and lets users put up stories for 6, 12, 24 or 48 hours. Now, the social media platform has extended the ability to post stories for Telegram Channels. However, they will be dependent on a boost from Premium users to do so. Telegram Premium will provide one boost per user that can be granted to any channel. As the channels gain boosts, they will step up to different levels. With each level, channel admins can post an additional story per day. Users can still decide the Channels on which they wish to see stories. Channels can check how many boosts they need to grow their level by going to Channel Info > More > Statistics > Boosts.
Another update is the ability to add reaction stickers and music to the stories. Users and channels can put up reaction stickers, and viewers can respond to them with a single tap. In order to add a reaction sticker, users can click on the icon in the sticker panel and choose any emoji from the provided options. While Premium users can add up to 5 reaction stickers per story, other users will be allowed only one reaction sticker per story. Users can add music to their stories by going to Audio > Select file > Adjust the track. They can also choose to keep the original audio.
Similar to WhatsApp and Instagram, users can send media on Telegram with a view-once mode. Users can switch between a view-once setting or a 30-second display mode. View-once mode will permanently delete the media file once opened, and the viewer cannot save it or take screenshots.
Last but not least, Telegram will send a login alert to users every time they log in from a new device. They can also review all the devices they are logged on by going to Settings > Devices. For an additional security layer, users can add two-step verification. To do so, they need to go to Settings > Privacy and Security > Two-Step Verification.
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