Featured Image Credit: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images. Chesnot/Getty Images
Topics: Twitter, Elon Musk, Social Media
Stewart Perrie
Topics: Twitter, Elon Musk, Social Media
Twitter users are not happy at the idea of having to pay to use the platform.
Like many social media sites, Twitter/X has been free to sign up.
However, Elon Musk has recently forecasted a world where every user would have to pay a 'small monthly fee' to share and see posts.
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During a roundtable talk with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President and co-Founder of OpenAI, Greg Brockman, and physicist Max Tegmark, the tech billionaire flagged the future for his platform.
"The single most important reason that we’re moving to having a small monthly payment for use of the X system is that it’s the only way I can think of to combat vast armies of bots," he said (via Social Media Today).
"Because a bot costs a fraction of a penny, or a tenth of a penny, but if somebody even has to pay a few dollars or something, some minor amount, the effective cost of bots is very high, and then you also have to get a new payment method every time you have a new bot.”
Premium users have to pay $8 per month for the privilege and Musk suggested regular users would pay something smaller than that.
But, it didn't take long for people to say they would boycott the social media site if they had to fork out their hard-earned cash.
One said: "If I see a charge to open Twitter or see the TL, I’m gone. Yall can pay that man, I refuse."
Another added: "You’ve already turned this platform into a cesspool of misogyny, racism, antisemitism & fascism. But I’ll bid adieu before I pay you a f**king cent to be here."
A third wrote: "If Elon Musk makes it mandatory to 'charge everyone for Twitter' will be the death of this app. The whole reason social media is popular is because they’re free and your friends are on it. Not everyone can afford to pay."
Musk didn't indicate when this supposed payment would come in and whether it has been officially approve, so don't race to log off just yet.
Removing accounts that are run by fake or spam operators has been a primary concern of Musk ever since he took over Twitter/X.
When he announced his bid to purchase the social media platform he explained it would be one of his big missions to make it a bot-free space.