Mark Zuckerberg and his Meta have started a “fight” with Elon Musk’s Twitter, with the former launching an app called Threads, bound to compete and perhaps even topple Musk’s social media platform. And it’s not just an ordinary bout because Threads, just days after it launched on Wednesday, is trending in the news and taking the world by storm. “Bye Twitter” also trended on Musk’s platform during its launch.
What is Threads?
Threads is the newest app from Meta – the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp – and can be accessed via your Instagram account. Threads looks a lot like Twitter, with a feed consisting mainly of text-based posts, but people can also post photos and videos, and converse with each other in real-time.
“Whether you’re a creator or a casual poster, Threads offers a new, separate space for real-time updates and public conversations,” the company said in its official news about Threads. “Our vision with Threads is to take what Instagram does best and expand that to text, creating a positive and creative space to express your ideas.”
According to Meta, messages posted to Threads will have a limit of 500 characters. Moreover, just like on Twitter, netizens can reply to, repost, or quote others’ posts. Since Threads can be accessed from Instagram, users can also share posts from Threads to their Instagram Stories. Verified Instagram accounts are automatically verified on Threads.
“Feels like the beginning of something special, but we’ve got a lot of work ahead to build the app,” Zuckerberg wrote on his official account on Threads. “It’ll take some time, but I think there should be a public conversations app with 1 billion+ people on it. Twitter has had the opportunity to do this but hasn’t nailed it. Hopefully we will.”
Just a few hours after Threads’ launch, it has amassed more than 30 million downloads, according to the Live Mint website.
Not just this, but influential celebrities and news media outlets are immediately signed up on Threads, including Jennifer Lopez, Shakira, Hugh Jackman, Oprah Winfrey, The Washington Post, and The Economist.
If you are not yet on Threads, we think it’s about time that you should.
Twitter threatens to sue Meta over it
Threads is clearly competing with Twitter, and Musk is fast to act. Just hours after Threads launched, Twitter threatened to file a lawsuit against Meta.
Musk also released a series of posts on Twitter, including that which says, “Competition is fine, cheating is not.”
According to a letter to Zuckerberg, Meta’s CEO, Musk’s lawyer Alex Spiro accused the company of “unlawful misappropriation of Twitter’s trade secrets and other intellectual property.”
The letter also accused Meta of hiring several former employees of Twitter who “had and continue to have access to Twitter’s trade secrets and other highly confidential information.”
However, Andy Stone, the spokesperson for Meta, opposed the accusation, saying on Threads, “No one on the Threads engineering team is a former Twitter employee — that’s just not a thing.”
