Elon Musk wants to overhaul Twitter’s premium subscription service with a cheaper price, cryptocurrency payment options and no advertising, after he became the social media platform’s largest shareholder last week.
Musk was invited to join Twitter’s board by CEO Parag Agrawal on Thursday, after securing a 9.2% stake in the company, and he has wasted no time in proposing changes to the site’s services and features.
In a series of tweets posted over the weekend, Musk focused his attention on Twitter Blue, a subscription service that launched in July 2021 and currently offers “exclusive access to premium features” for users who pay a $2.99 monthly fee.
The 50-year-old believes the price should be cut to around $2 per month but be paid on an annual basis, and that payment options should include Dogecoin, a cryptocurrency.
Perhaps most surprising is Musk’s desire to ban ads on the premium service.
He said: “The power of corporations to dictate policy is greatly enhanced if Twitter depends on advertising money to survive.”
Musk also asked his 81 million followers whether the Twitter headquarters in San Francisco should be used as a homeless shelter in the future, to which 90% responded with a “yes”.
The suggestions appear to be Musk’s own personal musings as Twitter declined to comment on them.
The proposals do highlight a potential area of conflict for Twitter after Musk, who is CEO of Tesla, the electric car manufacturer, bought into the company last Monday.
Musk’s $3bn stake in Twitter, which amounts to a 9.2% holding and is around four times larger than the next largest shareholder, comes just two weeks after he spoke about launching a new social media platform.
That now looks very unlikely to occur, with Musk preparing for an “ask me anything” (AMA) session with Twitter employees in the coming weeks.
However, as announced late on Sunday by Parag Agrawal, Elon Musk has decided not to join Twitter’s board. So, the future of the changes Musk proposes are left in uncertainty.
