Jeff JarvisJul 6, 2023
No. This is a mass-media worldview. Mass does not matter; critical mass of community does.
Can we not learn the lessons of Twitter's demise? Support Mastodon & Bluesky, too.
wizdumJul 9, 2023
Show threadJeff Jarvis
Now it's true that Threads gets users to critical mass immediately thanks to Instagram & FB. The *real* lesson there is not that their power wins but that portability of one's own social graph is vital and we must insist on it.
Jul 6, 2023 at 9:56amWeb
Show threadKristoffer LawsonJul 6, 2023
@jeffjarvis it was always clear #Threads would rapidly go to millions of users. What I’m less convinced about is whether it will be considered a long term success. For that you need engagement. It can surely get that, but just being by #Meta will not guarantee that. They don’t actually have a strong track record of launching new services.
Show threadLee 🌏Jul 6, 2023
@Setok @jeffjarvis
But being less shit than Twitter may well be all that's needed. Twitter just feel like noise these days, outside who I'm following. Search Ukraine War and it's just garbage results. Being better than that may be all that's needed. Along with better moderation.
Show threadKristoffer LawsonJul 6, 2023

@MrLee @jeffjarvis you’re right, it may be enough. I personally think they need to do more than that to make the service truly compelling. Just being a ‘less shit’ something is rarely enough when the other service still has the masses. You need some new approaches.

That btw applies to Mastodon. Just being a Twitter alternative will not be enough, but that’s where an open protocol helps: it allows innovation with new types of services.

Show threadLee 🌏Jul 6, 2023
@Setok @jeffjarvis
I think enough big names have had it with Twitter. It's an absolute shit fest for all prominent people in the political centre or left. Every tweet filled with 100's of Blue Tick Dicks at the top. If a good number of those people leave, the far right will also move, so they can continue to troll and lie and force their politics. The Twitter death spiral begins. It's then just a matter of momentum.
I'm happy here on Mastodon myself. I think lots more will move here eventually because Threads will still be shit.
Show threadskyeyeJul 6, 2023
@Setok
I'm not terribly worried. If mastodon federates threads and it's just a thing, then sure. There's a big name or two that I'd like to follow. People can move or make new accounts on an instance that doesn't federate with meta. I think the "worst" thing they could do is defederate from mastodon in like 5 or 10 years or become incompatible with activity pub. But a part of mastodon will probably keep going like it is now. I think activity pub is useful to meta
@MrLee @jeffjarvis
Show threadBrendan JonesJul 6, 2023
@Setok @jeffjarvis I’m also not convinced that launching Threads with the Instagram social graph is that useful to people. They’re two different forms of social media. Would you import your Instagram social graph to Twitter, if it were possible (before Elon screwed everything up)? I sure wouldn’t. Maybe one or two people, and that’s enough to get over the first user activation speedbump?
Show threadTommy WilliamsJul 6, 2023

@Setok @jeffjarvis Basing it around Instagram makes it an almost instant non-starter for me since I'm never going to spend time on a social media site that is not available as a Web site, or only barely available as such.

And I hate that my follower list is based on IG, since I barely engage there due to its app-centric nature (and no native iPad app after all these years, either).

Show threadKristoffer LawsonJul 6, 2023
@twwilliams @jeffjarvis I agree, if there's no web version it won't be for me. Then again I don't believe I can get my regular username either (already taken on IG), so even more reason to pass...
Show threadskyeyeJul 6, 2023
@Setok
It feels impossible to predict how successful any of these projects will be. I've seen articles about the "failed" mastodon migrations cause activity dropped off after all the sign-ups in November. But then Twitter keeps changing and there's hundreds of thousands of new sign ups. Its like these social media networks took off at the right place and time. But now that people have been apart of them for 15 years, its much harder to change than in the old days
@jeffjarvis
Show threadChris MahanJul 6, 2023
@jeffjarvis Who we follow, who follows us, who we blocked, who we muted, at the very least.
Show threadChris MahanJul 6, 2023
@jeffjarvis This, however, implies portable account identities (a user on one platform is who on another platform?)