Betting It’s Worth Paying for (Or How Twitter Helps Itself)

Aiming to reverse Twitter’s fortunes, new owner Elon Musk announced plans to charge for full access, prompting a Tweetstorm by infuriated keyboard warriors. Requiring people to pay will root out bots and likely elevate the quality of discussion. Imagine if Dorothy could have pulled the curtain back on the great and powerful Oz from the beginning of the film. It certainly would have saved her and Toto a lot of walking.

Carey Smith | Founding Contrarian

Just days before the U.S. midterm elections, The New York Times reported that Russia had redeployed its virtual army of misinformation-spreading bots to social networks full of unsuspecting voters. If only there were a way to keep Putin — and other nefarious players — from tampering with our hearts, minds and scrolling fingers. If only!

Twitter’s new owner, Elon Musk, just introduced a plan to charge users $8 per month for full access that includes the blue checkmark verifying their authenticity on the platform. The outcry from keyboard warriors, celebs and politicians was swift. Even the business-friendly editors at The Wall Street Journal lambasted the move, claiming a “complete betrayal of the social media social contract” in an opinion piece lacking much in the way of logic.

The most hot-headed among them left the platform entirely. As Twitter replied, #goodbye.

Introducing these paid subscriptions should make the platform a lot cleaner, a lot more honest and probably a lot more useful. Now, instead of turning over your age, eye color and relationship status for a blue checkmark, you just have to give Musk your credit card number.

When you charge people for access, they take it more seriously. It’s exactly what needs to happen. It won’t crash the channel – it will elevate it. These days, anyone can Tweet anything, and they’re not held accountable for it. They can, and do,  all over the platform. Perhaps that’s part of the reason it’s bloated and unprofitable, too.

Think of it this way. If it cost money to send each email, I guarantee you we would see a lot less spam.

And sure, some people will fork over the cash required to maintain their bots’ cover, but Musk’s stated quest to defeat bots or “die trying” will be realized, at least on some level. And that’s a very good thing, not just for our elections, but for our society as a whole.

As Dorothy once sang, “Somewhere over the rainbow, bluebirds fly …”

Twitter has its chance to fly again, for a mere $8 per month.