Instagram Threads, a competitor to Meta X, is making it easier for users to access their Fediverse settings from a single URL, meaning it's now easier for people who want to request that others turn on the Fediverse sharing option on their accounts. Now, instead of posting a request to turn on sharing linked to some description, you can link to a URL that will pop up an option to enable the threads feature with a single click.
The new option was demonstrated and announced live on Thursday at FediForum, an online “unconference” for people developing and learning about the Fediverse and related technologies, including protocols such as ActivityPub, AT Protocol (which powers social networking startup Bluesky) and Nostr (backed by Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey).
Fediverse sharing (sharing Threads posts to the open social web, including services that adopt the ActivityPub protocol, such as Mastodon) is a key differentiator for Threads. Not only does it give Threads users' content a wider reach, it also demonstrates the hard work put in by Meta's engineering team to develop using open protocols that work with other services, rather than locking users completely into a proprietary platform.
However, on Threads, Fediverse sharing is not turned on by default, which means many people don't understand what it is or why they need to enable it. As a result, we've seen people promoting Fediverse in replies on popular Threads accounts, requesting that sharing be turned on for their own accounts.
Image credit: Screenshot from Threads
With Fediverse sharing enabled, Threads users can post content to both Meta's own app and the open social web simultaneously. This is made possible by Threads' use of ActivityPub, established by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), which is designed to communicate with other Fediverse servers that support it, such as Mastodon and WordPress.
The long-term goal is to enable Threads users to communicate with the broader open social web and vice versa, but this is an ongoing process.
Threads users' profiles can currently be followed by users in fediverse, and in the future Threads users will be able to follow back. They can also see replies and likes from fediverse users on their posts. Threads has recently added the ability to see fediverse replies to other people's posts, as well as support for syndicating content to fediverse through the Threads API for third-party applications.
Given the broad reach of Fediverse sharing, we know most users will want to turn it on, but some may not know how to turn it on in their settings. With a new easy-to-share URL (https://www.threads.net/settings/account/fediverse), we're making it even easier for users to make the request. When you ask a user to turn on Fediverse sharing and point them to the URL, a popup will appear with the exact settings they can use to enable the feature.
It's a small step forward, but it shows that Meta's engineering team is paying attention to the Fedeverse community as they work to educate Threads users on the possibilities.