Competition for Twitter. Zuckerberg launches a new website
Meta plans to launch a microblogging application called Threads. The new service will be a direct competitor to Twitter, which has recently been going through a major crisis after Elon Musk announced a temporary limit on the number of posts that users can read.
Threads is scheduled to launch on Thursday. The app is expected to be connected to Instagram, which will allow users to retain their followers and account name.
Competition for Twitter
The rollout poses a direct challenge to Twitter, which has faced numerous controversies since Musk bought the company for $44 billion in 2022. Last week, the billionaire announced a series of new restrictions on the app, limiting the number of tweets users can view per day, prompting outrage from many on the platform.
While alternative microblogging sites – such as Mastodon and Blue Sky – have seen user growth since Musk’s takeover, neither has been able to challenge Twitter.
But Instagram already has hundreds of millions of registered users and has a history of rolling out new features based on the success of other social media companies. In 2016, it added a feature to Instagram called “stories,” which are user posts that disappear after a set period of time, in response to Snapchat’s growing popularity. The recently introduced roller skates are intended to be a challenge for Tik Tok.
Twitter in retreat
After taking over the company late last year, Musk fired about 80 percent. employees and reinstated a number of banned accounts, such as former US President Donald Trump and the conservative satirical news site Babylon Bee.
Hundreds of advertisers, concerned about a perceived increase in harmful content on the platform, have suspended spending on Twitter, and internal documents seen by Reuters showed that the platform’s most active users were withdrawing.
