Twitter users sent the hashtag #RIPTwitter trend on the social media platform after the service announced plans to charge for seeing some premium posts.
It will come in the form of a new ‘Super Follows’ feature, a subscription service in which users would pay for special content from high-profile accounts.
This would be part of a new economic model for the free-to-use abbreviated content platform, in an attempt to diversify its revenue streams.
Users were not satisfied with the idea, with many resorting to memes to express their dislike, including one showing a photo of Homer Simpson sleeping and the caption ‘I am sleeping peacefully knowing that I am not paying for Twitter’.
Most users have listed other features, including an ‘edit’ button, that they would prefer before the service starts charging for content.
Users were not satisfied with the idea, with many resorting to memes to express their dislike, including one showing a photo of Homer Simpson sleeping and the caption “I am sleeping peacefully knowing I’m not paying for Twitter”, with others asking for an edit function
No timetable has been given for when Super Follows could become a feature, but the tech giant is expected to make new announcements later this year.
The globally popular social media platform announced the potential new Super Follows service at its annual investor meeting on Thursday, where it was described as an opportunity for creators and publishers to be supported by their audience.
A spokesman said he would ‘encourage them to continue creating content that their audience loves’.
Some users laughed at the fact that Twitter was hosting anger at its own idea on its own platform
But the public does not appear to be open to the idea, with hundreds of users sharing their distaste through humorous posts using the hashtag #RIPTwitter.
Several users have suggested that charging for Tweets would attract an audience similar to OnlyFans, a site that allows people to sell subscriptions to adult content – with users paying to view nude images.
Most users did not think that paying for Twitter was cost-effective, suggesting that it would follow the same path as other platforms and become less relevant.
Domie said: ‘I’m sorry, but nobody’s tweets are so important for me to pay for them’, an opinion expressed by several users.
“We are examining and rethinking our service incentives – the behaviors that our product features encourage and discourage when people participate in Twitter conversations,” said the spokesman.
Neil Lowenthal, a struggling self-proclaimed writer, tweeted that Twitter seemed to be more concerned with getting money out of people than giving an edit button. He said he declined “the idea of charging people for a free platform”.
Twitter, which currently makes money from ads and promoted posts, may be able to add additional revenue through Super Follows transactions and help it reach its goal of having 315 million ‘monetizable’ users by 2023 – up from 192 million last year.
Carolina Milanesi, an analyst at Creative Strategies, is not convinced that people will be willing to pay for special content on Twitter, saying the model works for YouTube because the videos take hours, but not a single tweet.
Calls to an edit button were a common theme among users, with many saying they want to make changes, including correcting typos in a tweet
Twitter is also considering allowing users to participate in communities dedicated to topics through a feature apparently similar to Facebook ‘groups’.
This concept also didn’t go well with platform users, with some claiming that Groups are the most toxic part of Facebook.
DrewNYC tweeted: ‘So they are taking the most toxic part of Facebook, the part responsible for the spread of hate and misinformation on the internet, and doing it here? Got it. #RIPTwitter ‘
The San Francisco-based company defined monetizable users as people who log in daily and can see ads.
Twitter, like Google and Facebook, earns most of its money from digital advertising.
Several users joked that charging for Tweets would only work if the site allowed people to charge to view nude images, similar to OnlyFans
The company said it aims to earn $ 7.5 billion in revenue in 2023, more than double the $ 3.7 billion it earned last year.
Twitter also plans to double the ‘speed of development’, that is, the number of new features it launches per employee to get people more involved with the service.
Twitter revenue product leader Bruce Falck told analysts that the technology company was aware of a possible drop in revenue that could be caused by new privacy labels that Apple is demanding for applications on its mobile devices.
Other users said it would mark the end of Twitter as a social media platform, with users switching to alternatives that don’t charge for content
Application makers are concerned that labels discourage users from allowing the collection of data used to target ads more effectively.
“It is still too early to say exactly how it will impact the industry, but it will be felt across the industry,” said Falck, adding that Twitter was innovating to ease the scam.
Twitter’s plan to increase revenue also includes getting more involved in online commerce, including allowing people to buy a product through a tweet.
Social media users who are desperate for tastes “have thought patterns similar to laboratory RATS in search of food,” says the study
Users who want to enjoy social media may have thought patterns fundamentally similar to those of lab rats in search of food, a study concluded.
Researchers from the United States and Europe have found that efforts to maximize ‘likes’ follow the pattern of so-called ‘reward learning’ also found in animals seeking food rewards.
Users who want to enjoy social media may have thought patterns fundamentally similar to those of lab rats in search of food, a study concluded (stock image)
Experts estimate that platforms like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram occupied the attention of more than four billion people for several hours every day last year.
While some have compared social media engagement to an addiction, it is unclear why some are driven to obsessively engage with such online platforms.
The new findings, the researchers said, may help experts discover new ways to address problematic engagement with social media.
“These results establish that engagement on social media follows basic principles of reward learning across species,” said article author and psychologist David Amodio of New York University.
“These findings can help us understand why social media comes to dominate many people’s daily lives.”
The study, he added, may also ‘provide clues, borrowed from research on reward and addiction learning, on how problematic online engagement can be addressed’.