In a flash, a new social media app has appeared, ready to challenge Twitter’s status as the go-to platform for highly online people. Last week, Meta unveiled Threads, an app that works much like Twitter, has gained over 100 million users in less than a week.
Among those curiously watching Threads are arts professionals, many of whom are scrambling to earn a piece of this new online attention crush.
Among the gold rush winners, apparently, is the Whitney (@whiteneymuseum). The New York Museum took the opportunity to place itself at the center of the art-Threads discussion, attracting attention with a quip-centric and very internet-centric posting strategy, e.g. “😌😌 <— We post art weird contemporary knowing you can't message us to complain” or “Threads is my favorite social media platform because no one here has ever made me cry”.
“Our director of communications really trusts me, so I felt comfortable starting the account with a post or two of my own, after hours,” said Casey Betts, who manages the Whitney’s Threads account. Museum, at Artnet News.
Other museums throw their hats into Threads. MCA Chicago, for example, has started posting memes about visiting its collection.
Screenshot of an article from MCA Chicago’s Threads.
Yet the Whitney’s sheer enthusiasm has thrust it into the limelight, to the point that other museums are trying to poke fun at it.
The Guggenheim (@guggenheim) recently job a love poem at the Whitney, accompanied by a painting of flowers by Andy Warhol. The Whitney quickly returned the love with his own Andy Warhol flower painting and his own Guggenheim love poem.
“People are talkative!” Betts said, explaining the appeal of the new network. “They want to talk to each other, and it seems less combative than other places on the internet.”
Screenshot of a Guggenheim article on Threads.
Some were taken aback by the informal tone of the Whitney Threads. “Omg guys I’m not an intern,” @whitneymuseum job recently, responding to commenters joking about Whitney’s bubbly new Threads character.
But informality, after all, is the point. The tone on Threads tends to be laid back, embodying the trend of “rogue” corporate accounts on Twitter, where calculated corporate language is ditched for a more human tone, often with a healthy dose of memes (although this tone, too, is a kind of calculation).
“It actually fits into our broader social media strategy, which is to reach as many people as possible,” Betts explained. “If the way to do it is to have a lighter tone or be more laid back, then this is a great opportunity to explore a different voice than what we would do on Instagram or even TikTok.”
In any case, in the war between Twitter and Threads, it’s clear that Whitney is bid on Topics at the moment.
An image of Edward Hopper Early Sunday morning published by the @whitneymuseum Threads account.
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