Threads makes it easier to evangelize the open social web with a new direct link feature

Meta’s X competitor, Instagram Threads, is making it easier for users to access their fediverse settings from a single URL — or, rather, it’s making it easier on those who like to request that others turn on the fediverse sharing option on their accounts. Now, instead of posting a request that someone please turn on sharing, linked to some sort of explainer, they can link to a URL that pops up the option to enable the Threads feature with a single click.

The new option was demonstrated and launched live Thursday at FediForum, an online “unconference” for those who are developing and learning about the fediverse and related technology, including protocols like ActivityPub, the AT Protocol (which powers social networking startup Bluesky), Nostr (favored by Twitter co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey), and others.  

Fediverse sharing — meaning sharing Threads posts’ out to the open social web, which includes services like Mastodon and others powered by the ActivityPub protocol — is a key differentiator for Threads. Not only does it give Threads’ users’ content a broader reach, but it also represents a sizable effort from Meta’s engineering team to develop using open protocols that work with other services, instead of fully locking people into its own platform. 

However, fediverse sharing is not turned on by default in Threads. Because of this, many people don’t understand what it is or why it should be enabled. That’s led to others evangelizing the fediverse in the replies of popular Threads’ accounts, followed by a request to switch on sharing on their account.

After fediverse sharing is enabled, Threads users can post their content to both Meta’s own app as well as to the open social web at once. This is possible through Threads’ use of ActivityPub, established by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), which is designed to talk to other fediverse servers, like Mastodon or WordPress, that support it. 

The long-term goal is to allow Threads users to communicate with the wider open social web and vice versa, but it’s an ongoing process.

Threads users’ profiles can now be followed by those in the fediverse, and later, Threads users will be able to follow them back. They can also see the replies and likes from fediverse users on their own posts. More recently, Threads also added the ability to see the fediverse replies on other people’s posts, as well as support for syndicating content to the fediverse through the Threads API for third-party applications. 

Given the broader reach that fediverse sharing provides, most users would seemingly want to turn it on, but some may struggle with figuring out how to do so in the settings. The new, easily shareable URL — https://www.threads.net/settings/account/fediverse — will allow users to more easily make those requests. They can ask the user to turn on fediverse sharing and then point to the URL to pop up the exact setting where the feature can be enabled. 

It’s a small advance, but one that speaks to Meta’s enginerring team paying attention to how the fediverse community is trying to educate Threads users about the possibilities.