Threads hits 100 million users in record five days

Meta Platforms' Twitter rival Threads crossed 100 million sign-ups in five days, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on Monday, dethroning ChatGPT as the fastest online platform to hit the milestone.

The app has been setting new records for user additions since its launch on Wednesday, with celebrities from Jennifer Lopez to Kim Kardashian joining the platform seen as the first serious threat to the Elon Musk-owned microblogging app.

Twitter has responded by threatening to sue Meta over the app, alleging that the social media behemoth used its trade secrets and other confidential information.

That claim, legal experts say, could be hard to prove.

Threads shares some resemblance to Twitter, as do the numerous other social media sites that have cropped up in recent months. It allows posts that are up to 500 characters long and include links, photos and videos of up to 5 minutes.

The app's sprint to 100 million users was much faster than the two months OpenAI-owned ChatGPT took in January, which had made it the fastest-growing consumer application in history, according to a UBS study.

As the platform grows at an unprecedented rate, Adam Mosseri, the head of Instagram, shared his thoughts on the presence of news and politics on Threads.

He said that while politics and hard news may inevitably appear on Threads, as they have on Instagram to some degree, the platform does not actively encourage these topics.

Mosseri addressed queries from several users, who asserted that for Threads to become a genuine competitor to Twitter, it would need to embrace the news industry. He responded by clarifying that the goal of Threads is not to replace Twitter but to establish a public space for Instagram communities that have not fully embraced Twitter, as well as for Twitter communities seeking a less confrontational environment for discussions, without encompassing the entirety of Twitter.

In another statement, Mosseri assured users that Threads would not down-rank news or politics. He acknowledged that Facebook had made promises to the industry in the early 2010s that it failed to fulfill, and he emphasised the importance of avoiding a repetition of those mistakes.

He also acknowledged the risks associated with politics and hard news. From a platform's perspective, any potential increase in engagement or revenue derived from these topics is not worth the scrutiny, negativity, and integrity risks they entail, Mosseri stated.

He explained that Threads already has a wide array of communities centered around sports, music, fashion, beauty and entertainment. The presence of these communities alleviates the need for Threads to heavily focus on politics or hard news.