Social networks | Elon Musk assures that he will charge all Twitter users (now X)

2023-09-19 17:32:24

Xthe red social formerly known as Twitter, could become paid. This was suggested yesterday by its owner, Elon Musk, in a meeting with the Prime Minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu. “We are starting to have a small monthly payment for the use of the system,” said the technology magnate.

Currently, the platform only charges users who have a ‘premium’ subscription. Its cost in Spain is 11 euros for both users of the iPhone like the operating system Android and includes improvements such as the ability to verify the account, post much longer messages or even hide the comments you have ‘liked’.

Musk has a long history of making improvised or exaggerated statements that later end up unfulfilled. At the moment, the owner of X has not made any further statements nor has he responded to questions from the press about this possibility.

Fight bots

The controversial businessman assured that raising a paywall for “a few dollars or something like that” would serve to deter bots or automated accounts that proliferate on the social network. When he bought Twitter in November 2022, he assured that he would end the fake accountsbut these have become a headache for Musk.

In April it started recommending only messages from paying users as the “only realistic way” to combat bots, but the problem hasn’t gone away. Even some changes, such as allowing the purchase of the blue verification pin, have made phishing on X faster, which has scared away many advertisers.

Controversy over anti-Semitism

Musk met with Netanyahu this Monday in California. During the meeting, broadcast live on X, the leader of Israel publicly pressured the magnate to stop the growing antisemitism detected on the social network. Musk responded that, despite being against hatred of Jews“the freedom of expression It sometimes means that someone you don’t like says something you don’t like. “If you don’t have that, then it’s not freedom of speech.”

Musk said nothing about the role his changes have played in the proliferation of anti-Semitic messages. Various studies have detected that hate messages have skyrocketed since the tycoon bought the old Twitter. In recent months, the Auschwitz Memorial has denounced that the social network no longer eliminates messages that incite hatred against Jews or other minorities. Musk not only recurrently amplifies accounts of extreme right and their conspiracies, but has even denounced a historic NGO that has uncovered that X does not eliminate up to 99% of the publications racists y homophobic.