Meta Develop Separate Text Content App With ActivityPub Support

Meta, is creating a separate text-based content application. (photo: twitter @fb_engineering)

JAKARTA - Meta, a parent company from Facebook and Instagram, is reportedly creating a separate text-based content application that will support ActivityPub - a decentralized social network protocol that powers Mastodon and other decentralized applications competing with Twitter.

According to a report by TechCrunch, apps that will appear - with code name P92 - will be branded Instagram and allow users to log in with their existing Instagram credentials.

The P92 team plans to follow the "fork" approach on the initial product version, with the user profile filled with details of their Instagram accounts, such as name, username, bio, profile photo, and followers.

According to the product briefing, the app will comply with the company's current privacy policy, but will also have additional privacy policies and service requirements specifically to handle data sharing between apps.

Tech companies and startups have been looking for ways to take advantage of the increasing trend of Twitter users looking for alternative platforms. In recent months, several competing platforms such as Mastodon, Post.news, and T2 have been launched or gaining traction in their efforts to attract Twitter users.

The current plan for a minimum variable (MVP) product is to allow users to broadcast posts to people on other servers. However, it remains undecided whether users can follow and view other people's content on other servers.

The initial version of the app will include features like customizable links in posts with previews, user bios, usernames, verification badges, images, and videos to share. It will also have a follower-like functionality and likes, but it's not clear if the comments and messages features will be included in the product's first version.

Development teams are also discussing possibilities that allow content to be re-shared like on Twitter, but only for business accounts and creators. MVP will integrate rights managers for first-party content from scratch but not third-party content from other apps and servers.