Thread app: caller ID and social media get married

Thread takes caller ID to a whole ‘nother level

While there are many caller ID apps on the market, to be frank, they’re mostly useless (no offense, developers). While technology has advanced dramatically, caller ID is still stuck in 1993, and on smartphones, it’s even worse. You may know what city someone’s calling from, but that is the extent of the predictive power of most apps or smartphones.

Thread is a new app that got the attention of technologists, named a 2013 SXSW Accelerator Finalist this week. The team behind the app agrees with us that caller ID sucks (our words, not theirs) and they set out to do more than just tell you who is calling, but to give you all of the caller’s most recent social network updates to add context to their call.

“Thread is caller ID re-imagined,” they explain. Not only does the app show you an incoming caller’s latest Facebook and Twitter posts, but your most recent text messages and emails with them, and after the call, you can respond to any of the four immediately from the app. Talk about time saving and remaining top of mind.

Thread also offers sorting and filtering from all of your contacts by text, email, Twitter and Facebook, making it the only app of its kind that lets users see what they call “pure content streams” of full text and images from social networks within the app. Thread reminds us that the cherry on top is that the app eliminates the clutter of ads and sponsored posts social network users must endure. Genius.

The company envisions the app as serving “as a homebase for your communications and social network needs” as it pulls all of your information together in one place, adds context, and never forces you to leave the app.

So while your phone may already populate an incoming call with the contact’s picture or Facebook picture, Thread rounds it all out by adding everything you want to know in one spot, taking it more than just one step further.