A Twitter-like app would enable Meta to reap the benefits of the present chaos on the Elon Musk-led firm.
Meta Platforms Inc is exploring plans to launch a brand new social media app in its bid to displace Twitter because the world’s “digital city sq.”.
“We’re exploring a standalone decentralized social community for sharing textual content updates. We imagine there’s a chance for a separate house the place creators and public figures can share well timed updates about their pursuits,” a Meta spokesperson advised Reuters in an emailed assertion.
Meta’s app can be based mostly on the same framework that powers Mastodon, a Twitter-like service that was launched in 2016.
A Twitter-like app would enable Meta to reap the benefits of the present chaos on the Elon Musk-led firm, the place cost-cutting has been rampant.
Twitter has been struggling to carry on to its promoting base since Musk’s takeover of the platform late final 12 months. Firms have pulled again spending following Twitter’s transfer to revive suspended accounts and launch a paid account verification that resulted in scammers impersonating firms.
Meta’s plans got here at a time when its greatest platform, Fb, is struggling to draw the eye of a youthful viewers, whereas its large investments within the metaverse, a digital world through which customers work together and work, have proven little signal of paying off, a minimum of within the close to time period.
Its video-sharing app, Instagram, can be dealing with stiff competitors as content material makers or important influencers abandon the platform for TikTok.
It was not instantly clear when Meta would roll out the brand new app.
“The historical past of Meta is that they’re much higher acquirers than they’re innovators or builders … so far as copying Twitter, that is only a defensive transfer,” mentioned Thomas Hayes, chairman and managing member of New York-based Nice Hill Capital.
“They’re simply making an attempt every part … a minimum of with a mini running a blog web site like Twitter, there’s some expectation that it may begin to earn cash out of a a lot faster timeline than the metaverse funding.”
Meta’s investments within the metaverse won’t drive income progress till 2030, analysts have mentioned.
Meta shares have been marginally greater at $181.7 in early commerce on Friday. They’ve gained about 51 % to this point this 12 months.