Credit: Unsplash
The same content, but now you pay for it!
As the internet evolves, more people find ways to turn its usage into a proper career. Some people go through established systems like running ads on YouTube videos, while others crowd-source their income through services like Patreon or OnlyFans. Both YouTube and OnlyFans have the option to completely cordon off content from those who don’t pay to subscribe to the channel owners. In the near future, a similar feature will be implemented on Twitter.
Twitter announced today that at an indeterminate point in the future, it will be implementing a new feature known as “Super Followers.” In a similar vein to memberships on YouTube channels, this feature will give Twitter users the ability to restrict their posts to only their Super Followers who have paid a subscription fee. This isn’t necessarily the only way it could be used; it could also be used to offer “bonus” tweets to Super Followers, as well as perks like newsletters and badges. The subscription fees would presumably be set by the account holder.
The announcement of this feature was met with some less-than-enthused reactions from the Twitter userbase, with the hashtag “#RIPTwitter” trending for a period after the fact.
I love y’all, but there’s no way I’m paying to read your tweets.
Nope.
#RIPTwitter pic.twitter.com/BSZxFG4P6j— Cakes (@cakes_iam) February 26, 2021
Me unfollowing someone as soon as they start trying to charge money for their tweets:#RIPTwitter pic.twitter.com/p0Iz7MvE3G
— Public Enemies Podcast (@TheEnemiesPod) February 26, 2021
Besides Super Followers, Twitter also announced development of Twitter Communities, a means through which users can gather together and focus their timelines on particular interests in a similar vein to Facebook Groups. Groups was one of Facebook’s more well-received features, and one that some Twitter users have been requesting to aid with navigating the site’s dense population.
