Meta, formerly known as Facebook, is developing a new social media app codenamed P92 that allows users to post text updates. According to an email sent privately to Platformer, Meta is exploring a decentralized social network for creators and public figures to share updates on their interests in a timely manner, and it’s a lot like the popular social media platform Twitter. P92 will allow users to login using their existing Instagram credentials.

Although there is no release date yet, the project is ongoing and legal and regulatory teams are investigating potential privacy issues. Instagram’s CEO, Adam Mosseri, is taking over the project, which is still in its infancy. The most notable aspect of the project is that the network will be decentralized, allowing users to create their own independent servers and content moderation rules. Creating a decentralized network could allow Meta to experiment with an app that rejects the standard criticisms of Facebook and Instagram. Different groups set their own community standards with the “lowest” number of rules set by Meta. This would be very similar to how individual communities, known as subreddits, work on Reddit.

It is not clear which business model is most successful for such an application, and no one has yet built a profitable, decentralized network on a global scale. Challenges faced by developers include basic social networking features such as user tracking, which is complicated when accounts reside on a large network of servers. It is also unclear how successful the financing business model with non-fissile tokens (NFTs) will be, and the continued collapse of the crypto economy has made this approach less attractive to users. However, it is clear that the time has come for new social media platforms to debut, as Twitter seems to be making the same mistake as Tumblr, where a lack of understanding of its user base has led to a decline in the overall popularity of the platform.