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Comment by activiation | Hacker News Reader

No web app means I won't even look at it.

> No web app means I won't even look at it.

It means I can’t even look at it as the app is not available in my region (Europe) :D But I guess I’ll be okay, if today is any indication, I’ll get the play-by-play on both Hacker News, and Lemmy …

you are so far in the niche in today's internet userbase it will not matter

It doesnt to Facebook but it doesnt matter to me either... You would have to pay me to install a Facebook app.

They did actually try that once. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2019/jan/30/facebook-...

User base if the West, but not predominantly the world

Not even that.

Threads is not available in EU, which is the biggest chunk in terms of population of the so called West.

If I had to make a guess I would have supposed non-West to be overwhelmingly mobile first also. Is this not true?

Yes that's what I was intending to say. So I agree with you, that the idea that a user who prefers mobile first being niche is highly specific to the West.

Lmao, the world outside the West is MORE mobile based than the West.

Many citizens of many countries can't afford a laptop or desktop setup, go to a small village in Thailand or something and they'll all have cheap Chinese Android phones as their connection to the local outside worlds.

That's what I thought I said. I'm responding to this point:

> you are so far in the niche in today's internet userbase it will not matter

That the idea that a user who wants a web app (mobile first) is niche is only applicable to the West; that most of the rest of the world wants a web app.

Hmm, I do think it matters though. Alot of people read news/articles on the web and then they'll be abandoned when they try to click through if they're on a desktop. Meta needs to figure out a web solution but it's not critical just yet and it can be narrowly focused on just this situation.

Twitter is going to end up with app-only soon. You can authenticate users with device attestation on an app and you can't on a website. That's how Twitter is going to avoid bots and scrapers.

It's funny, you got 6 months to make the shittiest possible Twitter clone because at this point anything will go, but then you end up captured by Instagram product management that want you to irrevocably hook it up to their systems (why?) and weirdos that still think "app-first". Jesus, can nobody execute anymore?

Also no EU apparently because making a product that doesn't record every interaction and pushes it down some "personalized ads" pipeline is unimaginable.

You make it sound like they (meta) are dumb for making these decisions. Probably, their goals shifted from "get as many users as possible" to "earn as much money as possible". I guess they know very well what they are doing.

I've got 1 word for you.

Metaverse.

Ok, good point...

Even if there was a web app, why would anyone get excited for a Twitter clone?

This is just such a mind blowing lack of creativity. If I didn't know better I would think this is a type of parody or satire.

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