Meta’s new text-based social app Threads has quickly gained 100 million users since launching last week, which appears to be negatively impacting traffic on Twitter. According to web analytics, Twitter traffic declined 5-11% over the first two days Threads was available compared to the previous week. Threads was able to grow rapidly by allowing users to sign up with their existing Instagram accounts and bring over some of their followers. However, Threads has not yet launched in Europe due to regulatory issues. The fast growth of Threads may solidify its position as a real competitor to Twitter, which has over 238 million daily active users.
Yes, having state-run instances of federated social media would be an excellent way to both legitimize the fediverse and remove some of the control that these mega-corporations have. There’s no reason why privately- or corporate-run instances could not exist alongside these instances, and would still serve to combat potential state or corporate censorship.