Elon Musk states he will begin charging users of X.

X already provides a £9.60 per month premium subscription that grants users a verification tick, enables them to submit lengthier articles and amend old ones, and gives their account priority in search results.

According to NBC News, the billionaire entrepreneur who changed the platform's name to X said during a live webcast that the corporation will implement a "small monthly payment" to fight "vast armies of bots."

Musk has long criticised the existence of false identities on the network and has attempted to use his complaints as an excuse to back out of his agreement to purchase it last year.

He did not provide any other information on the new charge, such as a cost or whether it will have additional benefits.

The change would put an end to one of the site's most well-known memes, in which users tag pictures of especially eye-catching postings with the phrase "this website is free."

In an interview with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Musk discussed the ideas in an effort to respond to criticism of the way he is handling the platform.

Since spending $44 billion (£38 billion) to acquire Twitter, the self-described "free speech absolutist" has been under fire for allegedly promoting misinformation, bigotry, sexism, and antisemitism.

Additionally, he has allowed accounts that had been previously banned, including Andrew Tate and Donald Trump's.

The platform came under scrutiny last month for taking many days to take down messages encouraging Holocaust denial despite the Auschwitz Museum regularly attracting attention to them.

Musk further boasted that X currently has 550 million "monthly users" who produce between 100 million and 200 million posts daily during the live feed with Mr. Netanyahu.

Despite rising competition from smaller platforms like Bluesky and Mastodon as well as the egregiously identical Threads app from Meta, it has managed to maintain its popularity.

Musk has largely concentrated on monetising X's user base since advertisement spending has decreased as a result of questions about his moderating procedures.

His long-term goal is to make it an "everything app" that can handle everything from purchases to video conversations.

(Sources: news.sky.com)