<div style="text-align: justify; "><b style="font-size: 1rem;">More than 10 million people have signed up to Threads, Meta's rival to Twitter, within the first few hours of its launch, the company's CEO Mark Zuckerberg said Thursday.</b><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The app went live on Apple and Android app stores in 100 countries at 2300 GMT on Wednesday, and will run with no ads for now, but its release in Europe has been delayed over data privacy concerns.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Threads is the biggest challenger yet to Elon Musk-owned Twitter, which has seen a series of potential competitors emerge but not yet replace one of the world's biggest social media platforms, despite its struggles.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"10 million sign ups in seven hours," Zuckerberg wrote on his official Threads account Thursday.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Accounts were already active for celebrities such as Jennifer Lopez, Shakira and Hugh Jackman, as well as media outlets including The Washington Post and The Economist.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Zuckerberg also offered a shot across the bow at Musk -- the pair are known to be bitter rivals, and have offered to wrestle it out in a cage fight.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">In his first tweet in over a decade, Zuckerberg posted a Spiderman pointing at Spiderman meme in an apparent reference to the similarities between Threads</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">On Threads, he wrote: "It'll take some time, but I think there should be a public conversations app with 1 billion+ people on it. Twitter has had the opportunity to do this but hasn't nailed it. Hopefully we will."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Twitter has said it has more than 200 million daily users.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">- 'Be kind' -</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Threads was introduced as a clear spin-off of Instagram, which offers a built-in audience of more than two billion users, sparing the new platform the challenge of starting from scratch.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Instagram chief Adam Mosseri told users that Threads was intended to build "an open and friendly platform for conversations."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"The best thing you can do if you want that too is be kind," he said.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Zuckerberg is widely understood to be taking advantage of Musk's chaotic ownership of Twitter to push out the new product, which Meta hopes will become the go-to platform for celebrities, companies and politicians.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"It's as simple as that: if an Instagram user with a large number of followers such as Kardashian or a Bieber or a Messi begins posting on Threads regularly, a new platform could quickly thrive," strategic financial analyst Brian Wieser said on Substack.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Analyst Jasmine Engberg from Insider Intelligence said Threads only needs one out of four Instagram monthly users "to make it as big as Twitter."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"Twitter users are desperate for an alternative, and Musk has given Zuckerberg an opening," she added.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Under Musk, Twitter has seen content moderation reduced to a minimum with glitches and rash decisions scaring away celebrities and major advertisers.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">He has angered Twitter's most devoted aficionados by declaring that access to its TweetDeck product -- which allows users to view a fast flow of tweets at once -- would be for paying customers only.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">- EU 'many months' away -</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Meta has its legion of critics too, especially in Europe, which could slow the growth of Threads.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">The company has been criticized for its handling of personal data, the essential ingredient for targeted ads that help it rake in billions of dollars in profits.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Mosseri said he regretted that the launch was delayed in the European Union, but had Meta waited for regulatory clarity from Brussels, Threads would have been "many, many, many, months away."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"I was worried that our window would close, because timing is important," he told the tech news site Platformer.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">According to a source close to the matter, Meta was wary of a new law called the Digital Markets Act (DMA), which sets strict rules for the world's "gatekeeper" internet companies.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">One rule restricts platforms from moving user data between products, as would potentially be the case between Threads and Instagram.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Meta was caught doing just that after it bought WhatsApp, and European regulators will be on high alert to ensure it does not do so illegally with Threads.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Globally, the Threads hashtag on Twitter has garnered over a million tweets, with many users jokingly suggesting people will return to Musk's platform.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"10 mins into threads app. Me coming back to Twitter," one user wrote, sharing a video of a man sprinting.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">Others expressed privacy concerns.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"Meta loves to collect private information and I don't trust the way it treats private information," a Japanese user tweeted.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">"I also have the impression that this is a company hated by EU, so I'm reluctant."</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">But some said they would permanently move to Threads.</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify;">One Threads user wrote: "Now I truly can say goodbye to Twitter forever." AFP</div><div style="text-align: justify;"><br></div><div style="text-align: justify; ">bnbd24/kh</div>