Musk has more to worry about than cage fight with Zuckerberg

Chief among advertiser concerns is a view that Twitter is no longer a safe place – people can post racist, sexist, or otherwise harmful speech without much consequence.

Back in January, swaths of staff from Twitter’s content moderation team which policed offensive or harmful posts has been fired, partly reflecting Musk’s free-speech absolutist ideology, and partly to cut costs.

Corporate advertisers are protective of their brands and don’t want to be tarnished by association.

In other words, Musk didn’t need Zuckerberg’s competitive challenge to threaten his social media business. Twitter was in trouble before Zuckerberg’s Meta decided to mimic Twitter.

Twitter is now a wounded corporate beast – vulnerable to copycats, including but not limited to Threads.

Loading

Several apps that bear a striking resemblance to Twitter have sprung up in recent years, such as Donald Trump’s Truth Social and Mastodon.

Another similar app, the Jack Dorsey-affiliated Bluesky, claimed to have had “record” traffic after Musk’s move to restrict usage at the weekend.

Some in the industry have even referred to Threads as the “Twitter Killer”.

But it is Zuckerberg’s Threads that will present the greatest challenge. It has been tied to Meta’s other popular social sharing platform Instagram. Those signing up for Threads can piggyback Instagram accounts by retaining their usernames and migrating their followers.

According to data provided by German software company Sistrix, Twitter’s visibility has plummeted by 25 per cent in critical markets such as the UK (28 per cent drop), France (down 17 per cent), Italy (26 per cent fall) and Germany (25 per cent decline) since the weekend when its usage was restricted.

Separate research by Evolving Digital shows that Twitter’s projected traffic in Australia dropped by 34.6 per cent over the past eight days, representing a loss of 3.3 million compared with the preceding week.

Social media is the real battleground. Threads is a clear and present danger.

The Business Briefing newsletter delivers major stories, exclusive coverage and expert opinion. Sign up to get it every weekday morning.