Twitter users were ready to declare the app dead when the service announced plans to charge a fee to view some premium posts.
It will come in the form of a new ‘Super Follows’ feature, a subscription service in which users would pay for special content from high-profile accounts.
This would be part of a new economic model for the free-to-use short form content platform, in a bid to diversify its revenue streams.
Users weren’t happy with the idea, with many turning to memes to express their dislike, including one showing a picture of Homer Simpson asleep and the caption ‘me sleeping peacefully knowing I ain’t paying for Twitter’.
Twitter, which currently makes money from ads and promoted posts, might be able to add additional revenue via the Super Follows transactions and help it reach its goal of having 315 million ‘monetizable’ users by 2023 – up from 192 million last year.
Creative Strategies analyst Carolina Milanesi was not convinced people will be inclined to pay for special content on Twitter, saying that the model works for YouTube as videos take hours, but a single tweet doesn’t.
Twitter is also considering allowing users to join communities devoted to topics via a feature seemingly similar to Facebook’s ‘groups.’
This concept didn’t go down well with users of the platform either, with some claiming Groups are the most toxic part of Facebook.
DrewNYC tweeted: ‘So they’re taking the most toxic part of Facebook, the part largely responsible for the spread of hate and misinformation on the internet, and doing it here? Got it. #RIPTwitter’
The company said it is aiming for $7.5 billion in revenue in 2023, more than double the $3.7 billion it took in last year.
Twitter also plans to double ‘development velocity,’ meaning the number of new features it releases per employee to get people to engage more with the service.
Twitter revenue product lead Bruce Falck told analysts that the tech company was mindful of a potential crimp in revenue that could be caused by new privacy labels Apple is mandating for apps on its mobile devices.