 "After “Paid Blue Tick,” Elon Musk is planning to make DMs or Direct Messaging on Twitter a paid feature")
The firestorm that Elon Musk’s decision to make Twitter Blue Tick for verified accounts had started, had not even begun to slow down when a new rumour about another key feature being placed behind a paywall started to rile people up even more. [caption id=“attachment_11557721” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Elon Musk is expected to place a number of commonly used features behind a paywall. Image Credit L AFP[/caption] Apparently, Elon Musk and Twitter are planning to make DMs a paid feature. Jane Manchun Wong, a security researcher and blogger has revealed in a tweet that soon, Twitter is working on “Paid DMs.”
Twitter is working on “Paid DMs”
— Jane Manchun Wong (@wongmjane) November 2, 2022
Wong has a proven track record of reporting about the latest developments in platforms like Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, which have turned out to be true. Furthermore, her expertise and experience as a front-end developer and security researcher, have helped her amass a sizeable online following. Just earlier today, Elon Musk had doubled down on his announcement of making verified account holders with Twitter Blue Tick pay $8 a month for the service, along with a bunch of other features. As was the case with Tesla, Musk has started placing some previously free features behind a paywall. Musk’s idea to place DMs behind a paywall actually makes sense if we take his vision of making Twitter a bot-free, scam/spam accountless platform. However, it seems that with each and every decision that he is taking, he seems to be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. There is no doubt that restricting DMs in a certain context will make Twitter a better and a much safer place. The kind of vile and revolting messages that many women who are active and vocal on social media platforms is truly horrifying.
At the same time, seeing a feature that was free and a cornerstone of a particular social media platform, go behind a paywall and being made into a premium feature is not just saddening, but alarming as well.
Twitter is going the direction that LinkedIn went years ago. As of now, there is little to no detail available as to how Twitter plans to make “Paid DMs” work. Having said that, there is speculation that this might become a feature that will be accessible to people with Twitter Blue Tick verified profiles, or people who have subscribed to Twitter Blue. It is also not clear whether Twitter charge users for every message they send, like SMS, or will it be a one time payment that will last users a lifetime. Either way, it will be very interesting to see how Elon Musk deals with the furore that such a decision is bound to make.
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