Owner of social networking site, X, Elon Musk has hinted that the platform will start a new programme that will require new, unverified accounts to sign up for a $1 annual subscription to be able to post and interact with other posts.
The programme is being tested in New Zealand and the Philippines in preparation for its global rollout. This, however, is not going to affect unverified existing users on the platform.
Musk noted that the new users who opt out of subscribing at the signup stage will only be able to take “read-only” actions, such as reading posts, watching videos, and following accounts.
At signup, new users will be able to select from subscription options of $1 fee, X Premium, or Verified Organisations.
The statement released by Musk reads, “this new test was developed to bolster our already successful efforts to reduce spam, manipulation of our platform and bot activity while balancing platform accessibility with the small fee amount. It is not a profit driver. And so far, subscription options have proven to be the main solution that works at scale.
“This will evaluate a potentially powerful measure to help us combat bots and spammers on X, while balancing platform accessibility with the small fee amount. Within this test, existing users are not affected.
“This is actually a super tough problem. And it’s probably really the single most important reason that we’re moving to have a small monthly payment for the use of X. It’s the only way I can think of to combat vast armies of bots because a bot costs a fraction of a penny.
“But if somebody has to pay, you know, a few dollars or something, some minor amount, the effective cost of bots is very high. And then you also have to get a new payment method every time you have a new bot. So that actually had the constraint of how many different credit cards you can find even on the dark web or whatever.
“And we’re actually going to come up with a lower tier pricing. We just want it to be a small amount of money. This is a longer discussion, but in my view, this is actually the only defence against vast armies of bots, because as the AI gets very, very good, it’s actually able to pass these sorts of CAPTCHA tests better than humans.”