Abstract: Exemplary embodiments relate to techniques for representing conversations in a messaging system, where content serves as the organizing feature or primitive of a messaging inbox. In the messaging inbox, content may be aggregated in two hierarchical tiers: first, on a per-sender basis, and second on a per-content basis. Conversational threads may be stored in buckets represented by a relationship tuple (sender, receiver). Individual content threads may be represented by a thread identifier of the structure (content ID, sender, receiver). One piece of content may be associated with multiple conversations through the thread ID. Replies may be organized in a hierarchy under the thread ID tuple. Content ephemerality may be implemented by tying the content identifier to ephemerality conditions. Different users may view the content at different times, since the thread ID tuple can be removed from a sender bucket without removing the associated content.