Meta’s Threads Rivals Musk’s X; Trump Phone Review; Maine's Senate Race Implodes

Summary

Podcast Summary

Podcast: Uncanny Valley | WIRED
Episode: Meta’s Threads Rivals Musk’s X; Trump Phone Review; Maine's Senate Race Implodes
Date: July 9, 2026
Hosts: Zoë Schiffer (Director of Business and Industry), Leah Fieger (Director of Politics and Science)

Episode Overview

This episode explores three major stories at the intersection of tech, culture, and politics:

• The surprising rise of Meta's Threads as a serious rival to Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter)
• The recent rollout and review of the controversial “Trump Phone”
• A deep dive into the imploding Senate race in Maine, where Democratic nominee Graham Platner faces mounting scandals and party pressure to withdraw

The episode weaves insider analysis, first-hand impressions, and a candid, often playful tone as the hosts break down what these developments say about Silicon Valley, national politics, and digital influence.

---

1. Meta’s Threads Rivals Musk’s X

(03:03 – 08:39)

Key Discussion Points

• Silent Climb of Threads:

  • Threads, Meta’s X rival, reached 500 million monthly users last month, matching X’s reported number.
  • Zoë notes the initial hype: “I was heralding it embarrassingly as like the new next, better Twitter.” (03:57)
  • After a big launch, it seemed to disappear due to an “overly moderated LinkedIn feel,” but now it’s thriving quietly.

• Meta’s Underdog Success:

  • Leah: “Meta kind of accidentally lucked into a product that people are actually using in a consistent way.” (04:58)
  • Integration with Instagram (including forced signups and shared logins) drove user adoption—“too big to fail” dynamic.

• Changing Community Feel:

  • Threads is becoming more like Reddit, focused on niche communities—travel complaints, K-pop, customer service issues—rather than mainstream news or politics.
  • Zoë: “It’s not like we saw finance Twitter or sports Twitter or politics Twitter migrate over... Overwhelmingly something different is happening over there.” (06:53)

• Skepticism of User Stats:

  • Leah and Zoë question what “monthly users” really means; many accounts are likely inactive or only occasionally visit via Instagram.
  • Zoë: “We should be skeptical… It’s unclear right now how many… are actually active users, like you said. I mean, some of them are doubtless bots.” (08:15)

Notable Quotes & Insights

• “If you have distribution, there is just so much you can do.” — Zoë Schiffer (05:09)
• “I am vaguely impressed that this product… built a niche.” — Leah Fieger (06:38)
• “If we see finance Twitter migrate to Threads, then I think X, Elon Musk’s platform, has a real problem. But that just didn’t happen.” — Zoë Schiffer (06:53)

---

2. Trump Phone Review

(08:39 – 12:56)

Key Discussion Points

• Launch Recap:

  • Announced summer 2025 by Trump’s sons at Trump Tower as an “all American cell phone.”
  • 600,000 people reportedly placed $100 deposits for the $499 “T1” phone, but the hosts are skeptical about those numbers.
  • Multiple shipping delays, now phones are trickling in.

• The Device Itself:

  • It’s a “basic Android device with Truth Social preinstalled,” described as simple, lacking in features, and visually unappealing.
  • “It looked tacky, it looked cheap. There’s this ugly blue background… not a lot else going on.” — Zoë Schiffer (09:47)
  • Leah: “It’s gold colored. There’s an American flag at the bottom… not subtle.” (10:30)

• Comparisons and the Real Play:

  • Zoë compares it to the old U2 iPod—emphasizing the focus on branding over tech.
  • Major issues with software updates and uncertainty about “Made in America” claims.
  • “Trump Mobile is the play here… just built on top of the T-Mobile network.” (11:08)

• Wider Implication:

  • The business is seen as an “influencer play”—slapping the Trump name on products for profit, regardless of actual utility.
  • Zoë: “It appears to be working. They are able to leverage that family name regardless if the products… even work.” (12:16)

Notable Quotes & Moments

• “You just simply can’t expect there to be many a software update on this phone.” — Zoë Schiffer (11:08)
• “In some ways, it’s all an influencer play. They’re just slapping their names on all sorts of things and making money…” — Zoë Schiffer (12:16)
• Leah envisions the next Trump product: “Self whitening toothpaste.” (12:43)
• Zoë proposes: “I think we’re going the supplements route.” (12:54)

---

3. Maine’s Senate Race Implodes (Graham Platner Scandal)

(12:56 – 18:48)

Key Discussion Points

• New Allegations:

  • Democratic nominee Graham Platner faces allegations of sexual assault stemming from a 2021 incident; his accuser felt “she had no choice” but to go public after other controversies failed to oust him.
  • “It’s really sad. Like, that’s ultimately, to me, the thing I want to very much focus on here… She didn’t actually want to go on the record… but felt she had no choice.” — Leah Fieger (13:47)

• History of Scandals:

  • Platner previously had to explain years-old insensitive Reddit posts and a tattoo “that was a Nazi symbol.”
  • “He had tons and tons of Reddit posts… really insensitive comments about black people, LGBTQ people. He had a tattoo that was a Nazi symbol.” — Leah Fieger (14:51)
  • His campaign’s response: The tattoo was covered up “kind of recently.” (15:08)

• Party Leadership’s Response:

  • Despite these issues, Platner won the primary, partly because progressives viewed him as preferable to incumbent Republican Susan Collins.
  • Leah describes Democratic strategy: “Like, at least this is our option. This is better than Collins. It’s a vote against Trump.” (15:36)

• Call for Withdrawal & State Dynamics:

  • After the latest allegations, key Democrats—Schumer, Sanders, Warren, Ro Khanna—call for Platner to step aside.
  • Urgency: Democrats have under a week to replace him and start a new nomination process.
  • “Maine is in crunch time and I’m very curious how this is going to actually play out.” — Leah Fieger (17:05)

• Plattner’s Stance:

  • Reports indicate Platner may seek to influence his replacement, which the hosts describe as “so wild for so many reasons.” (17:12)
  • Leah highlights Susan Collins’s strong position in Maine, making this an “uphill battle” for any Democratic candidate.

Notable Quotes & Moments

• “If you want a Democratic candidate elected in Maine, the Democratic candidate who is likely about to step down in shame should probably not be linked to this successor…” — Leah Fieger (17:12)
• “This is arguably… the most important Senate election in the country… It’s certainly in the top three.” — Leah Fieger (18:36)

---

Timestamps for Key Segments

| Segment | Start | End | |-----------------------------------------------|----------|----------| | Threads vs X Discussion | 03:03 | 08:39 | | Trump Phone Review | 08:39 | 12:56 | | Maine’s Senate Race Scandal | 12:56 | 18:48 |

---

Tone and Style

Throughout the episode, Zoë and Leah maintain a mix of insider savvy, critical skepticism, and conversational humor. They balance tech industry reporting with realpolitik commentary, delivering sharp, insightful analysis for listeners seeking depth behind the headlines.

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Memorable Moments

• Zoë admitting to overhyping Threads, poking fun at her own early optimism (03:57)
• Both hosts joking about obscure Trump-branded products that might come next (12:43)
• Leah’s candid take on the Democratic Party’s crisis management in Maine: “There has to be like a bit of a reckoning about how this happened.” (18:36)

---

Listen for

• Breezy but incisive breakdowns of major digital and political news
• A critical lens on big tech’s claims and business strategies
• Unfiltered, behind-the-scenes commentary on campaign chaos and influencer-led capitalism

---

For details or referenced articles, see the episode show notes.

Transcript

[Jane Mayer]

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[Outshift by Cisco Representative]

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[State Farm Advertiser]

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[Leah Fieger]

Hey buddy.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Leah, hello.

[Leah Fieger]

How's it going?

[Zoe Schiffer]

It's great. Brian is gone. When the cat's away, the Mice will not be talking about any tech conferences.

[Leah Fieger]

We're talking about a gadget. But it's.

[Zoe Schiffer]

It's one we care about.

[Leah Fieger]

It's one we care about. It's a gadget we care about.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Welcome to Wired's Uncanny Valley. I'm Zoe Schiffer, director of Business and industry.

[Leah Fieger]

And I'm Leah Fieger, Director of Politics and Science.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Today on the show, we're discussing how Threads, Meta's competitor to X, has been silently growing and actually catching up to its rival. Last month, threads reached 500 million monthly users, making it as popular as Elon Musk's social platform. Truly caught me by surprise. We'll discuss what this milestone means in a landscape that's increasingly obsessed with AI AI products.

[Leah Fieger]

We'll also be diving into the Trump phone, the one that was announced a year ago, delayed quite a few times, and now, apparently the placed orders have finally been arriving over the past few weeks. The phone's features are exactly what you would expect. Then we'll be turning our attention to the political debacle happening in Maine. Democratic nominee Graham Platner is facing allegations of sexual abuse and numerous calls to step down.

[Nicole Phelps]

Foreign.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Okay, Leah, let's dive in to Meta's Threads first. If you have an Instagram account, you've definitely seen it. The app is like constantly being promoted in the main feed. And just to catch people up who aren't aware, it looks a lot like X, like Twitter. And that is the point. Elon Musk bought Twitter in 2022, turned it into X, and Meta basically saw a wide open field because were so upset with how Elon Musk was running that platform. And so they created Threads as like a direct competitor. When it first launched, it got a ton of press. I was part of that press. I was heralding it embarrassingly as like the new next, better Twitter. But then it just had this kind of overly moderated LinkedIn feel, at least to me, and it seemed like many others. And so it feels like it's dropped off the map a little bit. But then Meta announces, oh, wait, no. 500 million monthly users putting it on par with X. I mean, like, I

[Leah Fieger]

love this for so many reasons, which is, of course, Meta kind of accidentally lucked into a product that people are actually using in a consistent way.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Yes. And if you have distribution, there is just so much you can do. It's a little bit too big to fail in some ways, because if you have an app like Instagram and you're just forcing Threads on everyone, which is what they were doing at the very beginning, you couldn't delete threads without also deleting your Instagram account, which is so nuts. So like, yeah, you can get a fair amount of adoption. And it does look like the app now operates a little more like Reddit. It's like these very specific conversations. People are on there talking about like heated rivalry or K pop or whatever. And it's supposed to be like a nicer place to discuss stuff.

[Leah Fieger]

Yeah, and I think that's a hundred percent right back to the Zuckerberg of it all. He said that it's not their massive priority, it's not their massive project. Like you mentioned, they're way more all in on their AI projects at the moment. But you can't overemphasize enough the vertical integration of it all. Like, of course there is already an app that people are using and this is like so next door to it. This is the sibling. This is like not even a different login, barely a click out. And also managed to like take kind of a piece of pie of communities that were probably not that active on X or former iteration of Twitter to begin with. Yeah, like you said, like the Reddit of it all. I'm actually very fascinated by where threads is now. When it gets sold to me in my algorithm, it's a lot of people complaining about airport travel experiences.

[Zoe Schiffer]

I was gonna say customer service issues.

[Leah Fieger]

It's like a lot of customer service issues. Which like brings me back to, you know, Twitter 1.0. But like you said, like all of these niche communities that there is something to be said about. Like I am vaguely impressed that this product of course too big to fail, but like this product build a niche.

[Zoe Schiffer]

And I think you make a really good point, which is that it's not like we saw finance Twitter or sports Twitter or politics Twitter migrate over to threads. Au contraire. It's like much more specific cultural conversations. Those conversations of course take place on threads, but overwhelmingly something different is happening over there. And I think that to me was like what I was looking at at the beginning. I kept thinking to myself, if we see finance Twitter migrate to threads, then I think X Elon Musk's platform has a real problem. But that just didn't seem to happen. Despite the fact that at the beginning Meta was spending a ton of resources trying to court big name sports journalists on the platform, trying to lean in a little bit more to break news. But because they didn't want to be a news first platform and certainly not a political platform, it just never really took off Okay.

[Leah Fieger]

I do have a question, though. When they're talking about their many millions of monthly users, do I count in that category? Like, I have an account, I don't post. I, every once in a while click on a little thing that takes me from Instagram on over. Because I do want to see what Karen in Seat 5E did when confronted with, like, a screaming toddler. But, like, I'm. I wouldn't consider myself an active user at all. I'm a little. Should we be skeptical?

[Jane Mayer]

A little.

[Zoe Schiffer]

I think we should be skeptical. Yeah. We don't really have the full picture. It does seem like the app is growing, but it's unclear right now how many of those 500 million monthly users are actually active users, like you said. I mean, some of them are doubtless bots. The company's full picture will probably be a little more available once they release revenue data. And until then, I think we don't know.

[Leah Fieger]

All right, I want to talk about a different product that I will be watching so closely. The Trump Phone. Well, good morning, everyone. Last summer, at a glitzy event at Trump tower, Donald Trump Jr. And Eric Trump, President Trump's sons, announced the launch of a new, quote, unquote, all American cell phone. And today we're here to introduce Trump mobile. The T1 phone, priced at $499, apparently received $100 deposits from an estimated 600,000 people, which. Should we be skeptical of those numbers too? Maybe, Maybe. So this was all slated to launch in August 2025, and then it just kind of went away and we never really heard about this again for many months. It did not launch by the planned date. They pushed it to the winter. Then they pushed it again. But earlier this year, Trump Mobile confirmed that orders would start shipping soon. And now, apparently some orders have been trickling in. Zoe, have you heard about this? Do you know anyone who has a Trump phone?

[Zoe Schiffer]

Certainly not. Certainly not. Where a lot of KQED listeners in my corner. However, I have been reading from the people who have received the phone. It really seems like it's a basic Android device with truth social media pre installed. Yes. Ironically, I was listening to the Verge folks and this is their bread and butter talk about this. And they were like, it's kind of the. The phone that a lot of hardcore Android users have been asking for for years because it is so simple in certain ways. It has like the core features and not a lot of other bells and whistles. But I think for a lot of people, you know, it looked tacky, it looked Cheap. There's this ugly blue background that is pre installed and not a lot else going on.

[Leah Fieger]

It's gold colored.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Yes.

[Leah Fieger]

There's an American flag at the bottom.

[Zoe Schiffer]

I mean obviously.

[Leah Fieger]

And it's the size of your hand. Like it's not a. This isn't the phone. This isn't subtle. No shade to anyone who bought this when we were in middle school. But for whatever reason, it's like really giving me the ipod vibes. When U2 and Bono launched that whole thing where like all of their music was already pre recorded on it and people were like, yeah, I will absolutely pay several hundred dollars more. This is an incredible investment. What you get here is true social pre inst. And then of course there's been like the whole Trump Mobile situation, which is messy.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Right. And that's the real thing here because the hardware, device is whatever. It doesn't seem like this is the main thing they are doing. Again, I'm cribbing from what the Verge folks were talking about, but they made a very good point which like you just simply can't expect there to be many a software update on this phone. Like you're getting the phone and do they plan to update that phone like tbd, but probably not. But Trump Mobile is the play here and that is basically just built on top of the T mobile network. Right? Right, exactly, exactly.

[Leah Fieger]

They did not specify how or where these phones are going to get made. All of their deposit terms and conditions are like incredibly messy. This was supposed to be only made in America. They've dropped that claim. Will there be a live big rollout? Will 600,000 people be receiving these phones? I. I think that there's like a lot more messiness to come. And in some ways this just frankly comes from like having to run a business with a physical item attached. Right. The Trump sons being involved in like the crypto biz or getting involved in Polymar, like, yeah, that's not tangible. In the exact same way, like people need to literally hold this in their hands.

[Zoe Schiffer]

But I think in some ways it's all an influencer play. They're just slapping their names on all sorts of things and making money. And like we have recently found out how much money and it's billions of dollars that Trump has made since he's been in office the second time. So like, yeah, it appears to be working. They are able to leverage that family name regardless if the products that they are slapping those names onto even work.

[Leah Fieger]

I'm perhaps most curious for what happens 10 years from now. What are these Guys hawking next. I'm. I'm envisioning like self whitening toothpaste.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Oh, yeah, I think we're going the supplements route.

[Leah Fieger]

I can't wait to discuss. Can we talk about the political scandal of the week? It is the core of my group chats. It is everything I'm thinking about when it comes to the midterms. I think you know exactly what I'm talking about, Zoe, because you've been the recipient of some of these chats. Graham Platner. He is currently, as of this recording, the Democratic nominee for the US Senate in Maine, running against longtime Republican incumbent Susan Collins. And he is currently facing many, many calls from across the Democratic Party to end his Senate bid following an allegation of sexual assault. On Monday, Politico reported that a woman who had an on and off relationship with Platner said that back in 2021, he entered her home intoxicated and forced her to have sex. Over her repeated objections. This happened in Maine. Platner has denied these accusations. And it's, it's really sad. Like, that's, that's ultimately, to me, like, the thing that I want to very much focus on here is that the person who accused him, she went on the record. Her name is out there, her photo is out there, her video is out there. She said very specifically that she didn't actually want to go on the record. She didn't want to put her name out there, but felt that she had no choice. Right. Because even as Platner has faced a long string of controversies, none of them have knocked him down. And she was like, I got to. I have. I have no other choice. Which is devastating. I mean, like, can we go through the laundry list just a little bit? I feel like everyone's kind of inundated with Platner right now, but it's important to make these lists right. He had tons and tons of Reddit posts that were made between 2009 and 2021.

[Jane Mayer]

Platner, who's drawing big crowds and raising big money, is having to explain comments he made on Reddit years ago, comments that he reportedly deleted before making his

[Leah Fieger]

Senate run long range, including really insensitive comments about black people, LGBTQ people. He had a tattoo that was a Nazi symbol.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Another controversy from Platner's past resurfaced when it was revealed that Platner had a Nazi linked symbol tattooed on his chest.

[Leah Fieger]

He had claimed for a period of time that he had no idea it was a Nazi symbol. Other people who know him have claimed differently and said that he absolutely knew and would talk about it. His campaign said that the tattoo got covered up kind of recently. It's really just been nonstop, completely.

[Zoe Schiffer]

So wait, just to make sure I understand. The tattoo, the Reddit comments, those things came out before he won the Democratic primary, right?

[Leah Fieger]

Oh, yeah. Like, well before. Well, well before. And something that I have talked a lot about with, with our senior director of politics, Security and science, Tim Marchman is. He got a lot of COVID from Democrats and a lot of COVID from progressive wings of the party. Tim and I were at an event where an official quite literally said to us, he's, you know, he's, he's progressive. Like, at least this is our option. This is better than Collins. It's a vote against Trump. And like, these are people that are saying this. After all of this information is coming out. I find it very disconcerting. And finally, though, after, after this Politico article, plenty of Democratic leaders have asked him to step down. Chuck Schum Schumer has asked him to step down. Bernie Sanders, who was a big Platner supporter, said he should step aside. So did Elizabeth Warren. Ro Khanna, who has literally gone to campaign for him, said the same thing. We're in this, like, kind of tricky timeline, period. We're recording right now. And it is Wednesday, July 8th. Democrats have less than a week for him to drop out so that they can start the process of nominating someone else. We've talked to people in the state of Maine in the Democratic Party who say that they would like to spend the weekend of July 25th making that happen. An open nomination process, an open primary process yet again. But this all has to be sorted by July 27. Maine is in crunch time and I'm very curious how this is going to actually play out.

[Zoe Schiffer]

Is the reporting accurate, though, that he's dragging his feet because he wants a say in who the successor might be?

[Leah Fieger]

That's what's come out a bit from his campaign, which is, I'm sorry, so wild for so many reasons. You can feel however you want about these accusations. You can feel however you want about this man, about the state of Maine, about midterms in general. But it feels like a pretty logical through line that if you perhaps want a Democratic candidate elected in Maine, the Democratic candidate who is likely about to step down in shame should probably not be linked to this successor if you wanna have a chance in the general election whatsoever. Especially because, and this is the part that I'm like, truly mind blown over here, Susan Collins is really popular in this state. Like last election, she won pretty handily. She has so many different parts of like the main populace locked up. I haven't seen a ton of national reporting on this, but there's some great stuff from the Portland Press, Herald and the main Monitor. Specifically talking about like her relationships with different unions, which is something that like Platner claimed to offer. But her relationships, for example, with like Bath Ironworks, which is one of the largest employers in the states and makes like many of the US's battleships, like this is. This was already going to be an uphill battle for whoever it was. And the fact that the DNC has managed to make this literally as messy as possible, I think that there, yeah, there has to be like a bit of a reckoning about how this happened. This is arguably, if this is not the most important Senate election in the country, I would say the Republicans probably think it's the most important Senate election in the country. It's certainly in the top three.

[Zoe Schiffer]

That's our show for today. We'll link to all the stories we spoke about in the show. Notes Uncanny Valley is produced by Kaleidoscope Content. Adriana Tapia produced this episode. It was mixed by Amar Lal at Macrosound. It was fact checked by Daniel Roman. Pram Bandy is our New York studio engineer, Mark Lehta is our third San Francisco studio engineer, Kimberly Chua is our Senior Digital Production manager, Kate Osborne is our Executive producer and Katie Drebben is Wired's Global Editorial Director.

[Evan Osnos]

There's a reason millions of people start their day with Morning Brew Daily. Each morning we break down the biggest news in business, from the latest tech headlines to why nobody can afford a house right now, all in a format that fits seamlessly into your day. You'll leave each episode of Morning Brew Daily smarter and ready to take on the world around you. I'm Toby Howell. And I'm Neal Freyman and we're ready to show you that business news doesn't have to be boring. So join us on Morning Brew Daily, available wherever you get your podcasts.

[Nicole Phelps]

Hi, I'm Nicole Phelps, Global Fashion News and Features Director at Vogue and co host of the Run through podcast. Each week on the show, our listeners get an audience all access pass into the world of Vogue. On Tuesdays, join me as I interview influential designers like Calvin Klein, Rachel Scott and Simone Bellotti. On Thursdays, join Chloe Mao, head of Editorial Content at Vogue US and Choma Nadi, British Vogue's head of Editorial content, as they explore fashion through the lens of culture with guests like Doja Cat and Margot Robbie listen and watch the run through with Vogue wherever you get your your podcasts and Vogue's YouTube channel.

[Leah Fieger]

Who is going to win control of Congress this November, and what is that

[Zoe Schiffer]

going to mean for the final two

[Leah Fieger]

years of Donald Trump's presidency?

[Zoe Schiffer]

I'm Susan Glasser.

[Jane Mayer]

I'm Jane Mayer.

[Evan Osnos]

And I'm Evan Osnos. We host the Washington Roundtable on the New Yorker's Political Scene podcast.

[Leah Fieger]

We're following what key races could tip the balance of power in Washington this fall. We're also going to go deep on the influence of dark money and tech billionaires.

[Evan Osnos]

So join us in the run up to the midterms in 2026. Subscribe to the Political Scene wherever you get your podcasts.