I’m still hopelessly addicted to Instagram. When Reddit shut down third party apps, including the only sane way to view Reddit (Apollo), I quit cold turkey. You know what happened once when I tried to quit smoking? I started drinking more coffee. People often find they lose weight when they start smoking because, instead of feeding their cravings for a snack, they have a cigarette. Humans want to be addicted to something. It’s this loop of dopamine that we just need. So, when we give up one addiction, we often find something else. For me, it’s been Instagram.
So, Instagram figured out I like webcomics. It started showing me some webcomics. Hey, as long as they’re not showing other people hate speech, right? … Right? Anyway, this one made me have an epiphany.
Also, I only just realized that “PizzaCake” sounds like “Piece of Cake” if you don’t put a bit of a ‘t’ sound in “pizza.” How? How did it take me so long to notice that?
Now, PizzaCake is a comic for everyday observations. It’s a safe comic… mostly. It has a brand. It is known. It made me realize something: there hasn’t been a place for brands since Twitter took a nose dive. The people who want to elevate their personal brand, or a company’s brand, hasn’t had a Nazi-free place with some moderation, a shining reputation, and, you know, a near zero chance of having your posts end up next to Nazi propaganda. That is, until Meta introduced Threads. Now there’s a safe space to talk to consumers as a brand.
How is Meta Brand Safe??
That’s a fair question. I mean, Facebook, Meta’s main and first product, and the original name of the megacorp that is now called “Meta” shouldn’t have a shining reputation. They’ve caused a genocide in Myanmar, which may have helped support a coup in Myanmar, they have elevated hate speech in Ethiopia and promoted violence, and it was the go-to place to plan the January 6th attack on the Capitol. Insurrections, genocide, coups, how the hell is that safer than Twitter? How does Facebook keep getting away with this?
The answer is: Meta’s platforms, including Facebook, tries. They do the bare minimum. They remove some hate. Sometimes, when you report a hateful comment, or calls for violence, or a post telling you that vaccines cause 5G connections, you can get it removed. Facebook removes just enough hate from the Facebook pages of wealthy countries to get away with having a shining brand image. That makes it “brand safe.” Because, even though hate proliferates on the platforms it manages, Meta does just enough to make it seem like those are a fluke, rather than standard practice. Is it true? Of course not. Facebook shares more fake news than real news and has reportedly inspired violence and genocide. But Meta has kept their brand image looking clean, and that’s all the corporations like McDonald’s or the self-promoting creators need. Meta is “safe.”
Brands Need a Brand Safe Place, and Threads is That
Twitter is not a safe place for brands. Musk made it a safe place for Nazis and people using blood libel to push followers to violence and terror attacks, which made it unsafe for anyone’s brand image outside of far-right circles. You could tweet something and have it show up next to a tweet for a Nazi propaganda film, or someone suggesting some children’s hospital is “dangerous” and someone should do something. How do you go from wishing a character a happy birthday with a milkshake to Nazi propaganda? How does the latter not affect your thoughts on the former? It’s simple, it does. Seeing McDonald’s ads next to Nazi propaganda will make you go, “Why does McDonald’s want this?”
But on Threads, you won’t find Nazi propaganda videos. You won’t even find a feed just of your friends and the people you follow. No. From day one, Threads was about one thing: brands. Your feed is from trending and popular posts from across the site. Promoted Threads from verified accounts. You start up Threads and you find professional athletes, fast food restaurants, and Mark Zuckerberg doing his best human impression as he interacts with those PR teams. That’s what Threads is for: marketing. From the data collection for better ad targeting to the feed that is just full of brands, Threads is for marketing.
You, once again, are not the consumer, but the product. Zuckerberg promises these brands that they have a safe place to end up on people’s phone screens, and they come running.
RIP Twitter
Facebook grew to over 30 million users in a single day, and that’s without European users because Meta, for some reason, just didn’t go to Europe with Threads. Meta made Threads so brands that don’t want to rub elbows with the Nazis that Elon Musk actively welcomes on Twitter could find a place that’s safe to be a brand. You know, just be your brand image. Safe, shiny, appealing brands. That’s what Threads is, it’s marketing. And 30 million have already signed up to sit and scroll through those curated ads. Threads is for brands, and that’s why it’s going to be the death of Twitter. People love brands, they love laughing with Wendy’s and making Grimace memes. Now, people found their new and “safer” way to be addicted to those brand interactions.
Happy scrolling!