Instagram (Meta) is developing a “text-based app” that will compete with Twitter. This new app is currently being tested by “celebrities and influencers,” and has been secretly available to selected content creators for several months, according to sources close to the matter. Bloomberg was the first to report about this on Friday.
The app, which will run separately from Instagram but will allow accounts to be linked, could appear as early as June, according to Lia Haberman, lecturer in social media and influencer marketing at UCLA.
Haberman also suggests that the app could be compatible with other Twitter-competitive apps in the future, including Mastodon.
Haberman:
“We know from past experience that Meta likes to try out and reproduce features from other apps and third-party tools, based on what they think will be popular with their users. Given Meta’s history of borrowing from other platforms, it is much more likely that they will get there first by merging all these experiences they are building.”
Based on a (somewhat blurry) example I got, Meta’s new app looks a lot like Twitter.
So, could this take over all the Twitter screenshots we’ve been seeing on the Feed lately? Maybe.
It’s impossible to predict how audiences will respond but this could be an alternative. pic.twitter.com/xgQa1kUjCl
– Lia Haberman (@liahaberman) May 19, 2023
