Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta, has revealed that their newly launched app, Threads, has attracted an impressive 30 million users on its first day. Positioned as a friendly competitor to Twitter, which was acquired by Elon Musk in October, Threads has the potential to appeal to Twitter users dissatisfied with recent changes to the platform. While Threads allows users to post up to 500 characters and shares many features with Twitter, Zuckerberg emphasized the importance of maintaining a friendly platform to ensure its success.
Responding to the launch, Musk remarked that he preferred being attacked by strangers on Twitter rather than indulging in the perceived artificial happiness of Instagram. When asked whether Threads would be bigger than Twitter, Zuckerberg expressed his belief that a public conversations app with over 1 billion users is possible, stating that Twitter had the opportunity but failed to achieve it.
The online response to Threads has been positive, with users viewing it as a much-needed competitor to Twitter. However, competitors have raised concerns about the amount of data the app may collect, including health, financial, and browsing data linked to users’ identities, according to the Apple App Store.
Some users have also expressed worries about the inability to delete their Threads profile without deleting their associated Instagram profile. While Meta acknowledges this limitation and stated that they are working on a solution, users can currently deactivate their Threads profile without deactivating their Instagram account.
Meta has positioned Threads as an initial version of the app, with plans to introduce additional features such as integration with other social media apps. Although Threads functions as a standalone app, users log in using their Instagram accounts, and their Instagram username carries over. Users also have the option to customize their profile specifically for Threads and can choose to follow the same accounts they follow on Instagram.
The release of Threads comes after Meta faced criticism for its business practices, including concerns about prioritizing profits over safety and mishandling personal data. Despite other Twitter alternatives such as Bluesky and Mastodon, Threads has an advantage due to its connection to Instagram and its already established user base.
Threads allows users to share posts between Instagram and the app, including links, photos, and videos up to five minutes long. Users can customize their feed, control who can mention them, and filter out replies containing specific words. The app also enables unfollowing, blocking, restricting, and reporting of profiles, with accounts blocked on Instagram automatically blocked on Threads.
While Meta emphasizes the ties to Instagram, media coverage has highlighted the app’s resemblance to Twitter, leading some investors to refer to it as a potential “Twitter killer.” In recent Twitter-related news, Elon Musk, CEO of Twitter, restricted the number of tweets users could see per day and announced that the user dashboard TweetDeck would soon be behind a paywall.
Threads is currently available for download in over 100 countries, including the UK, but is not yet accessible in the EU due to regulatory uncertainty surrounding the Digital Markets Act. Meta is exploring the possibility of launching Threads in the EU, as the act includes rules on data sharing between platforms owned by large companies like Meta. Meta emphasizes its commitment to privacy protection as a fundamental aspect of its business.