17 October, 2024
Threads finally launches its API for developers
Meta said today that it finally launched its much-awaited API for Threads so developers can build experiences around it.
Mark Zuckerberg posted about the API launch, saying, “The Threads API is now widely available and coming to more of you soon.”
In a blog post, Threads engineer Jesse Chen said that with the new API, developers can publish posts, fetch their own content, and deploy reply management tools. That means developers can let users hide/unhide or respond to specific replies.
Making the Threads API announcement at the Cannes Festival, the company added that along with these features, it will also allow developers to tap into analytics with measurements such as the number of views, likes, replies, reposts, and quotes at the media and account level.
Instagram head Adam Mosseri also posted about the announcement, saying that this move will help “businesses and creators manage their Threads presence at scale.”
In October 2023, Mosseri mentioned the company’s work on the Threads API for the first time. The company launched the API in a closed beta with partners such as Sprinklr, Sprout Social, Social News Desk, Hootsuite, tech news board Techmeme and a few other developers. At that time, Chen said that Meta plans to make the API widely available to developers in June. The company has delivered on the promise.
With the new API launch, the company has also released a reference open source app on GitHub for developers to play around with.
Third-party developers building social networking tools faced a tough 2023, with social networks like Twitter (now X) and Reddit restricting or shutting down API access at different levels. Decentralized social networks such as Mastodon and Bluesky have taken a more developer-friendly approach. But Meta’s Threads is the biggest new social network with more than 150 million users. With Threads integrating with the fediverse and releasing an API, it gives a chance to third-party developers to build some great social media experiences.
Social networks are getting stingy with their data, leaving third-party developers in the lurch
A year later, what Threads could learn from other social networks
Threads, Meta’s alternative to Twitter, just celebrated its first birthday. After launching on July 5 last year, the social network has reached 175 million monthly active users — that’s a notable achievement. But, after a year, Threads is trying to find its own voice by not being as newsy as Twitter/X and not being as open as Mastodon or Bluesky — at least for now.
Over the course of the last year, the Threads team has shipped features at a rapid pace and has gathered feedback on the social network directly through its users. After the launch, Threads has gained support for multiple profiles, a web app, a TweetDeck-like interface on the desktop, trending topics in the U.S., and custom controls for mute and quote replies.
The company has also made some progress to integrate with the fediverse. Users can connect their accounts to the ActivityPub protocol and can share their posts with the fediverse. Plus, they can look at likes and replies from the wider fediverse. But they can’t follow people from other servers just yet.
Why Meta is looking to the fediverse as the future for social media
However, there are a lot of things Meta can learn from other social networks.
Following topics
Bluesky has done a great job with custom feeds and helping people discover different content. Custom feeds are programmatic feeds that aim to pull posts related to one topic without being just limited to one tag.
Threads implemented tags last year. But at times users end up sharing posts with different tags for an event or a trend. Is it WWDC or WWDC 2024 or WWDC 24 or Apple Event? You can save a search term and hope to get relevant and recent posts, but there is no way to combine those. Some kind of provision for this in the API, or a custom list implementation, would be a great addition.
Last month, Threads made its API widely available to developers. The API enables toolmakers to post content for users and display their own posts within an app.
“The Threads API enables businesses to create and publish content on a person’s behalf on Threads and to display those posts within an app solely to the person who created it,” Meta wrote as a description for Threads’ API.
This doesn’t allow developers to create third-party apps to consume Threads. We wrote earlier this year that over the last few years, social networks have become stingy about user data. In the process, they have shut down the development of alternative experiences that could help different sets of users.
Social networks are getting stingy with their data, leaving third-party developers in the lurch
Threads’ rivals like Bluesky and Mastodon have fostered an ecosystem where third-party developers can make their own clients. It’s not clear if users will be able to pick other Mastodon clients to experience Threads when Threads achieves full integration with the fediverse. It would be good to get some assurance that Threads is open to allowing third-party apps.
Separating Threads and Instagram
Threads built a lot of its user base through its Instagram integration. However, with more than 175 million active users, the company can afford to lose its ties with Instagram. Initially, a Threads profile was completely tied to a user’s Instagram account. So you couldn’t delete your Threads profile without deleting your Instagram account. The company later released an update for users to deactivate or delete one account.
However, you still can’t create a profile that’s separate from an Instagram account. Plus, there is no way to DM people unless you go to their Instagram.
There is hope in this area, though. In an interview with Platformer’s Casey Newton, Instagram head Adam Mosseri said that the company is thinking of moving in this direction.
“My hope is that Threads gets more independent over time. It’s still deeply integrated with Instagram — you can sign in with the same account, you can automatically follow the same accounts, and we show Threads content on Instagram. But over time, I want it to be more and more independent. We’re working on things like Threads-only accounts and data separation,” Mosseri told Platformer.
News and politics
Threads and Mosseri have taken a stance that they are not actively promoting or amplifying news and political content on the platform. Despite that, political topics surface in places like trending topics from time to time. Right now, these topics are just concentrated on U.S. politics, but when they roll out to other regions, there will be times when political content will take over the social network. And the company should hone the product in a way that could handle extremes without suppressing news.
X’s Community Notes program is not perfect, and often it makes mistakes or is prone to bias. However, at times, it succeeds in providing useful context. When it comes to news, Mastodon recently rolled out a feature to show bylines linked with the writer’s account on the social network.
The “For You” algorithm
I’ll admit it. No social network has a perfect algorithm. Video platforms like TikTok might have moved the needle in a positive direction in terms of serving interesting posts.
In comparison, Threads’ “For You” feed sometimes looks bizarre. Several people have written about strange posts appearing on their feeds that seem out of their interest sphere.
More recently, I have been seeing posts about people asking “Where are you from?” and talking about how single life or dating is hard. I’m not sure what I did to trigger this. But Threads really needs to work on making the “For You” algorithm more palatable when showing random posts on the timeline.
Better local content
To surface local content, Threads doesn’t have to look far beyond Instagram, which has developed partnership teams in various countries. Before Elon Musk took over, Twitter also had partnership teams in various regions focusing on surfacing relevant content.
Threads rolled out live scores for NBA, MLS, and even Euro 2024. But it missed out on the opportunity to engage cricket fans with live scores during the T20 World Cup last month — earlier today, the company published a blog post saying that “India is one of the most active countries on Threads globally.”
While there are areas for improvement, given the feature release cadence, we might see some of these areas being addressed sooner than later. Threads has acted friendly with Mastodon and hasn’t really cared about Bluesky. But if we are to believe Mosseri, the ultimate aim is to beat Twitter.
Threads now highlights relevant trending topics above posts
Threads has made it easier for people to explore trending topics on the platform.
Instagram head Adam Mosseri said Tuesday that users in the U.S. can now see a label that highlights related trending topics above posts. You can tap on that label to see more posts related to that topic, and the new window will have “Top” and “Recent” tabs that let you filter posts.
“Hoping this makes it easier to find posts and follow conversations that are relevant to your interests,” Mosseri said on Threads.
Threads started testing trending topics in the U.S. in March. A month later, it made the feature available to all U.S. users.
The social network has been trying to experiment with helping users find more content relevant to them. In May, the company started rolling out a new TweetDeck-like multi-feed experience on its desktop interface.
Threads is also testing a similar multi-feed experience with a limited number of users on iOS.
“We’re always testing new ways to improve the experience on Threads. This test provides more ways to customize your feed and follow topics that are relevant to your interests,” a Threads spokesperson told TechCrunch, referring to the multi-feed UI.
Meta's Threads crosses 200 million active users
A day after Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg talked about his newest social media experiment Threads reaching “almost” 200 million users on the company’s Q2 2024 earnings call, the platform has touched the milestone.
Instagram head Adam Mosseri confirmed that the Twitter rival has reached 200 million active users in a post on Threads. Meta has taken just 13 months to achieve the figure.
“I’m excited to share that we crossed the 200M milestone on @threads,” Mosseri wrote. “My hope is that Threads can inspire ideas that bring people together and this amazing community continues to grow.”
Growth for Threads has been strong. The text-focused social media platform, which launched in July 2023, reached 150 million users in April 2024 and 175 million users in July on its one-year anniversary, before another growth spurt led it to hit 200 million a month later.
For comparison, Threads’ main rival X (formerly Twitter) had more than 600 million monthly users back in May, according to owner Elon Musk. The demise of legacy Twitter under Musk’s erratic change of direction — which alienated scores of long-time users — was the original impetus for Meta to launch Threads, to offer consumers an alternative space for online discussion.
Last year, Zuckerberg suggested Threads has a “good chance” of becoming a platform with more than a billion users. On the latest earnings call, the Meta CEO also described the platform as being on a good growth trajectory.
“We’re making steady progress towards building what looks like it’s going to be another major social app. And we are seeing deeper engagement,” he said, adding: “I’m quite pleased with the trajectory here.”
Zuckerberg added that apart from shipping features, the company is working on improving Threads’ content recommendation system.
Meta's X rival Threads gains multiple drafts, audience insights and more
Meta’s X rival Threads announced a number of new features today, including the ability to store multiple drafts, a way to rearrange columns on the desktop and insights into the user’s audience. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg also mentioned that the company plans to add a post-scheduling feature soon.
The company noted that these new features mark the first anniversary of Threads launching its web version in August 2023.
Threads initially began testing drafts in February this year and rolled it out to all users weeks later in March. Now, the platform will allow you to save multiple drafts with a limit of 100 drafts per account.
Meta is also rolling out a new user Insights screen that shows the age, gender and location of people who view and engage with you. The screen also shows total views and interactions with your posts bifurcated by followers and non-followers.
The company introduced a TweetDeck-like multicolumn view on desktop in May, which allows users to pin searches, liked posts, activity, saved posts, the profile page and Insights. Now, the company is letting users rearrange these columns in different order. However, you can’t move the “For You” column from its default place as the first column on the left side.
Both Insights screen and column-rearrangement features have been available to select users for the past few weeks.
Threads has also been testing a multi-feed experience on iOS with select users, but it didn’t specify if users will be able to reorder the feeds.
Earlier this month, Threads crossed the milestone for 200 million monthly active users — almost 13 months after its initial launch. For comparison, Threads’ prime rival X (formerly Twitter) had more than 600 million monthly users back in May, as per Elon Musk. Another decentralized social network, Bluesky, hit the 5 million user mark in February.
What is Instagram’s Threads app? All your questions answered
Twitter alternatives — new and old — have found audiences willing to try out a newer social networks since Elon Musk took over the company in 2022. Mastodon, Bluesky, Spill and T2 are some of the social media platforms people are among them. So is Meta’s Threads platform.
What is Threads? How do you create an account?
Threads is Meta’s text-based Twitter rival. It is tied to your Instagram account, so you can create an account by logging in using your Instagram credentials.
How is it different from Twitter?
Currently, there are no paid tiers and ads on the app. However, your verification mark from Instagram is carried over — even if you have paid for Meta Verified. Users can take advantage of their Instagram network to find people to follow.
The app launched more than a year ago, but it doesn’t have Twitter-like features such as long video, direct messages and live audio rooms.
How do you use Threads?
The platform is currently available on iOS and Android in more than 100 countries. However, due to privacy concerns, the app was not currently available in the EU until December 2023. At that time, Meta launched Threads in the region with an option for users to browse the social network without an account sans the ability to publish or interact with other posts.
Because you are logging in through your Instagram account, you will be able to follow all folks that you follow. You will also import your username, name and settings, like block list.
How many users does this thing have?
As of August 2024 — almost 13 months after the launch — Threads has more than 200 million users.
It’s been a steady ramp-up. Within hours of launch, Threads crossed the mark of 10 million signups and it reached 100 million users within just five days of launch.
What are the limitations of posting on Threads?
Users can post 500 characters in one post on the app. The post supports images, videos and GIFs. A Thread post supports up to 10 media items. As of July 17, Threads announced that it has to tighten up on rate limits, or limits on how may posts users can view, due to spam attacks.
Can you use Threads on the web?
Yes, you can view posts and also publish from Threads.net.
How do you delete your Threads account?
You can deactivate or delete your Threads account. Until the end of 2023, you had to delete your Instagram account, according to Meta’s “Supplemental Privacy Policy” to delete your Threads account. Meta keeps your data for 30 days after the initial deletion request. If you change your mind, you can cancel deletion within 30 days.
Can you DM people on Threads?
You can’t send a message to users on the app. Instagram head Adam Mosseri said that the goal is to “not build yet another inbox and instead let people send threads to other apps.”
Does Threads have an API?
After testing the API with select partners for a few months, Threads finally launched the public API in June 2024. Developers can build tools to publish posts of users and retrieve their own posts and gain insights about engagement. These tools can’t yet help you delete your posts.
Does that mean we will have third-party clients?
At this time, Threads API has limitations, like not allowing developers to fetch timeline data. So it is not possible to create an alternative clients for Threads.
Is Threads part of the fediverse?
Partially. Earlier this year, Threads started an experiment to let users share their posts to the fediverse. So if users turn on fediverse sharing, people on other compatible ActivityPub networks like Mastodon can follow them and see their posts. Threads also allows users on the fediverse to like Threads posts. The company is also planning to share your posts to the fediverse even if you publish them through a tool using Threads API.
What are some features that are currently missing from Threads?
Full Fediverse integrationScheduling posts (coming soon)Direct messagesSupport for listsSupport for third-party clients
What are Threads’ data collection practices?
Because you are using an Instagram account to log in to Threads, Meta says that “it is part of your Instagram account.” Users have already raised questions about the app’s data collection, given the privacy labels mentioned in the App Store.
In answer to queries about the app’s privacy labels on the App Store, Meta’s deputy chief privacy officer Rob Sherman said last year that these labels are similar to the company’s other apps.
“The labels are similar to the rest of our apps, including Instagram, in that our social apps receive whatever info (including the categories of data listed in the App Store) you share in the app,” he said in a Threads post at the time.
This story originally published July 6, 2023, and was updated to include recent updates.
Threads confirms it is experimenting with ephemeral posts
Automatically disappearing posts on social networks could be handy for users who have a habit of deleting their posts through third-party tools, or if the context of those posts is short-lived. Earlier this month, Threads said it was testing ephemeral posts only as an internal prototype. Now the company told TechCrunch that it is testing posts that disappear within 24 hours with a limited number of users.
While the company didn’t provide any statement, a spokesperson said this is a new and casual way to share on Threads. It also didn’t disclose if the experiment is region-specific or who could activate such posts.
App reverse engineer Alessandro Paluzzi published an ephemeral post on Friday. When you tap on the reply button, you an see the time remaining, after which the post will be deleted. Threads also shows a banner on top of the post indicating that the thread and all replies will disappear when the time ends. While the banner doesn’t specify anything about quoted replies, we observed that quoted posts have a timer similar to the original post and will disappear after the timer ends.
In June, Paluzzi first posted about Threads working on disappearing posts with a screenshot highlighting a 24-hour button next to the Post button to publish a disappearing thread. Technologist Chris Messina also found hints about these posts in the iOS app’s code earlier this month. Messina noted that disappearing posts won’t be shared with the fediverse, as Threads won’t be able to delete those posts from other ActivityPub-powered servers. Threads started allowing users to share their posts with the fediverse in June.
Posts with a 24-hour expiry could help creators who want to share an off-brand or off-topic post once in a while. They could also be useful for folks who want to post commentary on live events that might be difficult to understand out of context or that are irrelevant once the event is over.
In a pre-Elon Musk era, Twitter started an Instagram Stories-like format for disappearing posts called Fleets in 2020 but shut it down in 2021 because of low usage.
If Threads makes ephemeral posts widely available, it might be one of the only social networks among its rivals — such as X, Bluesky, and Mastodon — to do so.
The previous version of the story had a spelling mistake in Chris Messina’s name.
Meta's X rival Threads gains multiple drafts, audience insights and more
Meta’s X rival Threads announced a number of new features today, including the ability to store multiple drafts, a way to rearrange columns on the desktop and insights into the user’s audience. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg also mentioned that the company plans to add a post-scheduling feature soon.
The company noted that these new features mark the first anniversary of Threads launching its web version in August 2023.
Threads initially began testing drafts in February this year and rolled it out to all users weeks later in March. Now, the platform will allow you to save multiple drafts with a limit of 100 drafts per account.
Meta is also rolling out a new user Insights screen that shows the age, gender and location of people who view and engage with you. The screen also shows total views and interactions with your posts bifurcated by followers and non-followers.
The company introduced a TweetDeck-like multicolumn view on desktop in May, which allows users to pin searches, liked posts, activity, saved posts, the profile page and Insights. Now, the company is letting users rearrange these columns in different order. However, you can’t move the “For You” column from its default place as the first column on the left side.
Both Insights screen and column-rearrangement features have been available to select users for the past few weeks.
Threads has also been testing a multi-feed experience on iOS with select users, but it didn’t specify if users will be able to reorder the feeds.
Earlier this month, Threads crossed the milestone for 200 million monthly active users — almost 13 months after its initial launch. For comparison, Threads’ prime rival X (formerly Twitter) had more than 600 million monthly users back in May, as per Elon Musk. Another decentralized social network, Bluesky, hit the 5 million user mark in February.
Meta's Threads crosses 200 million active users
A day after Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg talked about his newest social media experiment Threads reaching “almost” 200 million users on the company’s Q2 2024 earnings call, the platform has touched the milestone.
Instagram head Adam Mosseri confirmed that the Twitter rival has reached 200M active users in a post on Threads. Meta has taken just 13 months to achieve the figure.
“I’m excited to share that we crossed the 200M milestone on @threads,” Mosseri wrote. “My hope is that Threads can inspire ideas that bring people together and this amazing community continues to grow.”
Growth for Threads has been strong. The text-focused social media platform, which launched back in July 2023, reached 150M users in April 2024 and 175M users milestone in July on its one-year anniversary, before another growth spurt led it to hit 200M a month later.
For comparison, Threads’ main rival X (formerly Twitter) had more than 600M monthly users back in May according to owner Elon Musk. The demise of legacy Twitter under Musk’s erratic change of direction — which alienated scores of long-time users — was the original impetus for Meta to launch Threads, to offer consumers an alternative space for online discussion.
Last year, Zuckerberg suggested Threads has a “good chance” of becoming a platform with more than a billion users. On the latest earnings call, the Meta CEO also described the platform as being on a good growth trajectory.
“We’re making steady progress towards building what looks like it’s going to be another major social app. And we are seeing deeper engagement,” he said, adding: “I’m quite pleased with the trajectory here.”
Zuckerberg added that apart from shipping features, the company is working on improving Threads’ content recommendation system.