I’m here today to write about the new social media platform, Threads. But first I have to talk about Twitter, because without the bird app, I’m pretty sure there would not be a Threads.
Back in the Spring of 2008, my friend Russ Florence invited me to connect with him on Twitter, a social media platform that debuted in 2006. I was in the final year of my career as a reporter at The Oklahoman.
So, I signed up on the app and followed Russ as my lone Twitter connection.
As a Twitter newbie, I didn’t realize there was a big Twitter world out there with lots of potential accounts to follow. I loved following Russ and his personal tweets like the one from the day his dishwasher quit on him.
But one day I happened to look at Russ’s profile and saw he was following scores of other Twitter accounts. So I clicked on his follow list. It opened a new world to me because there were so many news and technology sources that I didn’t realize existed until that moment.
I followed a couple dozen right off the bat, and my interest in Twitter grew exponentially.
What I loved about it was being able to follow big national media sources like the New York Times and NPR, or more local sites like The Oklahoman and Tulsa World. Plus there were sports accounts like ESPN, and eventually MLB, NBA and NFL. I got instant alerts anytime there was breaking news or sports.
Plus there was a growing number of Oklahomans joining every day, providing local perspectives.
I enjoyed Twitter immensely, because, until Donald Trump started opining 30 times a day on Twitter on the run-up to the 2016 election, there were few of what I call the Crazy Uncles on Twitter that you frequently find on Facebook. It was upbeat and fun.
Fast forward to 2022.
Billionaire Elon Musk completed his purchase of Twitter in October, and it’s all been downhill from there. Musk encouraged less-than-objective news sources to begin posting on Twitter. He appealed to the type of voices like podcaster Joe Rogan, who broadcast and repeat misinformation. Trolls blossomed. New rules were imposed that limited the number of tweets a subscriber could view on a daily basis.
With all that roiling long-time Twitter subscribers, along comes Threads, owned by Meta and launched through Instagram. I heard about it and signed up on Day 2. By the end of the week (last week!) I read that 110 million individual accounts had opened.
Threads looks suspiciously like Twitter in that you can comment, like and repost items with or without your own commentary. In fact, Twitter has threatened to sue Meta over the copycat status of Threads.
The downside I’ve seen so far is that you can’t set up lists that contain just the accounts — Threaders? — or topics you want to see, and posts aren’t presented in chronological order. And there’s no Threads site set up for Mac or (I assume) Windows computer users — it’s all mobile based so far.
But I’ve read those features are coming soon. Read this article from the Wall Street Journal, if you want to know more about Threads.
So, here’s my dilemma and that of millions of other long-time Twitter users. Many — including me — have made their living posting items on behalf of employers to Twitter accounts that are well established and have many followers. Many thought leaders still post regularly to Twitter, although you can find many of the same folks over on Threads.
Instead of just dropping my Twitter account, I’m hanging on, checking both Threads and my Twitter feed on a fairly regular basis.
Until further notice, I’ll be tweeting and threading simultaneously. I welcome followers on both.
Twitter: @James_Stafford
Threads: @jimstafford
Below is a sample Threads post. Seems familiar?
Jim Stafford's BlogOKC 