July 11, 2023

"The atmosphere of Twitter has lately gone from one of a decaying dinner party... to that of a bar where the bartender has to eject the last swaying patrons."

"Threads, by contrast, was bright and new, like high school on the first day of class. Meta seemed to have encouraged celebrities and influencers to pre-stock the feed with aggressively enthusiastic posts. Users entered into the midst of a raucous party.... It is currently impossible to see posts solely from followed accounts.... As a result, much of what I see on Threads is the kind of banal celebrity and brand self-promotion that I tried to avoid on Twitter—posts from Chris Hemsworth and Ellen DeGeneres, Spotify asking fans for their favorite playlists, and suggestions to follow Kardashians.... What once made Twitter successful was its steadfast commitment to real-time information. It was a free-for-all shout fest of journalists, newsmakers, and creators, and anyone else could join the din on a relatively equal footing. Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, posted on Threads that the app would not 'encourage' news, as Twitter once did.... Threads, he went on, is 'a less angry place for conversations.'... So far, no one seems to know quite what to post on Threads, though the dominant tone is anodyne and sincere...."

59 comments:

gilbar said...

It is currently impossible to see posts solely from followed accounts.

and, it's like the Hotel California.. You can check out, but you can NEVER leave.
Force Fed
Forced Censorship
Forced conversations

Sounds AWESOME!!!

chickelit said...

Isn't the real question which platform is going to respond to the Biden administration's attempts to manipulate narratives, despite recent court rulings? My feeling says Zuckerberg will be the more Biden-compliant, based on past experience. I will shun "Threads" for that reason alone.

RideSpaceMountain said...

"Threads, by contrast, was bright and new, like high school on the first day of class."

They really ought to put disclaimers on op-eds masquerading as advertisements, don't you think?

wild chicken said...

Oh, so users were trying to avoid bland celebrity self-promotion on Twitter? That's why they left?

Here I thought it was the cheeky backtalk of the canaille they didn't like.

Leland said...

I have to admit, that is a very provocative pull quote paragraph. Threads is like High School? Seems all of social media is about retaining the High School vibe.

I pretty much avoid social media because the part that isn't talking to others about events beyond their control, like HS; the rest of it is marketing. Meta has always been about selling you to marketers right down to tracking everything about you to better target ads. It is a shakedown hardly different than a pickpocket. Pay attention to the thread overthere, while we take your information and make money from selling it to others. But it is ok, because you have free will to fall for the marketing or not.

Except there is that equal footing. Funny how people that preach equity claim equal footing in freespeech via a platform that sensors politically incorrect speech. What equal footing was there when they were selling us the covid pandemic? Did we have free will to resist?

RNB said...

"Threads... is 'a less angry place for conversations.' " As with blogs, the tone depends on the character of the participants and the 'culture' of the site.

WWIII Joe Biden, Husk-Puppet + America's Putin said...

No one cared about the health of twitter until Elon bought it and promised free speech.

Loyalist mob leftists hate free speech.

since most of hollywood is leftist - and they need attention - I can see why they don't like twitter anymore.

rwnutjob said...

They stole Elon's code. (He's suing them) They scraped data from Twitter so much that Elon had to restrict people to the amount of engagement for a couple of days. Turns out Threads is old Twitter before free speech.

iowan2 said...

What I have seen reported is anyone with a instagram account almost, almost...was signed up for Threads. All the did is click one button and the info just transferred. Done deal. Most did not realize you had to delete your instagram account to get rid of threads.

This post really sells it though. All sweetness and nice....Boooring. (I never got twitter, so maybe not the best example.)

Enigma said...

Bland conformity is the destiny of all corporate, establishment enterprises. Censorship and government sponsorship always turns into the worship of kings and Dear Leaders.

Zuckerberg comes across as throwing everything against the wall to preserve his Facebook semi-monopoly. The most he can hope for is to keep the blue true believers inside the fence.

"You can fool some of the people all the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time." -- Abraham Lincoln

jim said...

What if you start a social network pre-stocked with wonderful influencers and celebrities and no one notices?

Nah, we're really just slightly evolved chimps throwing shit around.

Jersey Fled said...

“It was a free-for-all shout fest of journalists, newsmakers, and creators, and anyone else could join the din on a relatively equal footing.”

Except that it wasn’t.

M Jordan said...

Threads is the “No Labels” Party come to the twitterverse. Remember them? The “No Labels” guys? They were going to bring civility back to politics.

Ha ha ha ha ha. That’s a funny memory. Was David Frum one of them? Seems like I remember that. Canada was going civilize the US.

As I said, ha ha ha ha ha.

Aggie said...

The age we live in. We're all feeling like we're being pushed and prodded into a thousand different directions now by every noodle-brained idiot with access to a keyboard. There's no such thing as an objective opinion anymore, rare to find someone with an honest message. They're all purpose-driven, all of them. It's the new advertising. I'm an Influencer !

Gusty Winds said...

Threads is going to be like FB with women replying to each other with "LOVE THIS!" or "THANKS FOR POSTING!"

Let it be a liberal ass kissing vacuum. Just like a college campus.

Dude1394 said...

The musk thrashing by the democrat media continues. So predictable.

Gusty Winds said...

The atmosphere on Twitter is simply reflective of the political atmosphere of the modern politics.

Except now, left wing and gov't propaganda can be openly challenged without being censored. Biden family crimes, mRNA injuries, voter fraud, child transgender exploitation, proxy war in Ukraine.

Craziest stuff this year were all the videos of naked pride parades with children in attendance and then the "environmental" naked parade in Madison...with children participating and in attendance.

When you expose the left to a little bit of sunshine they run like vampires. Or they proudly parade naked in front of children.

rrsafety said...

This is all wishful thinking. Twitter is the same as it was two years ago.

PM said...

Oh, the humanity.

wildswan said...

There was a great article in the Atlantic on this same theme called Zombie Twitter. The idea was that people keep trying to revive Twitter and Threads is the latest attempt. But these attempts are like a zombie jamboree - a frenzy among the dead. And the point is made that all the worst features of Twitter arrive in the new versions almost at once. Within 24 hours people are comparing each other to Nazis, celebrities are self-glorifying, posters are looking at their approval numbers and so on. So I guess people are now engaged in article wars denigrating rival twitters. (Is twitter a noun now like kleenex and xerox? We need a noun. I say twitter.) I wonder how employees are treated at Threads and whether among them are old Twitter employees who sit around reminiscing about the glory days? or are they being worked into the ground by start-up woes? Are have they struck out on their own - Real World or Bust!

Here's an already-golden-oldie from a few months back on that theme:
https://babylonbee.com/video/fired-twitter-employee-applies-for-first-real-job

tommyesq said...

It is the Stepford Wives of social media!

Mark said...

"They stole Elon's code."

Actually, it's Jack's code if we are being semantic.

Funny how firing 80% of your staff leads to them getting jobs other places where they write similar code. Good luck with the lawfare, Elon!

Dave Begley said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
JK Brown said...

They've created the People Magazine of social media. That's nice.

JK Brown said...

"Threads, by contrast, was bright and new, like high school on the first day of class."

That's nice but if you went to high school, you know that eventually you realized you were doing time for the crime of being a teenager and just had to survive in hopes of getting out at 18.

Original Mike said...

"Actually, it's Jack's code if we are being semantic."

Actually, it's Elon's. He bought it.

Does someone need to explain the concept to you?

Dave Begley said...

Zuck is an opponent of Free Speech. Fuck Zuck.

Ann Althouse said...

"Oh, so users were trying to avoid bland celebrity self-promotion on Twitter? That's why they left?"

No, he's saying that on Twitter, you could (and can) display a feed of only the people you choose to follow. If you switch to Threads, for *whatever* reason, you'll find that you can't do that and that the bland celebrity self-promotion is foisted on you.

I think leaving Twitter had to do with wanting to avoid nasty stuff or wanting to shun Musk, but there's disappointment that it's too lacking in substance and bite.

Drago said...

"They stole Elon's code."

Dumber Than Usual Lefty Mark: "Actually, it's Jack's code if we are being semantic.

Funny how firing 80% of your staff leads to them getting jobs other places where they write similar code. Good luck with the lawfare, Elon!"

At the time of close for the sale of twitter to Musk, Dorsey owned less than 2.5% of twitter.

For the Dumb Lefty Mark's of the world, that means 97.5% of twitter was owned by others!

Does that math help you a bit Mark?

And it should be noted that Musk has let go 90%, not 80%, of the useless Mark-like idiot wokey censor-liar "workers" that were unnecessarily brought on by a distracted and overwhelmed Dorsey who publicly apologized to the twitter workforce for having "grown the company too fast" after caving to massive government directed censorship of American citizens.

This is all a matter of public record and easily accessible info for any sentient beings.

And yes Mark, taking/stealing "similar code"/uh-known as intellectual property to a new organization is the very definition of what companies are not supposed to be doing!

Dumb Lefty Mark is certainly having a day for the ages in terms of hot takes!

Lets see what happens next!

Drago said...

Althouse: "No, he's saying that on Twitter, you could (and can) display a feed of only the people you choose to follow. If you switch to Threads, for *whatever* reason, you'll find that you can't do that and that the bland celebrity self-promotion is foisted on you."

"Foistees" like a Dumb Lefty Mark or the random LLR positively adore a good foisting-session!

FullMoon said...

"Threads, by contrast, was bright and new, like high school on the first day of class."

? In my S.F. Bay Area high schools, upper classmen seek out freshman for unpleasant initiation.
Same in junior high.
Slow on your feet and lack of awareness liable to get you a couple of free bruises.

Anyway, here in silicon valley, all the people who sold their Teslas when Musk took Twitter have jumped on to thread. Both of them..

MB said...

The main reason I started using Twitter was to get news in real time from regular people who were witnessing it.

I downloaded the Threads app just to see what the fuss was about. I opened it once and didn't see a reason to open it a second time. Maybe it will eventually get more interesting.

MB said...

What happened to Mastadon? I thought that was supposed to be the next big thing. Is the echo chamber no fun?

Gerda Sprinchorn said...

I don't see why they don't allow you to choose your experience on Twitter and Threads and other social media.

If you want a fizzy first-day-of-high-school vibe, choose that option. If you want nasty partisan screaming all the time, flip that switch and select from the sub-menu: left-wing screaming, right-wing screaming, or a Hobbesian world of all screaming at all. You want boring Walter Cronkite style "news", hey, there's a toggle for that too. You want your feed to filter out undesirables? Then have an option for that, with a sub-menu to choose your preferred filter.

Don't they kind of already do this by allowing you to choose whom you follow? If so, there isn't really just one culture on these platforms, so these articles are misleading.

Michael K said...


Blogger Mark said...

"They stole Elon's code."

Actually, it's Jack's code if we are being semantic.

Funny how firing 80% of your staff leads to them getting jobs other places where they write similar code. Good luck with the lawfare, Elon!


Lefty Mark is ecstatic that "Threads" will provide a nice comfy place to indulge his lefty fantasies.

rehajm said...

Everything is leftie propaganda now, innit?

chickelit said...

Mark wrote: “Funny how firing 80% of your staff leads to them getting jobs other places where they write similar code. Good luck with the lawfare, Elon!”

That 80% weren’t the coders—they were the partisan hall monitors and they all needed to go.

chickelit said...

A high profile case of IP theft coupled with a discovery-based outing of the thief’s politics as a motive would feed the mill in a good way.

Freeman Hunt said...

I keep seeing articles about the death of Twitter, but then I go to Twitter, and it seems the same as it has always been.

BG said...

"Threads, by contrast, was bright and new, like high school on the first day of class."

I hated high school, and I was one who did well academically. I would never describe the first day of high school as "bright." New maybe, but more like scary new.

I read this yesterday and was solidified in my decision to never join Threads.
https://www.yankodesign.com/2023/07/07/the-threads-app-is-filled-with-deceptive-dark-design-patterns-we-spotted-more-than-ten/

Hammond X. Gritzkofe said...

"The atmosphere of Twitter has lately gone from one of a decaying dinner party... to that of a bar where the bartender has to eject the last swaying patrons."
"Threads, by contrast, was bright and new."

Knock, knock, Kyle
Who's there?
Argo
Argo who?
Arrrrgh! Go flick yourself!

Free Manure While You Wait! said...

They've created the People Magazine of social media. "

I remember when People first came out. And thinking I would love to hear and ad for for the launching of another new magazine that went, "Now, from the people who brought you People, comes Places & Things."

Mark said...

"And yes Mark, taking/stealing "similar code"/uh-known as intellectual property to a new organization is the very definition of what companies are not supposed to be doing!"

They are not stealing code. They are writing new code for a similar app and likely using what they learned the first time.

Meanwhile Twitter is trying to improve giant bloated code stack after firing the people who built it.

I am sure lawsuits will convince people to reinvest in Twitter. The endorsement of Twitter over Threads by the Taliban the other day is about the best PR Elon can get anymore.



Drago said...

Interesting side note for Dumb Lefty Mark: After the sale of Twitter to Musk Jack Dorsey rolled over his entire 2.4% stake into the new twitter.

I wonder what Dorsey knows about twitter that Dumb Lefty Mark does not?

Rhetorical.

Drago said...

Dumb Lefty Mark: "They are not stealing code. They are writing new code for a similar app and likely using what they learned the first time."

Sure they are Dumb Lefty Mark.

Sure they are.

Drago said...

Dumb Lefty Mark: "I am sure lawsuits will convince people to reinvest in Twitter. The endorsement of Twitter over Threads by the Taliban the other day is about the best PR Elon can get anymore."

Dorsey seems convinced.

Free Manure While You Wait! said...

"Meanwhile Twitter is trying to improve giant bloated code stack after firing the people who built it."

Can you provide a source that substantiates this claim? Thanks in advance.

Jamie said...

Meanwhile Twitter is trying to improve giant bloated code stack after firing the people who built it.

Do you understand the problem here?

Let me belabor the point. Back in the dot.com days, I worked for a furniture-related startup doing content management (so, not tech). Our web development firm built us a database of the products we were trying to sell that was 100% flat, like a spreadsheet. As it grew, it got slower... and slower... and slower... because a search of it had to go through the whole "spreadsheet" instead of just searching, for example, the Lamps table of a relational database, which would have each item's ID instead of slogging through 30 horizontal cells' worth of data for each item (that's the gist, anyway - and I have no idea how it's done now).

That company hired ONE guy who knew how to build a relationship database, and then they went out of business, and I had to start being our web developer because we were out of money to hire anyone else, so that ONE guy (who immediately got another job because he, apparently unlike all the other developers we'd been working with, knew what he was doing) kindly held my hand and taught and helped me enough to allow me to work in SQL-7 sufficiently well to rebuild our database more correctly (with the help of SQL-7 For Dummies).

But I was not and am not a programmer, and what *I* did, I'm sure, ran slower and took up more space than what he would have built.

The point being, why on Earth would you want the people who built the giant bloated code to stick around?

Old and slow said...

The fact that people like our Mark cheer on the censorship friendly Meta Corp while trash talking X Corp for allowing free-ish speech is so very telling. It's also a bit depressing. I remain a guarded optimist, I think Musk's free speech vision of the future is likely to win out for the same reason that the USSR collapsed. Lying and avoiding reality takes increasing amounts of energy to maintain. Eventually, it all collapses under its own weight.

cf said...

Dave Begley beat me to it, but I'll post it anyways:

Fuck 'em

walter said...

Blogger Freeman Hunt said...
I keep seeing articles about the death of Twitter, but then I go to Twitter, and it seems the same as it has always been.
--
Requiring log-in to view is new.
Still plenty of folks banned for wrongthink.

Gahrie said...

"Meanwhile Twitter is trying to improve giant bloated code stack after firing the people who built it."

Can you provide a source that substantiates this claim? Thanks in advance.


I've read that one of the first things Musk did after he bought Twitter was send over some of his coders and engineers from Tesla to try and fix things.

Butkus51 said...

Ive known technicians who couldnt use a meter, much less understand simple concepts like voltage and resistance.

There are a lot of bad programmers out there.

Craig Mc said...

You can smell the left's desperation every time they try to make Threads a thing. Mastadon, I hardly knew ya.

Mark said...

"trash talking X Corp for allowing free-ish speech"

Funny how you now admit Elon is only for free-ish speech not actual free speech.

Good luck searching Threads links on Twitter, free-ish speech has decided to block those searching for them.

Narr said...

"Good luck searching Threads links on Twitter . . . ."

Now tell us why anyone would want to.

Free Manure While You Wait! said...

"I've read that one of the first things Musk did after he bought Twitter was send over some of his coders and engineers from Tesla to try and fix things."

I've read that people have been abducted by aliens, which for some scientific reason unknown to us, shove everything under the sun up the abductee's ass.

https://winningwriters.com/past-winning-entries/the-probe

I, at least, can provide a source for my obvious bullshit.

Drago said...

Dumber By The Day Lefty Mark: "Funny how you now admit Elon is only for free-ish speech not actual free speech."

Every social media company in the west is required to abide by the laws passed in other nations while operating in those nations.

Its adorable how Dumb Lefty Mark pretends this is Musk's preference and an X./twitter thing.

Dumb Lefty Mark couldn't present an honest or realistic characterization if his life depended on it.

Not that it matters of course. Reality remains reality.

Jamie said...

Funny how you now admit Elon is only for free-ish speech not actual free speech.

What Drago said at 12:36.

Plus, funny how Mark didn't open with (or close with, or even mention) how Zuckerberg, by contrast, is for free speech. Or even free-ish.