Report: Elon Musk is Considering Putting Twitter Behind a Paywall

Under Elon Musk’s leadership, Twitter has just launched a new version of its Twitter Blue subscription that now costs $8/month. The rollout of this new subscription has been quite a disaster as the most-talked-about change, which is giving all subscribers a verification badge has been postponed after the US midterm elections.

With this revamped version of Twitter Blue pushed by Elon Musk, subscribers will also see fewer ads. According to a report from Platformer, the company may not make any money from Twitter Blue if Apple and Google take a 30% cut of these monthly subscriptions.

“Estimates showed that Twitter will lose about $6 in ad revenue per user per month in the United States by making that change, sources said. Factoring in Apple and Google’s share of the $8 monthly subscription, Twitter would likely lose money on Blue if the ad-light plan is enacted,” the report reads.
“The business fundamentals are just not there,” a former employee who worked on the plans also told Platformer.

With Elon Musk being pressured to make Twitter profitable pretty quickly, the report reveals that the new CEO is also considering putting the whole platform behind a paywall. Musk reportedly discussed the idea with David Dacks, a venture capitalist helping the new Twitter CEO during this transition period.

“Both Musk and Sacks have discussed the idea in recent meetings, according to a person familiar with the matter. One such plan might allow everyone to use Twitter for a limited amount of time each month but require a subscription to continue browsing, the person said.”

If the report says that this plan “does not appear imminent,” putting Twitter’s core features behind a paywall sounds like a terrible idea that may push power users away from the platform for good. Imagine spending years building an audience on Twitter, only to lose access to it unless you and your followers start paying? Yeah, that’s probably not the brightest idea coming from Elon Musk’s mind.

Even though Twitter seems to be in even bigger trouble since Elon Musk took over the company, the new CEO tweeted yesterday that Twitter usage “is at an all-time high.” Ironically, the Twitter CEO followed up by saying “I just hope the servers don’t melt” right after the company laid off half of its workforce.