NEW YORK: Meta's Mark Zuckerberg delivered a blow to Elon Musk on Wednesday night, as the tech billionaires' rivalry went live with the launch of Instagram's much-anticipated Threads platform, a clone of Twitter. "Let's do this. Welcome to Threads," Zuckerberg posted on the app, along with a fire emoji. Analysts said investors were salivating over the possibility that Threads' ties to Instagram might give it a built-in user base and advertising apparatus. That could siphon ad dollars from Twitter, whose new CEO is trying to revive the microblogging company's struggling business. While Threads launched as a standalone app, users could log in using their Instagram credentials and follow the same accounts, potentially making it an easy addition to existing habits for Instagram's more than 2 billion monthly active users. "Investors can't help but be a little excited about the prospect that Meta really has a 'Twitter-Killer'," said Danni Hewson, head of financial analysis at investment platform firm AJ Bell. Meta stock closed up 3% on Wednesday ahead of the launch, outpacing gains by competitor tech companies as the broader market edged down. Threads' arrival comes after Zuckerberg and Musk have traded barbs for months and even threatened to fight each other in a real-life mixed martial arts cage match in Las Vegas. The timing is opportune for Meta to land a blow, as months of Musk's chaotic decision-making has roiled Twitter. Musk bought Twitter for US$44 billion last October, but its value has since plummeted as it faced an exodus of advertisers amid deep staffing cuts and content moderation controversies.
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