Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX and Tesla, attends the Viva Technology convention devoted to innovation and startups on the Porte de Versailles exhibition centre in Paris, June 16, 2023.
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X, formerly Twitter, will start a take a look at that fees new users $1 yearly so as to “submit & work together with different posts,” the corporate mentioned in a latest submit.
The social media platform mentioned Tuesday night the transfer is a part of its efforts to fight spam and bot exercise. The annual subscription is a part of a program the corporate is asking “Not A Bot,” and will probably be first examined in New Zealand and the Philippines.
Elon Musk beforehand mentioned the corporate planned to move to a subscription fee model in September. X mentioned the modifications should not a revenue driver.
Users who’re unable or unwilling to pay the annual payment will solely have the ability to view posts and observe accounts, the corporate mentioned. Excess bot exercise has been a constant rallying cry for Elon Musk since earlier than he acquired the company in October 2022.
He first claimed that Twitter, because the platform was beforehand identified, was underreporting the number of bots on the platform as a part of his efforts to again out of the binding $44 billion acquisition deal. It was a declare primarily based on evaluation that was disputed by numerous experts.
Bot exercise has reportedly worsened under Musk’s ownership. Many choices ordered by Musk have dramatically modified the social media platform, which is broadly thought-about to be a important a part of catastrophe response infrastructure and an vital software for newsgathering.
Early in his possession, Musk ordered modifications to the way in which users are verified — phasing out the notability necessities in favor of a paid mannequin — and made cuts to trust and safety teams as a part of a broader cost-cutting initiative.
Independent researchers had beforehand recognized a big variety of bot accounts that tout crypto tokens, driving up their costs. Many users have complained concerning the platform’s degradation, and but rivals like Bluesky, Meta’s Threads, or Mastodon have but to mature into significant rivals.
It is not clear when the paid subscription will roll out worldwide.