Yesterday, Facebook parent company Meta launched Threads, their own conversation-based social media app, a la Twitter. Connecting automatically to prospective users’ already-existent Instagram accounts, Threads quickly gained over 30 million users within the first day.
The app was launched in response to Elon Musk’s latest technological blunder when trying to “improve” the blue bird app. The former CEO installed a feature to “rate limit” how many tweets a given user could see – 600 for unpaid, “unverified” users, 6000 for paid, and “verified” users.
The feature immediately caused a system to backfire that rendered all of Twitter unusable for most users. While it has since been “fixed” (meaning the site no longer entirely breaks when too many users reach their rate limits), this was the final straw for many.
Twitter Clearly Sees Threads as a Major Threat
While Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino attempted to seem unconcerned in her obvious subtweet denouncing the platform, a letter sent by Twitter’s legal team to Mark Zuckerberg appears to indicate otherwise.
Dextero said:
Twitter is accusing Meta of several things, including poaching/stealing employees to copy their platform
Twitter is accusing Meta of several things, including poaching/stealing employees to copy their platform
Here is the full letter: pic.twitter.com/XDCtO3Sx2u
— Dexerto (@Dexerto) July 6, 2023
Related: Elon Musk Thanks Disney For Keeping Twitter In Business
The letter accuses Meta of poaching many former Twitter employees and explicitly assigning them to create a Twitter copycat for Meta. They’ve threatened to sue if Threads does not “stop using any Twitter trade secrets or highly confidential information.”
This Is Why You Don’t Fire 80% Of Your Staff at Once, Elon
Twitter users quickly pointed out the irony of the accusations in the letter. User @wideofthepost said, with a fair dose of sarcasm:
how dare you “poach” these people we just mass laid off and then boasted how we could run this broken jalopy of a network better with such things as “staff”
oh hey, maybe there’s a reason why you don’t mass fire like 80% / 6,000 of your workforce, and it’s actually not just extremely shit social management, but an enormous tactical blunder –– and NOT some genius business acumen to be prized and emulated
oh hey, maybe there's a reason why you don't mass fire like 80% / 6,000 of your workforce, and it's actually not just extremely shit social management, but an enormous tactical blunder –– and NOT some genius business acumen to be prized and emulated 💡
— austerity is theft (@wideofthepost) July 6, 2023
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What they are referring to is the fact that Elon Musk, upon taking over as CEO of Twitter about a year ago, chose to fire what he said was 80% of his staff – including anyone who disagreed with him publicly – which quickly resulted in the beginning of serious issues with the site’s inner workings.
Meta Says They Have No Former Twitter Employees Working at Threads
Meta, however, had an even bigger issue with these accusations: According to them, they don’t have a single former Twitter employee working there, especially not at Threads.
According to Culture Crave:
Twitter also claims Meta hired their former employees. Meta says their accusations are baseless
“No one on the Threads engineering team is a former Twitter employee — that’s just not a thing”
Twitter also claims Meta hired their former employees. Meta says their accusations are baseless
“No one on the Threads engineering team is a former Twitter employee — that’s just not a thing"https://t.co/34OwHaKstV
— Culture Crave 🍿 (@CultureCrave) July 6, 2023
Related: Disney CEO Bob Iger Calls Out Elon Musk Over China Response
No formal suit has been filed as of yet, but the letter is a clear threat to Meta to “stay off our turf,” so to speak. We doubt that Threads will be backing down anytime soon, so whether or not Twitter has a legal leg to stand on, in this case, may be something we must see come out in court.
Regardless of what happens, it will be entertaining if we witness the fall of what was once an essential piece of media infrastructure online.
What do you think will happen next between Twitter and Threads? Let Inside the Magic know in the comments.