Twitter’s current CEO, Elon Musk, continues to make rapid changes, and on Saturday, he appeared to address user complaints about worsening advertising. Musk acknowledged that there was an issue with the saturation of Twitter with advertisements and promised that the company would “take steps” to remedy the situation. Musk concluded by reiterating plans to introduce a new, more expensive subscription tier that will completely disable advertising.
Since at least the introduction of the first Twitter paid subscription, which gave users access to a number of features. However, it did not alter the frequency with which they saw ads on the site. Consequently, users have expressed a desire for the option to pay to remove ads completely from the service. In the middle of December of last year, Musk hinted that a fully ad-free premium subscription would arrive in 2023. Elon Musk also claimed at the time that Blue subscribers paying the then-current rate would see 50% fewer ads than free users.
That would be a big change for Twitter’s business model. Until mid-December, Twitter made money through targeted advertising.
Late last year, Musk fired roughly half of Twitter’s 7,500-person workforce, casting doubt on the company’s ability to generate revenue from advertising. People worried that the company didn’t have enough people to moderate content, which scared governments and advertisers.
Read More: Wout Weghorst Signs A Loan Deal With United
Musk claimed that he was going to drastically cut costs while increasing revenue by launching a new subscription service called Twitter Blue. It would give users the coveted blue verification tick for a fee.
According to the service’s website, the price in the US is $11 per month. Besides, it is compatible with both iOS and Android. Subscriptions on the web are also available for $8 per month or $84 per year at a discount.
Musk’s admission of Twitter’s dismal advertising situation follows his oversight of the service’s shutdown of support for external clients. Twitter stopped giving these clients API access last week. First, it suddenly cut off access for the biggest clients, like Tweetbot and Twitterific. Then, earlier this week, Twitter changed its developer guidelines to cut access for all of these clients.