Elon Musk Hints at ‘Small Monthly Payment’ For All X Users

Would you pay to make use of X (previously Twitter)? The idea has been talked about for years, however now it seems to be one step nearer to actuality.

X proprietor Elon Musk hinted at presumably implementing a subscription paywall for all customers throughout a live-streamed conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday. Through the speak, Musk talked about that the corporate was contemplating a month-to-month charge, which he says could be “a small amount of cash” for utilizing X, and argued that such a change was needed to deal with the difficulty of bots plaguing the platform.

“The one most vital purpose that we’re transferring to [have] is a small month-to-month cost for the usage of the X system, is it’s the solely method I might consider to fight huge armies of bots,” Musk mentioned.

Associated: Elon Musk Took a $1 Billion Loan From SpaceX Before $44 Billion Acquisition of Twitter

Musk, who can also be the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, argued that regardless of bots being cheap to function (costing a “fraction of a penny” or “tenth of a penny”), in the event that they have been required to pay a small charge, the general value could be considerably increased, making the accounts much less viable.

“We are literally going to give you a lower-tier pricing. We would like it to be only a small amount of cash,” Musk mentioned, including that the chance is a “longer dialogue” however the “solely” method to sort out the difficulty.

LIVE: Talking with @elonmusk about how we are able to harness the alternatives and mitigate the dangers of AI for the nice of civilization. https://t.co/XiAQwOXzcP

— Benjamin Netanyahu – בנימין נתניהו (@netanyahu) September 18, 2023

Musk didn’t present additional particulars concerning the plan nor specify when such a change would possibly take impact.

Since buying the platform in October 2022, X has confronted a collection of modifications and challenges each financially and critically. In Could, funding group Constancy assessed X’s worth to be $15 billion, which is roughly one-third of the $44 billion Elon Musk had invested within the platform when he acquired it. Throughout the identical month, inside paperwork obtained by The New York Times revealed that X’s promoting income had declined by 59% in comparison with the earlier 12 months.

In July, Musk posted on X and acknowledged the monetary challenges, citing a major drop in promoting income and a heavy debt burden. In August, he shared one other ominous post, admitting that the platform “could fail” amid its onslaught of hurdles.

Associated: Elon Musk Accused of Deliberately Slowing Down Links to News Outlets and Competitors on X

In his dialogue with Netanyahu, the subject of hate speech was introduced up, whereby Musk said that he’s “towards antisemitism” and “something that promotes hate and battle.

In mid-August, Media Issues for America launched a report that discovered over a dozen manufacturers’ adverts have been positioned alongside a verified pro-Nazi account. In consequence, two of those manufacturers promptly halted their promoting expenditure on the platform.