New York
CNN
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After Elon Musk hinted final month that X might begin charging all customers, the corporate (previously often called Twitter) introduced a check of such a system.
X mentioned in a post on Tuesday that it’s testing a brand new program known as “Not a Bot” during which new customers in New Zealand and the Philippines shall be required to join a $1 annual subscription to put up and work together with different posts.
The check will apply solely to new net accounts, and the payment shall be waived if customers join X’s $3.99 monthly premium subscription service. New customers within the testing area who decide out of premium and the annual subscription will solely have the ability to learn posts, watch movies and comply with accounts — however not work together on the platform. Current customers won’t be affected as a part of the check.
The corporate mentioned within the put up that this system is supposed to “bolster our already profitable efforts to scale back spam, manipulation of our platform and bot exercise, whereas balancing platform accessibility with the small payment quantity,” including that the payment will not be meant to be a revenue driver.
The check comes after Musk has inspired customers to join X Premium as a method of decreasing spam and rip-off exercise on the platform, suggesting that requiring bank card funds helps confirm a consumer’s identification and creates a better barrier to entry for inauthentic accounts. As an added incentive, premium customers obtain a blue checkmark, have their posts boosted by the platform’s algorithm and are eligible to obtain funds as a part of X’s new advert income share program.
It additionally comes after Musk made a imprecise assertion in a dialog with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu final month suggesting he might begin charging all customers. He mentioned the corporate is “shifting to have a small month-to-month cost to be used of the X system” as a result of it’s “the one method I can consider to fight huge armies of bots.”
Specialists, nonetheless, have mentioned that many unhealthy actors are greater than prepared and capable of pay up for inauthentic accounts on the platform. In concept, an individual might additionally pay to confirm an account after which enable a pc to run it, thus successfully creating an automatic (or “bot”) verified account.
X has come below fireplace up to now week over false and deceptive claims which have been broadly shared on the platform associated to the Israel-Hamas warfare. The European Fee final week formally opened an investigation into X after a earlier warning about disinformation and unlawful content material on its platform linked to the battle.
X says it has eliminated “a whole lot of Hamas-affiliated accounts,” taken down 1000’s of posts for the reason that assault on Israel by Hamas and ramped up Neighborhood Notes, its program that enables customers to truth test different customers’ posts. “X is… addressing recognized pretend and manipulated content material throughout this always evolving and shifting disaster,” X CEO Linda Yaccarino mentioned in a letter to EU Commissioner Thiery Breton final week.
