Twitter will soon pay verified content creators for ads in their replies

Much to the delight of verified content creators on Twitter, the social media giant will soon start paying them for ads in their replies. According to a tweet by the company's CEO, Elon Musk, the first payment block will be around $5 million (about £4,019,250).

"Note, the creator must be verified and only ads served to verified users count," Musk explained in his tweet. Regrettably, Twitter has been struggling to retain its advertisers after the 51-year-old business magnate acquired the platform.

In May, Musk admitted that running the social media platform has been "quite painful" for him. According to a Gadgets 360 report, advertisers have understandably been concerned about placing their ads on Twitter after the company laid off a considerable number of employees.

Twitter continues to remain unprofitable

Interestingly, the move comes before Twitter's newly named CEO Linda Yaccarino takes the helm at the company. To those unaware, Yaccarino is a renowned American media executive, who was the chair of advertising sales for NBCUniversal. She succeeded Musk as the CEO of X Corp. and Twitter on June 5, 2023.

Earlier this year, Musk revealed that Twitter makes 5 or 6 cents per hour of attention from users. A report by Reuters claims Musk is planning to raise that to 15 cents (or more) with more relevant and timely advertisements.

In the meantime, European consumer group BEUC has complained to the EU and consumer authorities that online platforms including TikTok, Alphabet's YouTube, Twitter, and Meta's Instagram allegedly serve as a platform for the misleading promotion of crypto assets. In line with this, US regulators recently sued crypto platforms Binance and Coinbase.

As if that weren't enough, cryptocurrency exchange FTX collapsed last year, sparking concerns over consumer protection for Bitcoin, Ether, and other crypto assets. So, the EU decided to adopt the world's first comprehensive set of rules for crypto asset regulation.

BEUC filed a complaint earlier this week noting that the rapid increase of misleading ads on crypto assets on social media platforms isn't a fair commercial practice. BEUC claims this approach could lead to serious harm such as loss of money. To make things worse for Twitter, Instagram is reportedly working on a text-based app.

Instagram's Twitter rival leaked

While details about Instagram's new app are still scarce, we recently got our first glimpse into the Twitter alternative in the form of some leaked screenshots. During a recently concluded companywide meeting, one of Meta's top executives showed off the company's upcoming Twitter competitor.

Now, The Verge has shared some screenshots of the new standalone app, which will reportedly be based on Instagram. Moreover, the app will be integrated with the decentralised social media protocol called ActivityPub.

As a result, users of the new app will be able to effortlessly shift their accounts and followers with them to other ActivityPub-supported apps like Mastodon. During the meeting, Meta chief product officer Chris Cox described the app as Instagram's "response to Twitter."

The new app will use Instagram's account system to instantly populate a user's information. The app, which is internally referred to as "Project 92," will probably carry the "Threads" moniker when it makes its debut. This piece of vital information was found in internal documents spotted by The Verge.

Cox jibed about the way Musk is currently running Twitter during the meeting. "We've been hearing from creators and public figures who are interested in having a platform that is sanely run, that they believe that they can trust and rely upon for distribution," he said.

According to Cox, Instagram's goal for its new app was "safety, ease of use, reliability." Moreover, the company wants to ensure that creators have a "stable place to build and grow their audiences." In fact, he claims some celebrities are already committed to using the app. Cox further stated Meta is in discussions with other big names including the Dalai Lama and Oprah.