Elon Musk’s Twitter ‘threatens to sue Meta’ over Mark Zuckerberg’s new Threads app, insiders claim
TWITTER has reportedly threatened to sue Meta over its new “copycat” threads app.
Mark Zuckerberg’s so-called “Twitter Killer” app launched this week and already has more than 30 million subscribers.
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Threads – an offshoot of Instagram – is a text-based app that directly competes with Twitter.
Now, Semafor reports that Twitter has accused Meta of “poaching” former employees to create its app.
In a tweet accompanying the news, Elon Musk wrote, “Competition is okay, cheating isn’t.”
Twitter lawyers reportedly sent a letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg accusing the company of stealing intellectual property.
In the letter obtained by Semafor, Twitter attorney Alex Spiro reportedly wrote, “Twitter intends to strictly enforce its intellectual property rights.”
“And requires that Meta take immediate steps to stop the use of Twitter trade secrets or other highly confidential information.”
“Twitter reserves all rights, including but not limited to the right to seek civil relief and injunctive relief, without further notice, to prevent further preservation, disclosure or use of its intellectual property by Meta.”
Meta was reportedly accused of “systematic, willful, and unlawful misappropriation of trade secrets and other intellectual property of Twitter.”
According to Semafor, in the letter, Meta hired dozens of former Twitter employees who have access to confidential information.
Twitter attorneys also described Threads as a “copycat app,” according to the report, and warned that Meta “violates both state and federal laws.”
Tesla CEO Elon Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion on Oct. 27, 2022, and held the position of CEO until June when he was replaced by former NBC exec Linda Yaccarino.
According to the New York Times, Meta reportedly came up with the idea for Threads in November 2022 — before beginning work on the project in January of this year.
Facebook founder Zuckerberg posted his first tweet on Twitter in 11 years, sharing a popular Spider-Man meme, just as Threads was starting.
The not-so-subtle meme simply jokes that Twitter and Threads are similar.
Separately, Musk responded with a laughing emoji to a tweet that read, “Meta’s new app was built entirely with this keyboard.”
The tweet includes an image of a keyboard with three keys – CTRL, C, V – used to copy and paste on a Windows PC.
The US Sun has reached out to both Meta and Twitter for comment and will update this story with each response.
Twitter’s press office responded with a poop emoji — an automated response that went live in March 2023.
Semafor reported that a meta source called the allegations “baseless.”
They continued, “No one on the Threads engineering team is a former Twitter employee — that’s just not a thing.”
Twitter launched in July 2006 and has an estimated 450 million monthly active users.
What is Meta’s Threads app?
Meta’s Threads app is described as a “text-based conversational app,” according to Meta, the owner of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.
“Threads are communities where communities come together to discuss everything from the topics that interest you today to the trends of tomorrow,” the app’s description reads.
The app is linked to Instagram but offers Twitter-like microblogging.
Users are allowed to post up to 500 characters of text and up to five minutes of videos and links, as well as images.
The app links directly to Instagram – and allows you to import your profile and friends list.
However, deleting your Threads profile also means getting rid of your Instagram account, which caused frustration for early adopters.
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