Threads added a green dot to show you’re online. I have a theory about why.

Threads will show a green dot when you’re live.

Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto

Threads has added a green dot that shows when you’re online.Meta, which owns Threads, says it’s aimed at helping real-time conversations.It’s also possible the green dot was simply an easy feature to launch.

Threads has added a new and exciting feature. Is it improved moderation? Nope, guess again. Ah, the ability to pin the “Following” feed by default? No, and stop asking: That will never happen. DMs? Maybe, but not anytime soon.

Instead, it’s a green dot that signals when you’re online.

You look confused. In all honesty, so am I.

This doesn’t seem like a much-needed feature that is going to fix a big problem for users. Threads, compared to X or Bluesky, is notoriously not real-time. Posts show up in Threads’ “For You” feed several hours, sometimes days after they were posted. It’s not unusual for my feed to show a post from 30 minutes ago followed by a post from 16 hours ago. I’ve gotten used to the idea that the author of a post I see in my feed is still lingering online, ready to respond to my replies.

I suppose that’s the point. Instagram head Adam Mosseri, in announcing the feature, said it’s “a way to help you find others to engage with in real-time.” Perhaps I might be more inclined to respond to someone if I see they’re also online. Honestly, I don’t think that matters to me when I’m responding to someone.

On Threads, the general response to this seems to be lukewarm befuddlement. Some people have raised the fact that this can have an unintended negative effect for enabling harassment or stalking.

The green dot is turned on by default, but you can turn it off completely, or enable it to be seen only by mutual followers. When the feature launched Wednesday, a big button appeared at the top of the app directing people to adjust their settings. (In your profile, click the three lines above your avatar, then Privacy and Online status.)

But again … why?

Sometimes, there are features that are very popular with users who don’t use platforms in the same way that I do. Maybe it’s useful for people in other countries, sports fans, teenagers, or celebrities. I asked Meta for more information on what this feature is all about — what am I missing?

“Participating in real-time discussions is important to the experience on Threads,” Alec Booker, a spokesperson for Meta, told me. “Activity status can help foster these discussions by showing that a post’s author is active and ready to continue the conversation.” Booker pointed to an example of someone on Threads expressing enthusiasm for the feature to help with discussing reality TV live, as it airs.

Live tweeting TV shows, sports events, award shows, and other big events were a staple activity on Old Twitter (2010-2021, RIP). With X in some stage of a possible death spiral, this doesn’t seem to be as much the case. Threads, I’m sure, would be very happy to welcome liveposting basketball fans or other sports fans, who also happen to be lucrative for advertising.

But do you need a green dot to indicate you’re talking about the Mets game or whatever is on Bravo at that moment? People have managed to have these live conversations on Twitter for years without an online indicator — the platform just prioritized fresh content and people followed along with hashtags.

If I could posit one last theory, which I am half-stealing from a former Twitter engineer: This was simply … an easy feature to launch. Instagram already has a version of an online indicator. It probably wasn’t all that hard to recreate it for Threads.

Sometimes at Big Tech companies, there is internal pressure to ship products and launch new features simply for the sake of justifying your existence to the boss. (I have no idea if this happened here!)

For now? Heck it, I’m leaving my little green dot on. I actually like the way Threads is really focused on replies and conversations (even if I’ve abused this with engagement bait in the past). I don’t imagine the green dot will change the way I engage with people, but I like to lean into the creepiness.