Musk is buying Twitter for $44 million. Credit: Steve Jurvetson
Elon Musk has suggested that he will charge Twitter’s business users once his takeover is complete. What else can he change?
Elon Musk has said there could be a “slight cost” to businesses I tweet once you take over.
The billionaire said he wanted to make improvements to the platform to make it “better than ever,” including new features. Other changes to Twitter Blue, the site’s subscription service, have been announced, such as lowering its price and allowing users to pay with the Dogecoin cryptocurrency. The premium service may also have an ‘undo tweet’ button, bookmarks and a reader mode. Tweets about the premium service have since been deleted.
Other tweets in recent weeks suggest that Musk wants to make Twitter’s algorithm open source so that it is transparent to developers and users. There were also reports from Reuters about discussions with banks about monetizing tweets that contain important information or go viral. Across the platform he wants to remove spam bots and authenticate all real people, instead of limiting authentication to users with a higher profile.
Musk described Twitter as a ‘niche’ platform at the 2022 Met Gala. Here, he said he would make Twitter transparent about how tweets are promoted and demoted, with the desire to make the software available for public scrutiny.
He could also turn the social media site public within a few years, as he told potential investors. In fact, he can sell his stock in just three years after buying it, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Musk is in the process of a $44 million buyout that Twitter’s board has agreed to. The estimated $1 billion in interest costs attached to the financing suggest he may impose fees and cost-cutting measures to make the acquisition viable. One such cost-cutting method is to cut executive salaries.
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