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Rivals have been gunning for Twitter ever since billionaire boss Elon Musk took ownership of the social media outlet this past October, especially after he laid off more than 80 percent of its employees and made several controversial decisions.
The latest is limits on the number of posts users can view. Then came July 6, when a fellow billionaire and fierce Musk adversary, Mark Zuckerberg, launched what appears to be the first serious challenger to Twitter.
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It is called Threads, an Instagram app, and that’s the way it's listed on Google’s Play Store for Android smartphones and the App Store for iPhones and iPads. By adapting the Instagram platform to power Threads, Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Facebook and Instagram parent Meta, has made it easy for users to sign up with their Instagram credentials and invite the people who follow them there to do the same on Threads.
Threads burst onto the scene with more than 100 million user sign-ups and counting in just five days. That bested the 100 million users ChatGPT amassed in its first two months, according to the analytics firm Similarweb. The company previously cited ChatGPT as the fastest-growing app, according to The New York Times.
You’ll be reminded of Twitter
Threads isn’t a replica of Twitter, introduced in 2006, but it comes close in this first iteration. Hours after the app’s debut, a lawyer for Twitter sent a letter to Zuckerberg accusing Meta of “misappropriation” of intellectual property.
Posts, or “threads,” are like real-time tweets. They can be up to 500 characters long and include links, photos and videos of up to five minutes. You can repost and quote others’ threads, the Threads equivalent of retweets. You can tap a heart icon to express your approval.
“Our vision with Threads is to take what Instagram does best and expand that to text, creating a positive and creative space to express your ideas,” Meta wrote in a press release.
The Musk-Zuckerberg animus seems to be genuine. After the Threads launch, Meta’s CEO actually went on Twitter to tweet a playful picture of a Spider-Man face-off, his first tweet in 11 years. The two men are also reportedly considering duking it out in a cage match — for real.
If you’re curious about Threads, here are some of the basics:
How do I sign up for Threads?
Download the app from Google Play or the App Store. If you are already on Instagram, signing up is as simple as logging in with your username and password. You’ll have to create an Instagram account if you don’t already have one, which you can do on the Instagram app or at Instagram.com. Web signups for Threads apparently come later.
Next, you can write a bio or accept the one you already have on Instagram and add a link.
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