Is Threads really concerned about the rise of Bluesky?

Well, yes and no, though it depends on what exactly you mean by "concerned" in this context.

First off, to clarify the situation, Twitter clone app Bluesky, which was originally launched as an internal Twitter project, and is staffed by former Twitter employees, has jumped from 9 million users in September, to 20 million today.

Now, 20 million is still a long way off of Threads' 275 million actives, so it's not like Bluesky is suddenly breathing down Threads' neck on overall popularity, while neither app is anywhere close to X, which claimed that it's now up to 570 million monthly actives back in July.

But it does seem at least a little concerned, what with the rollout of a heap of new updates- several of which mirror those available on Bluesky-and with Instagram and Threads chief Adam Mosseri making a public statement on reports of Bluesky's growth.
That statement doesn't really tell you much, but the fact that Mosseri felt compelled to comment at all is interesting, considering Meta's long-held media approach in not commenting on speculation.

So the indicators do suggest that Threads is at least monitoring the Bluesky situation, with the concern likely being the rise in momentum, and what that can mean for expanded usage.

Take, for instance, Clubhouse, which quickly surged from 600k users to 2 million in just four weeks when it became the trending app of the moment back in 2021. Then, it rose to 10 million users only three months later. So, while, at present, Bluesky may not be a big draw for potential users of Threads in total, the danger is that as more and more influential users switch over, and continue singing the app's praises, it could go from 20 million to 100 million very quickly. And yet, even by those measures, it would never be vying with Threads for total users, as that is a damnable lot of potential Threads users who'd be signing up to compete instead.

And that's the audience Meta's aiming at with Threads.

Meta originally developed Threads for the express purpose of scooping up cast-offs from Twitter/X, alienated by the changes under new owner Elon Musk.

Indeed, at launch, Instagram (and Threads) chief Adam Mosseri noted that:

“We wanted to get more done [before launching Threads], but we’re starting to worry that the window of opportunity was closing on us.”

That window was the market gap that had been left as people turned away from X, and were seeking an alternative. Mastodon had gained some early momentum, and Bluesky was also attracting more users. But Meta wanted to push Threads as the alternative, and snap up as many Twitter refugees as it could.

Thus, for now, Bluesky is diluting that market share, at least to some degree. That also makes the fact that tech journalists, particularly, seem obsessed with Bluesky a risk, in that more popular and influential users posting to the app will continue to attract a bigger audience.

And now, even celebrities are starting to promote their Bluesky handles.

It's not that Bluesky is a contender out of the gate, but the momentum is growing, which may well be why Threads is pushing out more updates, and why the Threads team seems at least a little spooked.

But Threads remains the top X alternative, and it's also fair to add that it, too, has acquired a mountain more users since the U.S. election -that's when Bluesky started gathering more attention. But if the trends are to be believed, Bluesky may just become a 100 million or 200 million user app overnight, and for this reason, Threads is now desperately trying to negate its key elements of differentiation wherever it can.

It's smart business, and replication has long served Meta as a key means to fend off rivals. So yes, Threads is at least a little concerned about the rise of "the Sky", but it's got a long way to go to become a legitimate contender in the real-time social race.