For years, Twitter was available to all users for free, but that could soon be the end of it!
Tesla boss Elon Musk (50) is considering a fee for certain users after taking over the US short message service.
He wrote on Wednesday night: “Twitter will always be free for private users, but there may be a small fee for commercial/government users.”
As the Reuters news agency announced, Twitter left a request for the Musk tweet unanswered. Musk wants to buy Twitter for $44 billion.
Twitter users are angry
Twitter currently makes its money almost exclusively from advertising, mainly in the form of tweets, which companies can inject into the news flow of users for money. However, Musk had already written before the start of his takeover attack that he found subscription models for services like Twitter better and that the advertising focus was wrong because it gave large corporations too much power.
Musk’s plans were not well received by many Twitter users. “So it’s all about the money,” wrote one angrily and at the same time declared that he would not buy a Tesla after all. One user commented, “So that’s the ‘free speech’ you allegedly wanted to defend.” Another wrote, “That’s it, that seals it. I am no longer a Twitter user.”
However, subscription ideas on Twitter are not completely new. The company is already experimenting with subscription business models in its Blue offering, which is available in the US, for example. Among other things, Twitter Blue customers can edit finished tweets for up to 30 seconds. Tweet series are also displayed in a more legible manner, and there is the option of organizing saved tweets in folders. The subscription costs $2.99 a month in the US.
There was also evidence that Twitter could charge for its Tweetdeck software, which makes using the service more convenient and ad-free.
Musk plans to delist Twitter after takeover. He argued that this was the only way for the service to realize its full potential as a platform for free speech. According to the Wall Street Journal, he advertised to potential investors that Twitter could return to the stock market in a few years. Musk mentioned a period of three years, the newspaper wrote on Tuesday, citing informed people.
Musk has unveiled $46.5 billion in funding to buy Twitter. Of that, $25.5 billion are loans, some of which are to be secured with his Tesla shares. He plans to raise up to $21 billion himself. According to media reports, Musk is trying to find partners such as financial investors. They could cash in later if Twitter were to go public again.
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