That is Instagram’s new Twitter competitor

We lastly have an concept of what Instagram’s rumored text-based Twitter competitor would possibly feel and look like, as reported by Lia Haberman, who shared in her ICYMI Substack e-newsletter what seems to be a leaked advertising slide and particulars concerning the app.

The slide doesn’t give the app a separate title — as a substitute, it simply calls it “Instagram’s new text-based app for conversations” — however the app is seemingly codenamed P92 or, alternately, Barcelona, in keeping with Haberman. Customers will be capable of register with their Instagram username and password, and your followers, deal with, bio, and verification will switch over from the principle app.

Within the app, you’ll see a feed, and you may make textual content posts as much as 500 characters lengthy with connected hyperlinks, images, and movies.

The app appears to be like just about like when you combined Instagram and Twitter collectively, based mostly on two screenshots included within the leaked advertising slide. And Meta will apparently have some good moderation controls from the beginning, “equipping you with settings to manage who can reply to you and point out your account,” the slide says. Any accounts you’ve blocked on Instagram will apparently carry over.

Maybe most importantly, although, the brand new Instagram textual content app could have a component of decentralization as properly. “Quickly, our app will probably be suitable with sure different apps like Mastodon,” Instagram’s slide says. “Customers on these different apps will be capable of seek for, comply with and work together together with your profile and content material when you’re public, or when you’re non-public and approve them as followers.” (Presumably that compatibility will come by way of ActivityPub, which Meta has been exploring alongside different tech firms.)

If the app is launched extensively, it might make Instagram an much more in style vacation spot than it already is. With the continued worsening of Twitter, many individuals are on the lookout for their subsequent place to share tweet-like updates. Whereas platforms like Mastodon and Bluesky have gained some traction, a text-based Instagram app would provide a method for individuals who have already constructed followings on the platform to simply preserve posting there with out having to scrounge for followers in one more place.

Meta declined to remark. In March, it supplied the next assertion about its efforts to Platformer: “We’re exploring a standalone decentralized social community for sharing textual content updates. We imagine there’s a possibility for a separate area the place creators and public figures can share well timed updates about their pursuits.”