NYC/NJ Earthquake Fails to Trend on Threads Until Hours Later

Instagram Threads Misses Opportunity to Shine During East⁢ Coast Earthquake

Threads’ Delayed Reaction to Trending ⁤Topics

On Friday, when an earthquake shook⁣ the New York/New Jersey area, users flocked to X (formerly Twitter) to discuss the event. Earthquake-related terms quickly dominated X’s Trends section, with hashtags like #earthquake, “East Coast,” “Long Island,” “Philly,” “Manhattan,” and “Brooklyn” rising to the top. However, on Instagram’s text-focused social network, Threads, these terms didn’t register⁢ on ‍the⁣ trends section until nearly four hours after the earthquake struck at 10:30 ‌a.m. ET.

Threads’ Unique Tagging Convention

While⁤ people were indeed ‌discussing the earthquake on Threads, the platform’s lack of hashtags may ⁢have ⁣contributed to the delay in trending topics. Instead of ‌using the obvious #earthquake tag, Threads users have adopted a​ tagging convention of “[term] Threads,” such as “Tech Threads” or “NYC Threads.” This fragmentation of tags could prevent a single term from gaining the necessary momentum ‍to break into ⁤the top trends, even when referencing the ⁣same event.

Threads’ Trending Algorithm

According to Instagram, Threads’ top five trends are determined by various signals, including the number of people talking about a topic and the engagement with ⁣related posts. As the earthquake was a regional event, it may have taken more time for enough people to join the conversation and ⁣push the topic to the top of the ‍national ‌trends.

The Importance of Real-Time Information

Threads’ inability to keep up with trends in real-time could hinder its ability to compete with X. In contrast, Twitter’s founders quickly recognized the platform’s potential to deliver⁣ real-time information, as‌ evidenced by the San Francisco⁣ earthquake that rocked‌ the service in its early days. As co-founder Jack Dorsey recalled:

“… I was in the office on a Saturday, and my phone buzzed, and it was a tweet, and it ⁤said simply, ‘Earthquake.’ Immediately after that I actually felt the tremors in San⁣ Francisco. The phone kept buzzing, and there was,⁣ ‘earthquake,⁢ earthquake, earthquake.'”

This shared experience helped users feel connected and comforted, highlighting the power of real-time information on the platform.

Threads’ Challenges in Becoming a True X Alternative

Despite boasting⁢ 130 ‌million monthly active users,⁤ making it the largest player ⁣in the‌ “fediverse”⁤ of interconnected social networks like Mastodon, Misskey, Pixelfed, and PeerTube, Threads faces several challenges in becoming a true X alternative. These include its plan to distance itself from political discussions, its failure to deliver⁢ a true X-like experience with timely trends and relevant content, and the randomness of posts⁣ that ⁤fill users’ “For You” feeds.

As Max⁣ Read described in a March newsletter:

“Threads is the gas-leak social network. Everyone on‍ the platform, including you, seems to be suffering some kind of minor brain damage. … Who ​are these people? What are they talking about? Are they responding to something that I missed? Why am I reading this? ​How did it ⁤get into my feed? How am I supposed to react?”

If Threads can’t capitalize on real-time information, keep its trends current,⁢ and provide a coherent user experience, its ability to be a viable X alternative could suffer. While people may use it due to their dissatisfaction⁣ with X’s new⁤ direction or Elon Musk, they may never have a true⁤ X-like experience on the platform.