Meta has decided to launch its own social media app in a direct challenge to Twitter. The WSJ writes: “Let the battle begin. Facebook parent Meta Platforms on Wednesday announced the launch of Threads, a stand-alone microblogging app that takes direct aim at Twitter as user unrest in that platform has grown since Elon Musk took the company over in October.”
The rise of social media as a news source and opinion shaper is eating away at the influence of traditional media platforms. Fewer people, mostly oldsters, still watch TV. Already, “almost half of Americans use social media as a news source, according to the Pew Research Center.” With the 2024 elections right around the corner, Musk’s acquisition of Twitter cannot go unanswered.
But the phenomenon is larger than just confirming the increasing importance of social media for news. Many separate pieces are moving toward what might be called a new information system that will have far more potential impact than the old tube. Social media, AI and even crypto are converging in as yet poorly understood ways to comprise an emerging environment that will come to provide:
- recommended content, as vetted by fact-checkers;
- sentiment analysis, which identifies the emotional tone behind a body of text;
- automated moderation, to create a safer online experience;
- creation of filter bubbles, so individuals are grouped with users whose content aligns with positive beliefs and interests;
- data capture as training material for machine content creation;
- protection from misinformation and algorithmic bias;
- virtual consensus.
Of course, it will all be tied together by artificial intelligence. It will be a whole new world and the big players know it. Meta’s entry into the fray only underscores how important it’s become.
