A “First Listen” to Threads

I judge radio industry conventions not by the number of people who attend, but by the quality of the content in the panels, and my conversations outside the panel room. For the latter, that’s whether I can find the right mix of old and new friends at any given moment. Organizers and sponsors want the most possible attendees. I just want a steady stream of good conversations at any given moment. Too many people isn’t always a good thing. I’m happy to get to the airport and not get a “are you still here?” text from someone I meant to connect with.  

As I write this, Threads is just about to hit its first week as Meta’s competitor to Twitter, and all of these things are true:

• It is off to the fastest start of any social network, and certainly a much faster start than any of the Twitter alternatives of the past six months. I have found a lot of radio and industry people who are already on after six days.
• That said, at this writing, I have about 5% of the Twitter followers that I have built up over the course of 15 years. So do most radio people. Country Insider’s Brian Mansfield is at 793 followers. I must praise him as a social media titan.
• There have been stories about Twitter usage being down sharply (and counterclaims from Twitter about it being the highest ever). My Twitter engagements are still about 6:1 over Threads, but, again, that’s with a 15-year lead time. 
• Twitter also has a lot of functionality that Threads does not, at least at this writing—no desktop version, no ability to post .GIFs, no hashtags, no direct messaging. All of those inhibit early interaction.

Threads launched last Wednesday, by the following Monday and Tuesday, I was already seeing some “is this thing on?” comments from users. Morning teams and station feeds were using some of their sure-fire icebreakers and getting only a handful of responses. There was, of course, a lively thread on whether pineapple is an acceptable pizza topping, but that one originated outside radio. (Pictures of the doggo seemed to work, too.) 

In general, the most robust threads and follower counts went to those corporate accounts that had already been using Instagram effectively. The Billboard account was already hosting robust dialogues. The Country Music Association account wasn’t posting steadily, but still had a lot of followers. On the radio side, WKTU New York has more than 3,000 followers and is posting regularly, but with only a handful of responses each time.

My social media content has always been limited to music and radio. To the extent that the people I interact with have shared more than that, I have been surprised by the variety of people I have encountered on Threads, and sense that there are a wider-than-you-might-expect variety of beliefs represented. Whatever their politics otherwise, at least a few people appear to be fed up with Twitter’s kluginess. Others may be trying to stake out a corner of the cafeteria without a 24/7 food fight.

That will be offset by those who are as or more concerned about Mark Zuckerberg than Elon Musk. (A lot of the concerns I’ve seen about the Meta-verse are expressed, as it happens, on Facebook.) Some radio and social media people are publicly unenthusiastic about having another account to keep up. I’ve also seen plenty of prominent Twitter voices who express concerns about the site, but aren’t ready to rebuild a huge audience from scratch. (Those are the “…and give up show business?” people.)

(UPDATE: It’s a week later, things are noticeably slower, and the “is anybody out there?” postings are the only ones picking up. A lot of users, including many of the ones who most surprised me by being here in the first place, haven’t posted yet. That said, when I go back to Twitter, the activity is better but the tenor is more jarring than ever. On Twitter, about 60% of my thread ends up being political and/or contentious. On Threads, I might go for more than 20 tweets without politics or controversy.)

Whether Threads is worthwhile for you at this moment depends on what you want from it and what effort you are willing to put into it. It’s much better if you are willing to be the person who goes to the dance floor first. My sure-fire conversation starter posts haven’t been nearly as effective in finding followers as engaging with friends’ posts and letting them know that I’m here. And whatever the “right time to Tweet” might be, I can tell you that my best engagement on Threads has been around 9-11 p.m.

Radio has decades of “random acts of social media” with mixed results. Already overburdened stations and personalities may be skeptical about putting in any more work. If there’s a value, it’s the early share-of-eyeballs among those users who are on. (I am more aware of WKTU’s socials now.) Those early convention hallway discussions are always some of my favorites, especially when they result in a new friend or a first really good conversation with somebody who has been a casual acquaintance until then. 

At 3 p.m. on Wednesday afternoon, the hallways are feeling kinda slow to me. It’s not unlike day six of a radio station’s 20,000 songs in a row launch where I’ve heard all the “oh wow” songs, but there are no jocks yet. But I’m saving any final judgment for when there’s full functionality. Unlike Twitter, the full story will probably reveal itself in less than 15 years, but 15 days (or eight) will be too soon, as well. Right now, it all comes down to your social media needs and worldview.

If you are on Threads, you can find me there (or across social media) @rossonradio.