Tuesday morning saw large outages for Meta-owned social media platforms Instagram, Facebook and Threads that lasted roughly two hours.
The services going down on Super Tuesday — when voters in 16 states go to the polls — certainly wasn’t the best timing as numerous politicians made last-ditch efforts on social media to rally support behind their campaigns.
Meta experienced “major disruptions,” according to CNBC, with services such as Instagram Shops and WhatsApp Business API struggling to operate.
Google also had some issues, with its YouTube acknowledging that it was down for some users at the same time as Meta’s platforms.
But while Meta and other Big Tech companies were experiencing technical difficulties, at least one was happily thriving.
X CEO Elon Musk made sure to comment on the outage, taking to his own social media platform that was still operating fine.
“If you’re reading this post, it’s because our servers are working,” the billionaire posted on Tuesday morning.
If you’re reading this post, it’s because our servers are working
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 5, 2024
The official account for X also joked about it in a post, saying, “We know why you’re all here [right now].”
we know why you’re all here rn
— X (@X) March 5, 2024
Hilariously, the spokesman for Meta, Andy Stone, had to go onto the rival platform to share that his company’s social media sites had experienced disruptions.
“Earlier today, a technical issue caused people to have difficulty accessing some of our services,” he posted on X. “We resolved the issue as quickly as possible for everyone who was impacted, and we apologize for any inconvenience.”
Earlier today, a technical issue caused people to have difficulty accessing some of our services. We resolved the issue as quickly as possible for everyone who was impacted, and we apologize for any inconvenience. https://t.co/ybyyAZNAMn
— Andy Stone (@andymstone) March 5, 2024
Users on X quickly began to mock other sites for being down as hashtags like “#instagramdown” and “#facebookoutage” trended on the platform.
“Zuckerberg watching people go to x to see why facebook & ig is down,” one user said.
zuckerberg watching people go to x to see why facebook & ig is down pic.twitter.com/GGE3ETeYrj
— Jaçkayę (@ayejackaye) March 5, 2024
“Facebook & IG users coming to twitter to see if Instagram and Facebook are down for everyone else,” another said, sharing a video of an escalator rampage.
Facebook & IG users coming to twitter to see if instagram and Facebook are down for everyone else pic.twitter.com/Hn6cgsFZoI
— Uncle Chu (@datchughuy) March 5, 2024
While Meta was reeling over its services struggling, users on X were having a good time — as was the platform’s owner.
