Twitter subscriptions reportedly at 290,000, well below Elon’s 50% revenue mark

According to a report seen by The Information, a total of 180,000 people based in the U.S. had made subscriptions to Twitter mid-last month. These numbers are significantly low, considering the fact that Elon has been intending to make the subscriptions represent 50% of the platform’s total revenue.

Elon’s plans aren’t quite taking shape as he had hoped them to, with the total number of subscriptions coming in at 290,000. A huge number of subscriptions made are from users based in the States which constitutes approximately 62%.

It should be noted that this figure also features the new Twitter Blue subscription which was launched shortly after Musk’s takeover. Currently, a Twitter Blue Subscription will cost you $8 per month, however, this is for web users. If you are making the subscription from your Android or Apple device, it will cost you $11 per month. The subscription will grant you access to premium features such as editable Tweets and more.

The Information further noted:

All together, the global number of subscribers would equate to around $28 million in annual revenue — less than 1% of the $3 billion Musk has said Twitter aims to make in revenue this year.

In related news, Twitter announced its plans to shut down free access to its APIs, but this has since changed. Elon has made revisions to this arrangement after receiving suggestions and feedback from developers.

Responding to feedback, Twitter will enable a light, write-only API for bots providing good content that is free

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 5, 2023

Musk’s amendment incorporates a new provision that allows verified users to a write-only API. with one limitation, that the bots must be providing good content for free. It is not yet clear what constitutes as “good content” but if this becomes well-defined bots will continue lurking on Twitter. This also doesn’t address researchers’ etc. need for read access to Twitter, to monitor hate speech, for example.

It will be interesting to see how Twitter will distinguish good content from bad, and how Elon plans to increase subscriptions.

Are you a Twitter Blue user? Share your thoughts with us in the comment section.

via: Thurrott