The recent backlash against Musk’s proposed tweet cap could prove to be the perfect time to launch the competitor
Meta Platforms, the company behind Facebook, plans to launch a microblogging app called Threads on Thursday, to operate as a direct competitor to Twitter.
The launch comes just days after Twitter boss Elon Musk attracted criticism by announcing limits to how many posts users could read on the platform.
Threads will allow users to directly port their followers from Instagram, another app owned by the company, and to keep the same username. This feature will allow users to supercharge the often slow process of building a following on the new site.
While other apps such as Mastodon and Blue Sky have failed to present much of a challenge to Twitter, Threads is launching after a period of intense criticism and scepticism of Twitter, which followed Musk’s US$44 billion purchase of the platform in 2022.
Musk has made significant staffing cuts in areas like content moderation which has caused a rift with advertisers. He has also implemented several elements such as an US$8 per month account verification system which has proved unpopular with users.
Instagram boasts roughly 2.3 billion users compared to Twitter’s almost 400 million, which poses a significant user advantage from which to draw from.
