After more than 10 million people today signed up for its Instagram-based Twitter competitor Threads, Meta’s stock price soared to a near $300 high. On January 28, 2022, Meta shares were last traded for $300. The company had just unveiled its AI Research SuperCluster (RSC), which it billed as one of the fastest supercomputers in the world, on a Friday.
Rumors of Meta’s poor performance began to circulate when the markets opened the following week, and when the company released its 2021 annual earnings on 4 February 2022, the price dropped under $240.
The following decline occurred after its third quarter announcement on October 26, 2022, with a 24% decline and a 67% increase year over year. At the end of that week, Meta stock fell below $100 as Mark Zuckerberg pleaded with investors to be patient with his metaverse play.
The business model of Meta, which sells ads based on user behavior, was hurt by Apple’s decision to limit access to private user data with its App Tracking Transparency framework on all supported iPhones and iPads.
Since then, the business formerly known as Facebook has been steadily improving, reducing talk of the metaverse and making the most of its AI investments as the hype surrounding artificial intelligence reached a peak.
Meta takes the phone call.
Facebook and Instagram, two of Meta’s social media apps, were also unanticipated winners after Elon Musk’s purchase of Twitter and subsequent antics drove users and advertisers to look for an alternative platform.
Meta’s full-throated response to the widespread call for a reliable microblogging platform that can also import pre-existing social graphs, ensuring users aren’t starting from scratch, is Threads, which became available to the general public today on iPhone and Android.
“Obviously, Twitter invented the field, and there are many excellent options available for public discourse. In spite of this, Adam Mosseri, the CEO of Instagram, told The Verge, “given everything that was going on, we thought there was an opportunity to build something that was open and something that was good for the community that was already using Instagram.
Users of Huawei devices can sideload the APK file for Instagram and install it from their preferred app store, then sign in using their existing account information. For a seamless sign-up process, Threads imports all followed Instagram accounts.
Though Instagram has released an app called Threads before, this is not the first time. It debuted a Snapchat rival in August 2019 that let users share messages and content with their “close friends” list.
In 2021, that usability was quickly incorporated into Instagram’s messaging feature, and the original Threads app was retired.
Away from the Fediverse
The.net extension on the profile-sharing URL is one of the new Threads app’s more intriguing features. This will allow for simple integration into the so-called “fediverse,” which consists of federated servers used for decentralized social media services, web posting, and file hosting in the future.
In the immediate aftermath of Twitter’s rapid collapse, BlueSky and Mastodon emerged as the early fediverse heroes. Both services have amassed sizable fan bases, but because they are independent servers with their own difficulties, they have a steep learning curve.
With Threads, we can easily manage our social feed using tools that are as simple to use as the regular Instagram app.
This would enable new types of connections that are currently not possible on most social apps, such as Mastodon and WordPress, by making Threads interoperable with other applications that support the ActivityPub protocol. The ActivityPub protocol will eventually be supported by other platforms, including Tumblr.
As of right now, Threads is accessible in more than a hundred nations, including South Africa, and Meta is requesting feedback so that it can continue to improve the service. In the EU, the service is not formally offered due to privacy issues.
