Report: Meta to launch Threads in the EU in December
According to a newspaper report, the Facebook group Meta plans to finally launch its short message service Threads in the EU in December. There will also be an option to use Threads just to read posts without being able to write your own posts, wrote the Wall Street Journal on Thursday, citing informed sources. The service is an alternative to Elon Musk's online platform X (formerly Twitter).
Meta left out the European Union when it launched Threads in July, citing legal uncertainties with regard to "new digital laws". According to observers, this may have referred to the dual package of the Digital Services Act (DSA) and the Digital Markets Act (DMA) - and the automatic linking of user data from Instagram and Threads could potentially cause problems for Meta.
Since Musk bought the short message service Twitter and renamed it X, the online platform's user numbers have been falling, according to market researchers. Several competitors see an opportunity to build on Twitter's former importance with alternatives. Threads is considered a particularly strong candidate because the service is based on Meta's photo and video platform Instagram, which already has hundreds of millions of connected users.
Threads has almost 100 million users who are active at least once a month, said Facebook founder and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in October. After its launch in July, Threads cracked the 100 million sign-ups mark within a few days - but user activity then fell again. Zuckerberg remained convinced that Threads could become a service with one billion users in a few years. Back in October, Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri held out the prospect that Threads could eventually become available in the EU in a few months.
Meta's decision to introduce Threads in the EU, initially avoided due to legal uncertainties related to digital laws, aligns with the EU market's potential. With Facebook's user base shifting due to Elon Musk's acquisition of Twitter, Meta views Threads, its Instagram-based short message service, as a strong competitor in the market, aiming to tap into the EU market by December.
Source: www.dpa.com
