Musk takes over Twitter for 100 days: go all out to transform and push new features Whether it can be "reborn" is still questioned

Focus

• 1 It has been 100 days since Musk took over Twitter, during which time he has taken many steps to revamp the platform, including rolling out new features such as subscriptions and mass layoffs.
• 2 Twitter is also reviving many ideas that have been tested before, such as the tweet read statistics feature.
• 3 Musk expects Twitter to basically break even this year, with revenue of about $3 billion, down nearly half from $5.1 billion in 2021.
• 4 It will be an uphill battle for Musk to convince enough users that his subscription service is worth the money and will be able to cover all the lost revenue.

Tencent Technology News February 11 news, since taking over Twitter, Elon Musk has been transforming the platform and constantly adding new functions. The biggest challenge facing the social media platform today is whether these initiatives can bring tangible benefits to Twitter's business to help it "regenerate."

On Saturday, local time in the United States, Musk took over Twitter for exactly 100 days. The billionaire has said his goals for Twitter include building a subscription business, reducing reliance on ads and providing a better experience for users. Top-notch changes to Twitter so far include the launch of Twitter Blue, a subscription service, and a new version of its algorithm-based Twitter feed, which has recommended content to users that doesn't just come from the accounts they follow.

Other changes include allowing U.S. subscribers to write long posts of no more than 4,000 characters on Twitter, rolling out gold and gray authentication services to businesses and government agencies, respectively, and shutting down popular third-party apps like Tweetbot and Twitterrific. Previously, many users had used these apps to get additional features that were not normally supported by the Twitter platform.

Twitter has also added tweet views statistics, which Musk says helps users know who is watching their tweets and how many have seen them. In addition, Musk has proposed more possible reforms, including introducing higher-priced, ad-free subscription plans, reducing the size of ads, and sharing advertising revenue with creators.

Daniel Newman, a tech industry analyst at Future Research, said: "I would say that there are new features that will immediately drive user growth and gain support from advertisers." Still, Newman said it's too early to evaluate the impact of these initiatives: "I don't know what else Musk has to offer." ”

Some users said they liked Twitter under Musk so far. Others expressed confusion and complaints, including negative feedback on the algorithm's recommendations. For example, sometimes the algorithm recommends posts that seem unrelated to the account, such as a post from a men's blogger who suddenly became popular on the platform.

Some changes have been implemented but withdrawn, such as a policy that briefly banned links to rival social media platforms. Twitter also suffered widespread outages on Wednesday, with many users unable to tweet. The issues were largely resolved within hours, and Twitter did not provide details that led to the problems.

Musk's most controversial change to Twitter may be a change in content moderation, which he says helps free speech. Twitter head of trust and safety, Ella Owen, said thousands of previously banned accounts have been restored. Twitter also ended a policy aimed at curbing the spread of misinformation about the pneumonia outbreak in the new embassy.

Musk asked Twitter employees to act quickly. He posted in November: "Mind you, Twitter is going to do a lot of stupid things in the coming months. We will keep the effective actions and change the invalid policies. ”

The CEO has said he expects Twitter to essentially break even this year. At that time, the company's revenue will decline, but its costs will also decrease. Musk said in December that Twitter is on track to earn about $3 billion in revenue in 2023, which is about $2 billion less than Twitter's $5.1 billion in 2021, the last full year Twitter publicly announces results. Musk said he cut Twitter employees from nearly 8,000 to about 2,000 as part of his aggressive cost-cutting efforts.

Musk was able to carry out the above measures thanks to the new state that Twitter is currently in. It is now a smaller, privately held company no longer subject to Wall Street, in stark contrast to the state it was when it went public. At the time, Twitter needed to tread carefully when making any changes, and was sometimes accused of moving too slowly.

Many former Twitter employees said that some of the previous ideas were being revisited, such as the tweet read count. Paul Stamathew, a former senior product designer at Twitter, wrote on Twitter that the platform had tested the feature before but had not been approved, in part because it might disappoint users with few views.

In the early years, Twitter continued to test and tweak its platform and features, but has long shy away from bold product changes. The platform kept the initial 140-character limit in place for more than a decade before expanding it to 280 characters in 2017. Last year, shortly before Musk officially took over, Twitter began rolling out the "Edit" button, calling it its most popular feature. Until now, only subscribers could use this button.

At the heart of Musk's strategy to increase subscriptions is the new Twitter Blue, which relaunched last December after a failed first attempt. Twitter has not publicly disclosed subscriber numbers, but data collected by researchers suggests that the service still has a long way to go before it can power Twitter.

At the end of January, Berlin-based software developer Travis Brown estimated the total number of Twitter Blue subscribers at between 275,000 and 325,000, a conclusion based on computer programs reviewing about 30 million accounts. The Information also recently reported that the new Twitter Blue had about 290,000 subscribers worldwide as of mid-January.

Users pay $8 per month to use Twitter Blue through a web browser and $11 per month for mobile devices. Mobile stores charge different commissions, which makes estimating Twitter's revenue quite complicated. But we can roughly calculate that Brown's estimated high-end of 325,000 subscribers would pay $8 per person per month, which equates to $2.6 million, or $31.2 million a year.

However, this estimate is far less than Twitter's advertising revenue. In 2021, advertising revenue accounted for about $4.5 billion of Twitter's nearly $5.1 billion in total revenue.

Due to Apple's changed privacy policy and tough economic environment, the social media industry in general is struggling to cope with the slowdown in online marketing. Mahana Dahl, a former Snap and Instagram executive, said the subscription model has huge potential in this context, and "I think it's a really great idea."

However, Dahl added that a successful subscription business needs to meet two conditions: a loyal user base and a clear value proposition. "In order for these foundations to work, you also need audiences who are willing to pay for them and be rewarded," she said. And I think that's an open question for Twitter. ”

Twitter under Musk is also aggressively attracting advertisers who are fleeing the platform because of too much uncertainty about Musk's content moderation and staffing plans. Data analysis by industry analyst Sensor Tower shows that as of Jan. 29, more than 70 of the top 100 advertisers before Twitter's acquisition had stopped advertising on Twitter.

Jasmine Enberg, an analyst at market research firm Insider Intelligence, said: "It will be an uphill battle for Musk to convince enough users that his subscription service is worth the money and can make up for all the lost revenue. (Golden Deer)