Meta launched its widely anticipated social networking app Threads on Thursday, offering users hopes of quality service and presenting the biggest threat yet to Twitter.
But the app is coming with a problematic option for users: if you terminate your Threads account, you lose your Instagram account.
Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg at least 10 million users signed up for Threads in its first seven hours.
– Challenge for users
The text-based Threads is linked closely to Instagram. Users are allowed to confirm their new accounts using their existing Instagram credentials. Non-Instagram users can also customise Threads profiles independently.
The app allows users to follow the same accounts they do on Instagram. Users can post short text updates of up to 500 characters, links, photos, and videos up to 5 minutes in length.
Threads’s high promise of being able to displace Twitter, where competitors Bluesky, Mastadon and Truth Social failed, is its being connected to Instagram and the 2 billion users already on that platform.
But the tie to Instagram poses a big challenge for users.
“You may deactivate your Threads profile at any time, but your Threads profile can only be deleted by deleting your Instagram account,” Threads says in its Supplemental Privacy Policy.
The stipulation has shocked many users.
“I deactivated my threads account already but it turns out you can’t delete your threads account *without also deleting your Instagram account* so maybe just don’t sign up!,” said Twitter user Emily Hughes.
I deactivated my threads account already but it turns out you can’t delete your threads account *without also deleting your Instagram account* so maybe just don’t sign up!
— emily hughes ✨ (@emilyhughes) July 6, 2023
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