Twitter is contemplating promoting usernames as a method to increase income, in accordance with a brand new report from The New York Times. The report comes because the social community’s proprietor, Elon Musk, has been in search of methods to generate income for the corporate.
The report says engineers on the firm have thought of organizing on-line auctions the place individuals can bid for usernames, also called handles. The potential new income stream has been mentioned since no less than December. It’s unknown if the thought will come to fruition, and if it does, it’s unclear if the plan will have an effect on all usernames or solely a few of them.
Final month, Musk said in a tweet that Twitter would quickly begin liberating up 1.5 billion usernames, noting that inactive accounts can be deleted. After buying the social community in October, Musk signaled in a tweet reply that he was concerned about liberating up accounts with desired usernames.
The social community didn’t reply to ’s request for remark.
Twitter’s username squatting policy doesn’t permit the shopping for and promoting of usernames. Regardless of this rule, individuals have been in a position to purchase coveted Twitter usernames on the black market for years. The apply of promoting fascinating usernames has additionally attracted hackers prior to now. In 2020, a young person was arrested after hacking the social network and acquiring high-profile usernames to promote them. The hacker compromised the accounts of quite a few public figures, together with Musk, former president Barack Obama, Invoice Gates and extra.
The brand new report comes as fashionable messaging app Telegram announced in October that can it maintain an public sale for usernames, for each particular person accounts and channels, via a market constructed on prime of the TON blockchain.
Since Musk’s $44 billion takeover of Twitter, the billionaire has been looking for methods to spice up the corporate’s income amid a downturn in advert income. Studies counsel that for the reason that begin of Musk’s Twitter possession, many advertisers left the platform and the corporate has been cutting down its inside income projections.
The corporate has made some modifications over the previous few months to spice up income. Earlier this month, the corporate mentioned it plans to lift its ban on political ads within the “coming weeks.” In November, the social community launched a revamped Twitter Blue subscription that prices $7.99 and comes with a verified blue checkmark.
