Elon Musk: Govt, commercial users to pay for Twitter

Billionaire founder of Tesla Inc, Elon Musk, who just sealed a deal to buy Twitter at $44bn, has said all commercial users and government agencies may be charged a fee for using the micro-blogging platform.

Musk disclosed this in a post on his official Twitter handle.

He, however, said Twitter would always be free for “casual users”.

“Twitter will always be free for casual users, but maybe a slight cost for commercial/government users,” Musk said in a tweet on Wednesday.

“Some revenue is better than none!” he said in another tweet.

Last week, Twitter announced that it accepted Musk’s buyout offer of $44bn, making him the new owner of the platform, pending regulatory and shareholder approval.

Following the buyout announcement, Musk said he wanted to enhance the platform with new features.

“Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated,” the billionaire had said.

“I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spambots, and authenticating all humans.”

On Monday, at the Met Gala – his first major public appearance since the deal was agreed – he was asked about his plans for Twitter.

“My goal, assuming everything gets done, is to make Twitter as inclusive as possible and to have as broad a swathe of people on Twitter as possible,” he said.

His latest announcement could be one of the changes he introduces after he completes his takeover of the social media platform.