Threads Adds 35 Million More Members in November - But Bluesky's Traffic is Surging (theverge.com) 86
At the start of November Threads had 275 million members. But in 30 days it's apparently increased another 12%, reports The Verge:
Threads has accrued over 35 million signups so far in November and is "going on three months with more than a million signups a day," Meta spokesperson Alec Booker told The Verge in an email today. 20 million of those signups have come since November 14th, as Axios notes...
At the same time, Bluesky has seen a surge of interest. The platform grew to 15 million users earlier this month and continued to add about a million signups per day for several days. It now sits at over 22 million users.
Dave Earley, audience editor at Guardian Australia, says that traffic to TheGuardian.com from BlueSky "is already 2x that of Threads." [T]hat's on a straight threads.net vs bsky.app referral comparison. BUT! 75-80% of tracked referral from owned Bluesky account posts is NOT being attributed to bsky.app, so I'm certain organic traffic would be undercounting by that much as well. By which I mean, I'm pretty sure traffic from bsky.app to theguardian.com is *significantly* higher than the very obvious 2x that of Threads.
That post was in response to one by a platform VP for the Boston Globe newspaper, who'd reported that traffic from Bluesky to bostonglobe.com "is already 3x that of Threads, and we are seeing 4.5x the conversions to paying digital subscribers."
And Axios notes that Bluesky's growth "has spurred inbound interest for a new investment round, just weeks after raising $15 million in Series A funding, per Axios' Dan Primack."
In response, Threads "rolled out a series of changes over the past week in what was seen as an attempt to keep an edge over Bluesky," reports The Hill: The changes included a new custom feed feature, which gives users the ability to build their feeds around the topics and people they are most interested in. Bluesky lets users make their own lists and feeds and set their own content moderation preferences. The platform also rolled out a few "long-overdue improvements" to its search and trending now features and its algorithm.
At the same time, Bluesky has seen a surge of interest. The platform grew to 15 million users earlier this month and continued to add about a million signups per day for several days. It now sits at over 22 million users.
Dave Earley, audience editor at Guardian Australia, says that traffic to TheGuardian.com from BlueSky "is already 2x that of Threads." [T]hat's on a straight threads.net vs bsky.app referral comparison. BUT! 75-80% of tracked referral from owned Bluesky account posts is NOT being attributed to bsky.app, so I'm certain organic traffic would be undercounting by that much as well. By which I mean, I'm pretty sure traffic from bsky.app to theguardian.com is *significantly* higher than the very obvious 2x that of Threads.
That post was in response to one by a platform VP for the Boston Globe newspaper, who'd reported that traffic from Bluesky to bostonglobe.com "is already 3x that of Threads, and we are seeing 4.5x the conversions to paying digital subscribers."
And Axios notes that Bluesky's growth "has spurred inbound interest for a new investment round, just weeks after raising $15 million in Series A funding, per Axios' Dan Primack."
In response, Threads "rolled out a series of changes over the past week in what was seen as an attempt to keep an edge over Bluesky," reports The Hill: The changes included a new custom feed feature, which gives users the ability to build their feeds around the topics and people they are most interested in. Bluesky lets users make their own lists and feeds and set their own content moderation preferences. The platform also rolled out a few "long-overdue improvements" to its search and trending now features and its algorithm.
Seems only the hate-mongers will remain on Twitter (Score:3, Insightful)
Kind of fitting with Elon-the-asshole in charge.
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Difficult to have open conversations with bots, russian psyops, and actual Nazi's, along with actual sexist people ("Your body, my choice", isn't something we can really have an open conversation about).
There's disagreements and there's "You don't have any right to exist" and "Status quo is just fine, just shutup and tolerate being denigrated as subhuman for merely EXISTING, without any action"
I imagine you will be arguing people should be having open conversations on who will be rounded up and put into con
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So you are part of the problem and proud of that? How repulsive.
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Exactly.
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The amount of projection with right-wingers is absolutely fascinating. I have never seen more censorship than with a conservative subreddit or forum. You think Republicans aren't well-known for having to "toe the line"? You act on feelings, and are willing to lie and distort reality to satisfy what you want to feel.
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20 goto 10
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Oh yes, and whenever one of them posts something so terrible that even their co-ideologues can't stomach it and downvote them, they claim brigading. Conservatives have to be some of the most thin-skinned people I've ever encountered.
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There is another type to add before that. Individuals that despise reality and truth. We live in a dangerous time because that is an inexplicably large number of individuals.
Funny how the biggest liars always claim to have truth. Well, not so funny actually: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Re:Seems only the hate-mongers will remain on Twit (Score:5, Informative)
It's hard to hold a conversation about any topic when the disagreeable people are simply trying to flood you own by posting crap in response.
It's one thing if the responses were informed debate. But no, it generally devolves into general hatred all around - racism, misogyny and other crap whose aim is to simply make it impossible to provide informed replies.
It's like debating the benefits of cycling around town, when the people opposed, rather than bring up honest arguments and counter evidence, simply decide to "roll coal" at "the greenies". (If you don't get it, it's what happens if you squirt diesel in the tailpipe - it causes a huge plume of black smoke to be emitted from the tailpipe).
Debate is impossible if the other side refuses to debate. That is the reason for free speech - that the solution to disagreeable speech is more speech.
But as long as Elon decides things like "cis" are banned terms, or some topics are just to rile up his people, more speech just won't happen. It's not unusuak for Elon to post something that's partially true, but the nuance is lost - the whole point is to get people to repost it blindly without thinking or critical analysis - to extract the truth from that nugget.
Elon calls himself an engineer, but he goes for the emotional response without engaging his logical thinking side to actually see what's going on.
Not that Bluesky is likely any different. Though the primary appeal is that both sides can debate something (i.e., "more speech") equally since no one can really control it or censor it.
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Before the racist apartheid nepobaby took it over, it at least tried to flush the garbage and suppress the Nazis and bots. Now its leader unbans and promotes them.
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The other thing that really made conversation difficult on Twitter is that people who pay Elon for a blue check go to the top of the replies, so the first thing you see are a load of "me too!" and "lol [meme]" shitposts.
Bluesky is, at least for now, vastly better.
Re: Seems only the hate-mongers will remain on Twi (Score:3)
You understand that your complaints, reversed, are why musk bought Twitter in the first place, yeah?
It was an echo chamber that only promoted one view then, too. It's just that at that time the hip and cool kids agreed with the censorship so it was fine.
I'm not saying flipping it right ward was an improvement, but the number of media-supported hoaxes that never would have been publicly discussed otherwise...is sizable.
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Me and a few friends are actively trying to design a system where we can enable such conversations and debate. One of the ideas is to split the threads in a few subgroups, based on the quality of the debate. Have people who sling shit, do it to each other and people who want to debate long form, can do it with other debaters. LLMs could help, but they also make it easier to disguise poo as debate.
Got any ideas ?
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p>Elon calls himself an engineer,
Elon Musk is not an engineer. That is just his big ego talking.
Re:Seems only the hate-mongers will remain on Twit (Score:5, Insightful)
The only people moving away from X are individuals who are are unable to have open conversations with people they don't agree with.
The same could be said about people who are staying. Just sayin', it cuts both ways and your comment is pretty closed/narrow-minded too. To be fair, it's hard to have discussions with people who believe fiction to be fact and are unwilling to consider, or care about, the actual truth.
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Well then you will absolutely LOVE this new service called bsky, they have absolutely zero protections against bots and even encourage bot creation!
Have you not realized that social media does not actually solve problems, but merely pretends to at the surface level but under the covers acts like every other hazardous social media service?
https://docs.bsky.app/docs/starter-templates/bots [bsky.app]
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Only to somebody who actually is one. A clear view of yourself is not part of _that_ package.
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This is well understood: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Well, understood by those that have some actual education and insight. Of course, the propaganda-pushers lack both.
It is als very telling how almost all of them post anon. Dishonesty starts right there. Somebody posting anon does _not_ want an honest exchange.
Re: Seems only the hate-mongers will remain on Twi (Score:2)
...He said, his self-righteousness blinding him to the rather obvious irony...
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You wish. Oh, and a response on the level of a petulant 3 year old just makes you look retarded.
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You literally just said "they're full of hate" and then called their owner an asshole...out of love?
How oblivious ARE you?
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Okay, but I wish you'd gone for a joke. Something about "Who forgot to flush the cesspool formerly known as Twitter?"
For what little it's worth, I think Bluesky looks nicer than Mastodon, but I like the design ideas of Mastodon more. Neither of them seems to have a viable business model, unfortunately. I won't touch Threads or any other Zuckerberg production if there is any way to avoid it. (I used the less vile cesspool known as Twitter for some years and was an early user of Facebook until 2022.)
Blink...and? (Score:2)
I had a peanut butter and jam sandwich. Grape jam specifically. I prefer jam to jelly or preserves as it spreads better. Nothing special about the peanut butter, just skippy, so likely nearly as much oil and peanut but it was yummy as could be an 100% whole wheat bread.
See editors, my completely pointless post is already worth more then this drivel you are posting about meta bullshit. No one on Slashdot fucking cares how many idiots are on threads.
While the government shouldn't be involved, it will actually
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Grape pb&j - it's a classic, but over the years, I have come to savor strawberry pb&j even more.
We just had a conversation, about pb&j. It was a feel good conversation. Nostalagia. Happiness. Makes me hungry for a gooey drippy pb&j sandwich right now. What can be bad?
So, your point is is not pointless. And as you correctly imply, your point and this conversation may be worth more than anything on Twitter-X these days or stories about its wannabe clones.
The government can ban social med
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Crofton's Raspberry Jelly. Best of Strawberry and Grape in a single flavor. Plus it's organic and can be found at your local supermarket
worth adding (Score:1, Flamebait)
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he never invented anything
he is just spending government money
he enables fascists on twitter
he promised we would be driving self-driving cars on Mars by now, just to get money from investors
he killed my dad
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You seem mad when people point out facts.
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it's funny
laugh
https://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=23525855&cid=64958889
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Nothing funny about it
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#AccidentalAlly
Don't forget the Lemmyverse as well (Score:3)
Actual signups? (Score:3)
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However if Threads is adding over a quarter of a million users, but engagement is flat, that simply doesn't add up. Especially when you consider that Zuck has added a Bsky feature to Threads (Lists) that should make engagement even easier
I don't think Bluesky will last (Score:1)
Re: I don't think Bluesky will last (Score:1, Troll)
Re: I don't think Bluesky will last (Score:5, Interesting)
If Bluesky would give the intolerant lefties a place to vent, while leaving normal folks in peace, then it would not be a bad thing.
Try again [imgur.com]. What you really meant to say is there is a large group of people whose only response to everything is MAGA! and who is unwilling to listen to, let alone consider, any idea which contradicts their bigotry. For example, when you tell them the stock market, as a rule, does better under Democrats than Republicans, they lose their shit despite the facts speaking for themselves. When you tell them that women trying to be seen as equal to men don't commit 80% of all violent crime [imgur.com], or that 99% of all murders are committed by men, they will immediately change the subject.
So try again.
Re: I don't think Bluesky will last (Score:5, Interesting)
One (one!) of the sad things is that they don't realize the slippery slope they're on and how easy it is to be deemed "not MAGA enough" and banished. This is a group that revolves around exclusion and sooner or later many inside this circle will find themselves on the outside because of the slightest thing. They were fooled once, and I sympathize but not for this second time. The first time around, many wanted to offer, or hoped for, the benefit of the doubt, but that doesn't exist this time; they know what they were getting, this is what they voted for and (apparently) support. They made their bed...
(Also, spot-on about the rest of your comment.)
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they will immediately change the subject
You mean the same way the left leaning people change the subject when you would like to discuss things like:
- Men having 0 decision power on abortion? If women can abort their child, why can men not "reject" their paternal responsibilities? They are essentially told: "suck it up, if you didn't want kids you should not have had sexual relations".
- Men having significantly heavier penalties for the same crimes
- Men un-aliving themselves way more than women
- Women not being subject to military draft
Easy to filter (Score:2)
It's okay if I don't listen to you or the guy posting cartoon animals with boners.
Re: I don't think Bluesky will last (Score:2)
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It's time for my preferred artist: https://thedevilspanties.com/a... [thedevilspanties.com]
I suspect you've never used BlueSky.
Yep, that's why everyone is complaining about BlueSky.
Maybe you mean Twitter/X? Yep, that's why people are leaving Twitter/X: There are more dumb people on BlueSky. That's why the normal people on Twitter are complaining about the 'problem' people leaving.
I just heard people complain the Democratic party is too leftist. Books are banned, Christian theology is a school subject, abortions are illega
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Threads (Score:2)
Threads is (sic) not growing. People are not flocking to it.
Instagram with its over a billion of users has been pushing Threads via ads incessantly ever since Threads was released. People have been installing and using it out of FOMO.
Can Mark Zuckerberg please release the stats on how many people are actually posting to Threads on a regular basis? What about commenting? Because that would indicate real growth. Not these sign-ups.
I guess he won't. Investors won't like it.
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X is popular as usual and I even hear about Bluesky recently, but never heard anything about Threads apart from their statistics, they must be inflated.
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Another useful stat would be how many Threads users exist without an IG account.
Oh wait, you can't make one without an IG account.
It really is totally dependent on them pushing it through IG, I get notifications to 'check this out on Threads'.
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Less compelling (Score:5, Interesting)
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wonder what musk is thinking at this time... (Score:2)
wonder what musk is thinking at this time.. .considering the pile of cash he burned buying up Twitter and running it straight into the ground. And a clone of the original Twitter just absorbing all the user base.
Maybe this is why he's pumping DOGE coin... trying to make up for the losses.
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yes, the rise in the stock prices of his other companies paid for most of that loss he incurred. It was fashionable to call him an idiot but looking retrospectively the valuation of his companies was never particularly following market fundamentals. He's a good marketer for the online influencer era where getting loads of attention does have a reality distorting effect
"Oh goody, a new toy!" (Score:1)
Twitter/X became a toy for a spoiled rich brat. While he didn't intend to break it, he's not that bothered by it breaking because Don let him play with the Federal Gov't now...
Zero interest in either or other social media (Score:2)
Bluesky and opensource (Score:2)
Not much could be worse, than twitter of today (Score:2)
Logic of the feed in the several recent weeks on former Twitter is ruined by the promotion of particular set: pro-ruZZia, anti-Israel, MAGA, all of which are opposite to my usual interest. Musk is using promotion of this to force upon reader. It was coming in the same manner intermittently months ago, back then did last several days to week. So far, permanent now. Way to kill Twitter. Pity.