It is not known whether Zuckerberg and Musk will fight in a cage, but it is clear that they will fight in the “ring” of social networks. Meta Group (Facebook) is launching Threads, a powerful rival to Twitter, on Thursday, and there are many reasons why the network has a good chance of growing quickly, especially since Twitter is in chaos after a year with Musk at the helm.

“Killer Twitter”?

Mark Zuckerberg would have bought Twitter 15 years ago, but it didn’t happen. But the head of Facebook, envious of the network’s success, has long wanted to launch a serious competitor to Twitter.

The time has come, and on July 6, a network called Threads will be launched, which will be linked to Instagram and will work in the style of Twitter, with text messages as the basic. Users will be able to follow friends or celebrities and can quickly “follow” those they already follow on Instagram.

Users will be able to send messages, subscribe to different groups and choose what they don’t want to see.

Meta’s big asset is that all its networks have more than 3 billion users, with Instagram alone having two billion. It already has the largest user base in human history, and there’s a good chance that at least 300 million users will tune in to the new network. If it exceeds that threshold, Threads will exceed Twitter’s user base.

Another advantage is that Meta has money, it’s profitable, and so it will be able to invest heavily if needed to help Threads grow.

Obviously, it will make a big difference if stars, influencers, actors or politicians also decide to post on the new network, but some of the most popular content creators will also join Threads.

Facebook will take interesting aspects from Twitter, as it did a few years ago with features of Snapchat and more recently with elements of TikTok. The name “Threads” is known on Twitter because it refers to a series of related tweets from a single account, a kind of “story thread”. In Romanian, the word “thread” comes from the English “thread”, “thread”.

Perfect timing when Twitter is in a major crisis

One must strike when the opponent is “wounded,” people told themselves on Facebook.

Facebook bosses have been thinking about “Threads” for years, but in 2022 they decided that it was time to launch this Twitter competitor (Twitter killer), which was motivated by the Twitter crisis, when Elon Musk’s leadership upset much of the world and turned everything upside down. Musk got involved in a lot of things, fired thousands of people, interfered with the head of moderators and algorithms, and also imposed a number of restrictions on use.

The people at Meta said now was the moment, and the New York Times quoted a company employee as saying on an internal channel about Twitter and the crisis there: “Let’s go and take their bread and knife.” Inside Meta, this new network they are working on is called Project 92.

There are several networks that will be an alternative to Twitter for those who are upset with the many changes made by Elon Musk. Two of the more famous networks are Mastodon and Bluesky, while others, even smaller, are Tumblr (with some sad popularity), Nostr, and Spill. However, these networks have very few users and no financial power. For example, Mastodon’s most optimistic numbers suggest more than 10 million users.

Elon Musk mocked Zuckerberg several times after Threads was announced. Apparently, Musk was furious when he learned that one of Meta’s most important executives had said that they wanted to create a “sane version of Twitter.” The hint was clear in the chaotic style of Musk, who made many changes at Twitter and ordered the dismissal of several thousand employees.

Recently, Mark Zuckerberg said in an interview: “I always thought that there should be a billion users on Twitter”, and there is also an obvious irony, because there are about 300 million users on the network.

Twitter is not very popular in Romania compared to other countries. The Threads network has the potential to be tied to Instagram, and some sources say that entry to Threads will be from Instagram.

According to oberlo.com, Twitter is very popular in the US with over 64 million users, followed by Japan with 51 million. Brazil is third with 16 million, and the UK is the largest European market. Twitter is also very popular in countries like India, Indonesia, Turkey, Mexico, Saudi Arabia and France.

Megaproblems are also in the Meta

Meta Group has announced two rounds of layoffs in recent months (a total of 21,000 people), has invested in the meta universe (although many are skeptical), and the group is on a cost-cutting program.

In addition, Facebook is not a popular network among young people, and TikTok is clearly preferred by those under 25 years old.

Meta was also involved in a series of scandals related to the management of user data, and its image suffered. Despite this, it remains powerful due to the amount of data collected and financial power.

Sources: New York Times, Bloomberg, AFP, TechCrunch