THE CABLE
Over one hundred million users have signed up on Threads, a text-based app, within four days of its launch.
On July 6, Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, launched Threads to rival Elon Musk’s Twitter.
The launch comes days after Musk announced that a temporary limit has been imposed on the number of posts users can read daily on Twitter.
He said verified users will have access to 6,000 posts daily, while unverified and new users will be allowed to read 600 and 300 posts, respectively.
LAWSUIT THREAT
Following the launch of Threads, Twitter threatened Zuckerberg with a lawsuit over “the unlawful misappropriation” of its trade secrets.
In the letter, Alex Spiro, Twitter’s lawyer, described Threads as a “copycat” and said that Meta had hired dozens of former Twitter employees who “had and continue to have access to Twitter’s highly confidential information”.
However, Andy Stone, Meta spokesman, in his response to the allegation, said “no one on the Threads engineering team is a former Twitter employee – that’s just not a thing”.
Threads comes with features similar to those of Twitter, such as liking, reposting, and deciding who can reply to conversations.
Users can also follow and connect with others who share similar interests, and build a loyal following of their own to share their ideas, opinions, and creativity with the world.
However, the new app, unlike Twitter, does not have an edit button or a direct message (DM) feature. It is however superior in terms of word length – 500 counts; and video length of 5 minutes.