Elon Musk has said that X, formerly known as Twitter, will move towards charging all users of the app a subscription fee.
The world’s richest man bought the app a little under a year ago, and since then it has seen some big changes.
Since Musk came on board, Twitter as a company saw its workforce reduced by a massive eighty percent. Many of these staff cuts affected the moderation team, which links in with the fact that another one of the changes was the introduction of ‘community notes’, which see users able to add their own messages when flagging misleading posts.
Musk also upheaved the verification system, changing it from the traditional blue tick for celebrities and notable figures to a pay-for-verification system. Currently it costs $11 a month in the US for iPhones and £11 in the UK for users to have a blue tick for the X Premium subscription.
One of the biggest transformations has been in the name of the app itself. Musk changed the social network’s name to just ‘X’ back in July, much to the confusion of many of its users.
However, the latest move from the billionaire is that he plans to introduce a pay-to-use system for the app.
Speaking earlier this year, Musk suggested that he was planning on introducing charges for everyone who wishes to use the app.
“We’re moving to having a small monthly payment for use of the system,” he said, per The Guardian.
He justified this by saying that it costs “a fraction of a penny” to set up bot accounts, but by increasing that cost to “a few dollars or something”, there is reduced incentive to create bots.
“Plus, every time a bot creator wanted to make another bot, they would need another new payment method,” he added.
Musk’s comments last month appear to have now come to fruition, with users in New Zealand and the Philippines being charged in order to post on the app.
The Guardian reports that users in those countries are being charged an annual fee of US$1 in order to gain access to the app’s key functions such as tweeting, retweeting, replying and liking.
The changes will impact newly created accounts first, with users being asked to verify their phone number and then pay the fee.
“As of October 17th, 2023 we’ve started testing ‘Not A Bot’, a new subscription method for new users in two countries,” X said in a new post.
“This new test was developed to bolster our already significant efforts to reduce spam, manipulation of our platform and bot activity.
“This will evaluate a potentially powerful measure to help us combat bots and spammers on X, while balancing platform accessibility with the small fee amount. Within this test, existing users are not affected.”
The company clarified what it will mean for users.
“New users who opt out of subscribing will only be able to take ‘read only’ actions, such as: read posts, watch videos, and follow accounts,” they wrote.
“This new program aims to defend against bots and spammers who attempt to manipulate the platform and disrupt the experience of other X users. We look forward to sharing more about the results soon,” the post added.
The US$1 fee equates to roughly NZ$1.43 and 42.51 Philippine pesos.
