Darren, 43, was sitting on the 149 bus scrolling through Instagram when something unusual caught his eye. There, among the aspirational patisserie and retro football reels, was a little portal into Threads, the social media network launched by Instagram’s parent company Meta in July 2023.
Darren had joined Threads when it launched, more in dismay at what Elon Musk had done to Twitter (now X) than any great faith in Mark Zuckerberg’s rival vision. He hadn’t used it much since. He was using Instagram less, truth be told. But when he did, he’d noticed the teaser adverts for Threads appearing with increasing frequency. And there was something about this particular post that demanded a response.
