Elon Musk suggests charging some Twitter users, as platform trials non-public tweets for smaller ‘circles’
- Elon Musk said a ‘slight’ fee could be imposed for commercial and government users to grow the platform’s revenue which lags behind other social media networks
- Twitter’s new Circle feature allows you to have semi-private conversations with a smaller group of people. Up to 150 users can be added to one Circle
Elon Musk said on Tuesday Twitter Inc might charge a “slight” fee for commercial and government users, part of the billionaire entrepreneur’s push to grow revenue which has lagged behind larger rivals like Meta Platforms Inc’s Facebook.
“Twitter will always be free for casual users, but maybe a slight cost for commercial/government users,” Musk said in a tweet. “Some revenue is better than none!” he added in another tweet.
Twitter declined to comment when contacted by Reuters.
Last week, Reuters reported that Musk told banks he would develop new ways to monetise tweets and crack down on executive pay to slash costs at the social media platform company.
Musk also told the banks he planned to develop features to grow business revenue, including new ways to make money out of tweets that contain important information or go viral, sources told Reuters.
At the annual Met Gala in New York on Monday, Musk said the reach of Twitter was currently only “niche,” and he would want a much bigger percentage of the country to be on it.