Is Threads A Twitter Killer?

With a slew of changes and a variety of new features, Twitter continues its transformation into an embattled playground from the global town square that it used to be. At the same time, it is also inspiring sharks in the social media industry to start reacting to the blood in the water. 

Facebook’s parent company Meta recently unveiled its new short-form text post app dubbed as Threads, which is more or less a Twitter clone. While Threads is tied-in with Instagram handles, it’s its own platform that allows people to fill the void that has been created from Twitter’s recent shift towards its user base. 

Threads VS Twitter: Lawsuit Bubbling Under Threat

While the Threads VS Twitter debate continued across the users of both platforms, it was not long after the launch of Threads that Meta was threatened with a lawsuit by Twitter. 

In the letter from Twitter’s attorney, the so-called bird app accused Threads’ parent company of purposefully welcoming former Twitter employees and using Twitter’s trade secrets to fast-track its new venture. 

At the time of writing, the lawsuit remains nothing more than a warning for Meta to back off of Twitter’s playing field. But with Threads continuing to gain users, especially from groups that use Instagram devotedly, it seems like Twitter’s rival is not going to leave the ring without a fight. 

Threads Amassed Massive Sign-Ups the Day of Its Launch

When Threads officially launched on July 5, it not only gained immediate interest from Instagram users, but also appealed greatly to active and former Twitter users. While this came as no surprise to anyone, the amount at which Threads gained new sign-ups was completely astounding. 

Within a day, Threads racked up a whopping 30 million users for its platform. The shake up made enough of a ruckus to be heard through the halls of Twitter, where Twitter’s users couldn’t stop sharing screenshots and commenting on their experience with Threads. 

Many of these users did not like how Threads doesn’t offer the option to see posts from people you follow but lets the algorithm decide what to show you from its global list of users. Whereas, others complained about the quality of posts that lack the signature humor from Twitter and seem like Facebook 2.0 in terms of freshness. 

But all publicity seems to be good publicity for Threads, which has now surpassed a massive user base of 100 million. Based on user sentiment, even those who are wary of Threads’ haywire outreach or mundane content are giving the app some leeway and hoping that it will provide an improved user experience with time. This makes the Threads VS Twitter all the more serious.

At the same time, it is important to note that Google search results for Threads has declined over the past week. Is this because people are not as interested or is it because they have found it simple to login to the platform through Instagram?

Threads Can Be a Surefire Threat for Twitter

For now, Threads can only be accessed through the gateway of Instagram. This means that if you don’t use Instagram, you first need to create a handle on the image-sharing platform and then move forward with getting your hands on Threads. 

Once you are on Threads, you can browse through posts that the algorithm shows to you. You cannot follow any people of your choosing despite wanting to recreate your experience from Twitter, which is largely popular due to this very reason. 

This makes the experience somewhat clunky and bothersome. But that is clearly not stopping those who are fed up from a series of changes on Twitter that were brought on for the sake of change. The Twitter bot problem that leads tens, if not hundreds, of fake DMs to users’ inboxes while falsely increasing the followers of harmful accounts only drives this negative emotion among many users of the bird app.

At the very surface, Threads threatens the popularity of Twitter through its overall popularity among the masses and unwavering support from tech giant Meta. But even when you dig deeper, the underlying promise to enhance its functions over time and provide a user experience that emulates Twitter makes Threads a promising alternative for many. 

But just because a company has significant assets, cash on hand, and the ability to do something does not mean that it will be able to create a product that users love. If that were the case, then many firms would have been able to out compete less advantaged startups.

It is too early to say if Threads will be a certain Twitter killer. For now, Twitter’s owner and CTO Elon Musk and Meta’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg are logging heads in a never-seen-before fashion, with the former posting a series of unsavory tweets that seem more like a high school argument than billionaire chit chat. 

On Monday, Twitter’s CEO Linda Yaccarino also took to the bird app to take aim at Threads by mentioning how Twitter had an all-time high usage days in the recent past. 

“There’s only ONE Twitter,” Yaccarino wrote. “You know it. I know it.”