Why Twitter Needs to Die

To fulfil the potential of a global town square, the current Twitter product needs to give way to something new

Interrupting regular programming about the Indian consumer to talk a bit about the new kid on the consumer social block - Threads

So I just created my Threads account, which means I am probably user number 108,578,124, testament to the absolutely wild growth for another element in Zucks 'I will own all your attention' strategy. The fact that it prompted him to abandon his 11 year moratorium on Twitter and get into a conversation with the king of all shitposters (Musk) should signal how important this is to him.

https://twitter.com/finkd/status/1676747594460962817

Zuck meme game still strong

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First impressions - Threads doesn’t feel like Twitter

I mean if the narrative that you’ve sold to build the fastest growing consumer app of all time is ‘This is going to be a better Twitter’, then the least the new product should do is feel like Twitter?

So although, Threads does look like Twitter, it feels more like the bastard child of Twitter and Instagram, with a definite bias towards Instagram, powering its growth based on Instagram's social graph. This is the biggest reason that today it doesn't feel like a better Twitter experience to a core Twitter user. So the very real risk for Threads is that the core Twitter audience ditches Threads after a short run.

But this might actually be the right call in the long run. I'll explain why I think so.

Threads is Instagram’s Explore Feed, with the UX giving more importance to text

Despite Tiktok taking over the world with its algorithmic feed, and Twitter and Instagram leaning heavily into algorithmic feeds, these two products still rely a lot on their follow/friend graphs. It made sense for Threads to bootstrap using Instagrams social graph, but that means Threads today is a Twitter UX built on Instagrams social graph, and on Day 1 the experience is very different from what a Twitter user expects.

So if a Twitter user looking for a better Twitter-like experience (or just a platform without Musk-ian shenanigans) signed up to Threads, he would want (?) and expect an angst-ridden, politics/tech/journalism heavy feed. This is what he had spent time and effort building on Twitter by working through his follow graph, and engaging with the right posts.

Instead, he is greeted by an (average?) combination of a follow + mostly algorithmic feed driven by his Instagram social graph, where the content and emotion (and feeling?) is the exact opposite of what is on Twitter.

To me, Threads is like my Instagram Explore feed with text captions on top instead of at the bottom of the post (like Instagram does), and none of the angst. It's almost like someone at Meta suddenly realised there was a lot of value in Instagram’s text captions and comments, which was not being well served by Instagrams UX and social graph. (Indeed Instagram today is many different large products in one semi-clunky interface, held together tenuously by your social graph.)

Is this how Instagram would look if the captions were on top, and comments were at the same visual level?

The Twitter local minima

Twitter's core growth loop was for the longest time focused on its public graph, driven by follows of celebrities and influencers in the politics/tech/journalism ecosystem (it shifted to an algorithmic feed fairly late in its evolution). The broad strategy Twitter used was to make sure important public voices were on its platform, and to get new users to follow those accounts to populate their first feed. With these mechanics (a chronological text first follow feed + important people tweeting), it attracted a certain kind of user base, and created a very specific kind of discussion forum which fuelled its growth to IPO. Even today if you want to hear from a world leader or want the latest trending news you’re going to Twitter, but to hear from the Kardashians you're going to Instagram.

The image that Twitter formed among users in its early days has persisted, despite various and accelerating efforts (especially in the last few years) to re-ignite growth. This included a mix of internationalisation (focused launches and localisation for newer markets) and launching new features (Spaces, subscriptions++)

Despite multiple features launched to increase its user base, mostly what has happened is that the core user base stayed and started using the new features, and the promised new user growth did not materialise. Twitter spaces is a good example - today spaces is just another way for the existing Twitter community to be more engaged, and not really attract a new audience. In a sense Twitter has gotten itself stuck in a local minima.

Twitter Spaces are still political, giving the core audience another format to engage - Link

Building a global town square, not a better Twitter

So what exactly is Zuck trying to do when he says someone needs to do a better job at Twitter than Twitter? While he has supercharged Threads growth with Instagrams graph, the core experience of the politics heavy outrage first Twitter is lost, to be replaced by something with Twitter’s UX and Instagram’s emotions.

And this actually might be the right strategic call - the way to build a better 'global town square' is likely to break out of the local minima that Twitter's core experience and growth path put it in, and thus get access to a larger market. The fact that Twitter continues to exist is testament to the need for such a product, but now there is some long overdue competition from a legit heavyweight, and if that means that Twitter dies, and gives way to a better product, well so be it.

Side note: I am obviously staying away from the concentrating power in the hands of corporations for something as important as a global town square, but first things first, there needs to be a better and more useful product first.

This need for a better global town square what Zuck is betting on - powered by his already strong social graphs on Meta, plus the algorithms required to isolate real time trends and make discussions more meaningful, compared to the product shambles that Twitter is today.

Of course, to do this there needs to be a lot of thoughtful product building between now and the next 6 months, which would probably include a better follow feed, figuring out how to move some of the outrage micro networks from Twitter (but not all of it), and ensuring Threads doesn't cannibalise Instagrams core features (like comments, where a lot of the text based discussion happens).

But if I had to put money on someone to do it right, it would be this guy, wouldn’t it?

Zuck doing Zuck things

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Bonus: Recommended deeper reading for consumer social product nerds

1. Ben Thompson - Threads and the Social Communications Map

2. Eugene Wei - How to blow up a timeline