Threads — From the Perspective of a Product Manager

It’s been quite a while since I wrote about specific products. Today, I am going to write about Threads, Instagram’s Twitter counterpart, or in other words, the content generator for meme creators for the next few days.

There are numerous amazing articles that did a great job of covering Threads. Adding one of the best articles I came across — Link.

I had some interesting thoughts and facts I could think of immediately after reading the article and using the product.

• Twitter threatening to sue Meta for stealing its “trade secrets?” I wonder how Twitter came up with the idea of Twitter Spaces. Hi Clubhouse 👋🏼

• There were other Twitter alternatives that came up like Mastodon and Bluesky, but they weren’t able to achieve mass adoption. How did Threads go about 70 million (and counting) downloads so quickly? It’s simple. Other apps are actual downloads, and they were acquiring new users, but these were funneled users from Instagram.

  
  

  This is so stupid to compare how many days Facebook or WhatsApp took to reach 1 million users as the user base with smartphones and internet connections was so low when those products came into the market. Unfortunately, there is no inflation adjustment that can be done for these numbers.

• As someone who loves numbers, if you take a look at your Instagram profile after you installed Threads, you would be able to see which user you are. I am user #4,653,803.

• Let’s be honest, Twitter is a disaster after Elon Musk’s takeover. Especially limiting the posts to 600 tweets per day for free users but also premium users (who pay $8/month for Twitter Blue) to 6000 tweets per day.

• Feature comparison:

Source: Twitter and Meta

*Not applicable to Twitter Blue users. Verification is only for paid members on Twitter but it’s for both verified and paid members on Instagram.

• I started using Twitter only because I did not have many followers, and I followed only a few pages or people. My feed used to be clean, but Threads is definitely chaotic for me right now.

• Can’t delete Threads account

  

  

Moving into the product perspective of these two products by digging into their company mission, vision, problems they try to solve, etc.

Twitter

Twitter’s mission: To give everyone the power to create and share ideas and information instantly, without barriers.

Vision: We believe in free expression and think every voice has the power to impact the world.

Twitter focuses on providing a real-time, public platform for users to share their thoughts, opinions, and news and engage in conversations.

This enables users to connect with a broader audience, stay updated on current events, trending topics, and hashtags and follow accounts of interest or celebrities of interest.

Basically, it helped amplify the voices of everyday people and built a community that engaged on a global scale.

Threads (Instagram/Meta)

Meta’s mission: Giving people the power to build community and bring the world closer together.

Vision: People use Meta products to stay connected with friends and family, discover what’s going on in the world, and share and express what matters to them.

Instagram’s mission statement is the same as above, but the vision statement is slightly a modified version of the above: We bring you closer to the people and things you love, and the vision of Threads is to take what Instagram does best and expand that to text, creating a positive and creative space to express your ideas.

If we analyze the mission statements above, it does seem very clear that Threads definitely is helping Meta achieve their mission and vision.

As Instagram’s CEO, Adam Mosseri mentioned in an interview: “The goal isn’t to replace Twitter. The goal is to create a public square for communities on Instagram that never really embraced Twitter and for communities on Twitter (and other platforms) that are interested in a less angry place for conversations, but not all of Twitter.”

So technically, the problem Threads is solving is the same as Twitter, and it also helps them with their goals.

But why now? Instagram’s user base is 2 billion while Twitter’s is around 300 million (rough estimate based on Google search).

While we can give full credit to Twitter for what it has achieved so far, it’s not easy for new competitors in the space to reach this user base as they need to start right from scratch.

Whereas Instagram can utilize its existing userbase and also given the current situation at Twitter with no real product people to lead the vision, Meta is taking full advantage and increasing their market share.

While this may go either way given Meta’s reputation in data and security, they are making hay while the sun shines. It’s too early to say if it’s a Twitter killer, but if Elon keeps taking decisions similar to today, Threads might actually become a Twitter killer.

But what scares me the most is the monopolization of Meta in the social media space.

Feature Image Source: AI-generated from https://gencraft.com/generate using the prompt Twitter bird on fire.