Meta Platfroms brings together many of the world's best-known social networks under its roof, with its latest addition being the Threads app, which is set to become a competitor to Musk's Twitter. It looks like it will be increasingly successful in doing so, as it is building off of Instagram with over two billion users. Launched on July 6, 2023, Threads attracted more than 70 million new fans in its first two days of existence and has exceeded expectations, according to the company's CEO Mark Zucerberg.
Twitter has had several technical issues recently and has also limited the number of posts users can see daily due to concerns about the use of data to train language models by companies working to develop artificial intelligence. This has caused many accounts to take the opportunity to switch to the social network from Meta, which CEO Mark Zuckerberg is presenting as a friendly haven for public discussions and will use the same safety policies as with his other networks. Many of the new accounts have already tried out the security of a server called Fediverse by discussing conspiracy theories and posting misinformation, which will make the Thread app and the entire team at Meta Platforms a long-distance run. Platforms like Mastodon or Bluesky, which Twitter's original founder Jack Dorsey is involved in, have also started to pose competition for Twitter, as they have seen a massive inflow of new account signups recently. Following the news of the app reaching the 100 million users mark in a record five days, shares of Meta Platfroms rose 1.1%.* Some analysts believe that Threads could generate annual revenues of $8 billion over the next few years.[1]
Meta Platforms' stock performance over the past five years. (Source: Google)*
A lawsuit from the comedians
Comedian Sarah Silverman and two other authors, Richard Kadrey and Christopher Golden, filed a lawsuit against Meta Platforms and OpenAI in federal court in San Francisco on Friday for alleged copyright infringement. The companies in question were supposed to use their intellectual property to train artificial intelligence languages, highlighting the legal risks that chat bot developers face when they use a lot of copyrighted material to create their apps without permission. The lawsuits seek unspecified financial damages on behalf of a nationwide class of copyright owners whose works were allegedly infringed.
* Past performance is no guarantee of future results
[1] Forward-looking statements are based on assumptions and current expectations, which may be inaccurate, or based on the current economic environment which is subject to change. Such statements are not guaranteeing of future performance. They involve risks and other uncertainties which are difficult to predict. Results could differ materially from those expressed or implied in any forward-looking statements.
