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Mark Zuckerberg just did what he usually excels at doing: ripping off Twitter's ethos to create the copycat Threads app. Instagram's rise and Snapchat's stagnation is another stellar example of this Machiavellian modus operandi. This time around, newly empowered with backing from the world's richest person, Elon Musk, Twitter is in no mood to give Meta a pass. But the road ahead is littered with legal convolutions and intricacies.
Earlier this week, Meta launched a direct competitor to Twitter in the form of its Threads app. Within 7 hours of its launch, the new offering had garnered over 10 million signups. By the end of the day, the app had 30 million users. The Threads app currently enjoys a symbiotic relationship with Instagram, where a typical Threads account can't be deleted without also having to delete the corresponding Instagram account.
🚨BREAKING: TWITTER TO SUE META | FACEBOOK'S LITANY OF COPYCAT FAILS
Elon's lawyer Alex Spiro sent a letter to Mark Zuckerberg threatening legal action, claiming that Meta hired former Twitter employees to create a clone.
This isn't surprising, as Facebook's Moto has always… pic.twitter.com/FTZrnKMugu
— Mario Nawfal (@MarioNawfal) July 6, 2023
This brings us to the crux of the matter. The global town square announced yesterday that it would sue Meta for engaging in "systematic, willful, and unlawful misappropriation of Twitter's trade secrets and other intellectual property."
Specifically, Twitter's parent X Corp. has alleged that Meta deliberately sought to hire former employees of the global town square in order to gain insight into Twitter's trade secrets and other confidential information.
Do note that Meta has contested this characterization by asserting that "no one on the Threads engineering team is a former Twitter employee." Of course, the wording of this statement does not preclude former Twitter employees having had a hand in Threads' development at a point in time in the past.
If Twitter can develop evidence that:
(a) Meta told new recruits from Twitter that they were hired to create a clone of Twitter, or
(b) Meta knowingly took possession of Twitter trade secrets or confidential documents,
--then Meta might have a problem.
Not legal advice.
— MetaLawMan (@MetaLawMan) July 6, 2023
Meanwhile, this saga is also attracting quite a lot of legal attention. A professor at the Vanderbilt Law School believes that the global town square will need to establish two things to prove its case against Meta:
- Meta explicitly informed former Twitter employees that they were hired to create a clone.
- Meta deliberately took possession of Twitter's trade secrets.
These are, of course, hefty points to prove in court. Perhaps, it is because of the magnitude of the challenge ahead that Elon Musk has been yearning for a no-holds-barred cage match with Mark Zuckerberg. Meanwhile, the saga continues.
About the author: Writing is my one incontrovertible passion. Over the past six years, he has authored over 2,200 distinct articles on financial and tech-related topics, spanning nearly 1 million words. And he has been a member of Wcctech mobile team since 2025. As an alumnus of the University of Toronto, Rotman Commerce Program, I bring nuance, in-depth knowledge, and a unique perspective to every topic that I cover. When I'm not writing, I'm traveling the world, exploring hidden confectionaries and restaurants as an aspiring food connoisseur.
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