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On Wednesday morning, we encountered the paywall that many marketers, journalists and news enthusiasts feared. Company X, formerly known as Twitter, began charging users for access to TweetDeck.
TweetDeck (now called X Pro) allows users to view and customize multiple feeds updated in real time. The platform was acquired by Twitter in 2011 Since it has become one of the most common ways people access sites.
The service has been available for free until now, but X announced it in 2016. post In July it was announced that it would be a subscriber-only feature. Starting Wednesday, users who want access to X Pro will have to pay for X Premium, a service introduced by site owner Elon Musk as a way to generate additional revenue for the company. The subscription fee is $84 per year.
Those who purchase X Premium will see a blue checkmark on their account in addition to features such as priority ranking in replies and searches, access to longer posts, and reduced ads. Formerly called Twitter Blue, the service got off to a rocky start in November when users created accounts impersonating popular brands and celebrities. Twitter Blue reopened again in December, but the problem of impersonation continued.
Mr. Musk, who is also CEO, Tesla And SpaceX bought Twitter for $44 billion late last year. His influence was immediately felt by employees and users as he undertook significant staff reductions and introduced a number of major new features and policy changes to the platform.
Most recently, the company began a sweeping rebrand, which Musk announced in July. Twitter has ditched its famous blue and white bird logo and replaced it with an X. Twitter services such as TweetDeck were soon renamed as well.
