Elon Musk Floats The Idea Of Making Everyone Pay For Twitter / X (Again), And After A Year Of Musk's Leadership, Some Want It To Happen So The Site Can Die

In November last year, Elon Musk floated the idea of making everyone pay for Twitter, which led people to vow that if Twitter went behind a paywall, they would leave, and opine that the site itself would basically be doomed.

In a "second verse, same as the first" moment, Musk has again floated the idea that Twitter (or "X" depending on who you ask) needs to go behind a paywall, this time to Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

After a year of watching the site devolve into chaos after Musk proposes one often unpopular change after another, many on the microblogging platform expressed that they hope it happens so that Twitter / X well and truly dies.

The news spread after it was reported by Bloomberg tech reporter Dave Lee yesterday afternoon.

According to Lee, Musk told Netanyahu that paywalling Twitter is the only way to stamp out "bots" — a bogeyman Musk has long said is plaguing Twitter, to some skepticism.

A video of the comments was tweeted from Netanyahu's account. In their discussion, Musk said Twitter is "moving to a small monthly payment for use of the X system," saying it's how he believes the site can combat bot armies (comments at roughly the 34-minute mark in the video below).

LIVE: Speaking with @elonmusk about how we can harness the opportunities and mitigate the risks of AI for the good of civilization. https://t.co/XiAQwOXzcP

— Benjamin Netanyahu – בנימין נתניהו (@netanyahu) September 18, 2023

While Musk said the reasoning for paywalling Twitter would be to stamp out bots, others suspect it's because Twitter is notoriously unprofitable.

In July, Musk himself tweeted the company has a "negative cash flow" due to a "~50% drop in advertisers." It has often been speculated that Musk's erratic changes to the website, such as removing legacy checkmarks and opening the door for impersonation pranks, plus the increased frequency of Musk's own controversial tweets, which have been accused of being anti-vaxx and antisemitic, may have scared off many advertisers.