Tech billionaires Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk have been joking about setting up a cage match. In the business world, the fight has already begun.
Less than a day after Mr Zuckerberg launched his alternative to Twitter, Threads, it had already claimed some some 30 million sign-ups – lending it credibility as a serious contender in the world of social media.
That’s still a small fraction of the hundreds of millions of Twitter users.
But analysts think it’s a sign that Mr Zuckerberg’s Meta has a good shot at wooing some of its gigantic 3 billion-plus users on Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp to the new offering – and bringing advertisers with them.
After all, Mr Zuckerberg, whose Meta made more than $117bn in sales last year, has a monster track record when it comes to selling adverts – and none of the apparent qualms of Mr Musk, who has disdained advertising at his electric car company, Tesla, and been looking for alternative ways to fund Twitter.