Meta to launch a Twitter competitor

Meta is preparing to launch an alternative to Twitter — the Threads app.

The development is a kind of extension for Instagram. Threads can be pre-ordered on the marketplace App Store.

Meta positions the new product as ‘an app for text-based communication’. Screenshots show that Threads almost exactly copies Twitter’s interface.

According to the user agreement, the social network will collect all sorts of data about the user, including location and financial information.

In March Meta announced the creation a decentralized social network under the working title P92. It remains unclear whether the new development is a continuation of this initiative or whether Mark Zuckerberg is seeking to benefit from the rival’s troubles.

In early July, Twitter owner Elon Musk introduced limits on tweet views. According to the businessman, the decision is ‘temporary’ and related to an ‘extreme level’ of data scraping and manipulation of the system. However, he did not specify a timeline for lifting the restrictions.

In the discussion under the Threads post, the billionaire wrote that he was pleased with the ‘reasonable’ launch of the application.

“But Twitter should resolve the issue of exceeding the view limit as soon as possible; otherwise I fear that Threads could take advantage of the situation. […] We need to come up with a more optimized solution for handling the limit exceedance so that the average user or content creator can continue to use the platform stably,” he added.

Against the backdrop of Musk’s troubles, lesser-known microblogging apps gained popularity. Cohost and BlueSky by Jack Dorsey even faced server overload due to the high number of sign-ups.

Earlier, the head of Tesla and SpaceX said that the social network’s approximate annual profit would be about $3 billion. In his view, this figure could have been around $4.5 billion if ‘2023 had been a normal year’.

In May there were reports of Twitter’s $40 million revenue loss due to the ‘community notes’ feature. Ripple’s chief technology officer David Schwartz jokingly said he was to blame for the situation.