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Meta's Twitter rival Threads has topped 70 million sign-ups in less than 48 hours, upended the social media landscape, and appears to have scared Twitter sufficiently that it is now contemplating legal action against Meta.
Even as people flocked to Threads, some eager to escape the volatility of Elon Musk's Twitter, Meta's app's rapid success may bring new issues.
Meta has long been chastised for its market domination and for allegedly attempting to suffocate competition by duplicating and eliminating rival apps.
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Now, some competition experts and even some Threads users are concerned that if the new app's popularity continues, it will just lead to Meta accumulating even more power and its CEO Mark Zuckerberg's domination.
Twitter was always considerably smaller than Meta's platforms but wielded enormous power in technology, journalism, and politics.
As Twitter failed under Musk, a cottage industry of smaller apps attempting to replicate its charm arose. Meta is in the strongest position to win the crown right now, more than any of them.
Threads' massive launch this week underlines an unsettling aspect of the new digital economy: To challenge some of the industry's greatest giants potentially, you may need to be a giant yourself.
Threads' instant popularity reflects unhappiness with Musk's ownership of Twitter and the particular power and reach of one of Meta's most important properties: Instagram.
When new Threads users sign up with an Instagram account, the program prompts them to follow all of their existing Instagram acquaintances with a single swipe. It is voluntary but simple to accept, and declining requires a conscious decision.
Meta has substantially lubricated the onboarding process by marketing Threads on Instagram and sharing Instagram user data with Threads to allow consumers to recreate their social networks rapidly.
Threads has avoided the "cold start" problem, in which a new platform fails to get new members since there are no other users to lure them.
