Meta might soon be coming up with its own Twitter rival. The parent company of Facebook and Instagram has announced that it is working on building a standalone text-based decentralized social network.
The move comes when Twitter is struggling to sustain its users after the takeover by Elon Musk last year. Meta is now planning to attract users looking for alternatives to Twitter. Read on to know more about the new social network in the works.
Meta Working on Twitter-Rival Social Media Platform
The project is code-named P92. A Meta spokesperson confirmed the development with a statement on March 10: “We’re exploring a standalone decentralized social network for sharing text updates. We believe there’s an opportunity for a separate space where creators and public figures can share timely updates about their interests.”
The platform will reportedly be Instagram-branded, and users will be able to log into the text-based network with their Instagram credentials. The new platform will reportedly have a number of Twitter-like features, including resharing, posting images and videos, and sharing tappable links in posts with previews.
It will also have the option to view bio, username handle, and verification badges. The project is said to be in the early stages and is being led by Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram.
The New Platform will be Decentralized
Meta is planning to decentralize the platform, unlike Instagram and Facebook. It basically means users will be able to create their servers or communities with their own rules. It will also allow third-party apps to be built into the platform.
“The plan as of now is that the MVP (minimum viable product) will definitely allow our users to broadcast posts to people on other servers. It may or may not enable our users to follow and view the content of people on other servers,” a source close to the development has revealed.
“The team is also discussing whether to have the ability to reshare content like Twitter apart from business and creator accounts. A rights manager will be integrated from the beginning for first party content, but probably not for third party content from other apps and servers,” said another insider.
The platform will have a supplemental privacy policy along with Meta’s existing privacy policy. “P92 users will be notified of and agree to this notice/terms when signing up to P92. Eventually, the graph will split and, after initial sign up, the data sharing from Instagram to P92 will be minimal, if not none,” revealed the source.
Twitter Users have been Looking for Alternatives Since Musk Took Over
A huge number of Twitter users are said to be disappointed with the change in policies on Twitter even since Musk took over in October 2022. Some alternatives have started rising to prominence since then. Mastodon, a decentralized social network that has been around since 2016, has reached from 300,000 users to over 2.5 million in recent months.
Another micro-blogging platform, named Koo, was launched in 2020 and now boasts over 450 million active users, second only to Twitter. Truth Social and Gettr have also seen an increase in userbase since Musk started leading Twitter.
For more news and updates, keep watching this space.
