The Front Page: Twitter v Threads - Who will win the social media battle between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg?

Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter owner Elon Musk will be going toe-to-toe. Photo / AP

Meta, the owner of Facebook, is shaking up the social media space with an app some are calling the “Twitter killer”.

Threads will offer a very similar service, but it will be powered by the massive machine Mark Zuckerberg has built since starting FaceMash, as Facebook was first known, in his university dorm room.

This dynamic makes for one of the most captivating tech feuds we’ve seen in years, especially given the billionaires have expressed some willingness to participate in a cage fight.

While Zuckerberg might have the social media muscle behind him, pulling people away from Twitter is no easy task. There have been numerous pretenders to Twitter’s throne over the years: Truth Social, Gab and Mastodon are just a handful of examples. But each time Twitter users claim they’ve had enough, they end up quietly returning to the platform again.

Speaking to The Front Page podcast, Melanie Spencer, group chief executive at marketing firm Thompson Spencer, says you shouldn’t bet against Zuckerberg succeeding where others have failed.

“Zuckerberg is very good at copying,” says Spencer.

“They’ve previously copied TikTok with their reels and they’ve done a good job with that. They’ll give it a good try. The other thing is that Meta already has the community and they will use their Instagram followers to get them on board.”

The point here is that Meta won’t have to build this new platform from the ground up – which is a significant advantage over start-ups that try to enter this space. The other big shadow hanging over all this is the rapid rise of TikTok.

While Zuckerberg and Musk might be duking it out for Twitter followers, the Chinese company continues its rapid ascent. So, is this just a case of two grandpas fighting while the kids run away with the birthday cake, or is there enough room for all these companies to co-exist?

And with Facebook’s numbers declining, how much runway does the platform have left?

Listen to the full episode of The Front Page podcast to hear a rundown on all these issues and more.

The Front Page is a daily news podcast from the New Zealand Herald, available to listen to every weekday from 5am. It is presented by Damien Venuto, an Auckland-based journalist with a background in business reporting who joined the Herald in 2017.

You can follow the podcast at iHeartRadio, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.