Meta's latest "Twitter killer" - Threads, is sweeping the industry at an alarming rate。

On Wednesday (July 5), social media Facebook's parent company Meta announced that it has launched Threads in Apple's App Store and Google Play in more than 100 countries, and users can download the app for free.。It is worth noting that the software online less than a week, its registered users have been over 100 million。

Why the pace is staggering, as it took nearly two months for the previous "blockbuster" app, ChatGPT, to accumulate to 100 million users。At that time, this growth rate has surprised many people, did not expect this record to be broken so quickly by Threads。In contrast, other popular apps such as TikTok, which took about nine months to reach 100 million users, and Instagram, another of Meta's social platforms, used about 2.5 years。

In response, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a Threads post: "This (skyrocketing user volume) is just an intrinsic need, and we haven't even made more publicity yet.。"

A very important reason for the surge in Thread traffic is that users can log in to Threads directly with their Instagram account, and information such as personal profiles and follow friends can also be imported from Instagramn with one click.。Instagram currently has more than one billion users worldwide, which provides a strong support for Threads, so that it does not have to start from scratch like ChatGPT. "。

The dramatic growth of Threads over the past few days suggests that Meta's users are willing to give the new platform a chance。But Mark Mahaney, an analyst at Evercore ISI, said: "It will be a while before we know if they are actually active users.。"

Mahaney added that from an advertiser's perspective, given Meta's strength in this space, Threads could gain an advantage over Twitter.。"Threads comes from a company that is very good at helping marketers effectively target relevant customers and run marketing campaigns.。Mahaney said, "They can do better than Twitter."。Currently, there are no ads on the Threads app, and Zuckerberg said the company will only consider making a profit if the path to one billion users is clear.。

Before Threads was officially released, it was considered a product that Zuckerberg wanted to compete with Musk's Twitter.。Chris Cox, Meta's chief product officer, has said the new app will be "our response to Twitter."。These two products are very similar in appearance and function。Posts for both focus on short texts, but also allow users to post photos and videos。So after Threads went online, the threat to Twitter began to become a reality.。

According to SimilarWeb, in the first two days when Threads was fully open, Twitter traffic fell 5% compared to the previous week and 11% compared to the same period last year.。

On Sunday, Matthew Prince, CEO of cloud infrastructure company Cloudflare, shared a graphic on Twitter.。Pictures show Twitter seeing traffic drop after Threads launch。

For menacing Threads, its rival Twitter side can't sit still。

On the one hand, Twitter claims to have a lot of user traffic.。Linda Yaccarino, Twitter's chief executive, came out to back Twitter up, tweeting on Monday that the platform had its "biggest use day" since February last week, though she didn't provide details.。Musk commented: "I think we could set a record this week.。"

On the other hand, in the face of such similar applications, Twitter threatened to sue Meta。In a letter to Zuckerberg, Twitter lawyer Alex Spiro said Meta hired former Twitter employees who "had and continue to have access to Twitter's trade secrets and other highly classified information."。Spiro also claimed that Twitter intends to defend its intellectual property and asked Meta to take immediate steps to stop using any Twitter trade secrets or other highly confidential information.。

Meta responded immediately, with Meta spokesperson Andy Stone saying in a Threads post: "No one on the Threads engineering team is a former Twitter employee."。In response to a tweet quoting the message, Musk said, "Competition is good, cheating is not."。

But Twitter's threatened prosecution is not favored by experts.。Intellectual property law experts, including Stanford law professor Mark Lemley, said Twitter would need to provide more details if it wants to file a trade secret theft claim against Meta。He said: "Just by hiring former employees of Twitter and creating a somewhat similar website, it is unlikely to support the claim of trade secrets.。"

New York University professor Jeanne Fromer said companies that claim trade secrets were stolen must prove they made reasonable efforts to protect company secrets.。Cases often revolve around security systems that are circumvented in some way。

Although Twitter's traffic decline Threads "responsible," but Twitter's own "chaos" is also a major cause of user loss。Last week, Twitter sparked controversy by limiting the number of tweets users can view per day。Musk has also changed and changed about limiting quotas, a policy that has raised questions and dissatisfaction among a large number of users.。In addition, Musk's acquisition of Twitter has relaxed content review rules and restored banned users, resulting in an increase in hate speech on the platform, which has led to many users "abandoning" Twitter after the emergence of the new platform.。

However, Cascend analyst Eric Ross does not think this is a "disaster" for Twitter.。Twitter, he said, has beaten rivals like Parler since it was launched in 2006.。"Twitter has been around for a long time and has withstood many different versions of the problem," he said.。"

In addition to the "tit-for-tat" with Twitter, Threads also faces a "spotlight" on privacy issues.。Some experts have expressed concerns about the software's privacy, especially the way Meta handles data collected from users subscribing to new services.。May involve sharing data with other platforms, or platforms where Meta may not have strict data privacy protections。

Hidden in Threads "terms of service is a promise that Threads will soon be part of" fediverse. "。fediverse is a decentralized network of servers that allows social networks such as Mastodon to communicate with each other.。For example, Threads users will be able to interact seamlessly with Mastodon users even though they are on different platforms.。

Once the app became part of "fediverse," for user information, Meta said: "Please note that you are directing us to transfer your information to services that are not controlled by Meta... Information sent to third-party services is no longer controlled by Meta and is protected by the terms and policies of these third-party services.。"

Predictably, Threads's terms of service are vague about what data to share and are carefully worded to provide maximum flexibility and protect Meta from liability.。Some professionals say that once the data is made public, users may have no recourse。