The thorny problem of how creative people might get paid for content they put online has persisted for the best part of 20 years.
Jack Conte, chief executive of creative content platform Patreon – one of the companies seeking to solve that issue by encouraging subscription payments to creators – sees those past two decades as a period when distribution was thoroughly figured out, but the economics remained elusive.
“The next 20 years is going to be [about] rebuilding the financial engine to get creative people paid,” he said in a recent podcast interview.
[These features] will allow creators and publishers to be directly supported by their audience and will incentivise them to continue creating content that their audience loves
Twitter
Today, across the web, you can see that challenge being tackled head on. Social media platforms such as Instagram and Facebook are introducing new ways for creators to be paid for their music, jokes, advice or expertise.
Whole platforms, such as Substack, have been built on this single idea: audiences paying creators directly for what they do, rather than clicking on adverts to generate meagre pocket money.
Twitter is now launching two new features which seek to capitalise on this trend. Super Follows allows creators to accept subscription payments through the platform in return for exclusive content. Ticketed Spaces, meanwhile, expand Twitter’s burgeoning Spaces feature – essentially an audio chatroom, not dissimilar to a live podcast – to allow charging for admission.
“[These features] will allow creators and publishers to be directly supported by their audience and will incentivise them to continue creating content that their audience loves,” said Twitter.
Super Follows is being tested in the US, with a view to launching globally. To join the scheme you must be at least 18 years old, have 10,000 followers or more and tweet regularly (at least 25 tweets in the previous 30 days). If your application is accepted, you could charge people $2.99, $4.99 or $9.99 a month to become your Super Follower. But what do you give them in return?
“It could be tweets, it could be DMs [direct messages]” said Kayvon Beykpour, product lead at Twitter, on The Verge podcast. “It could be subscriber-only Spaces. It could be subscriber-only newsletters. Think of it as stitching together all the current and new and upcoming forms of content that someone can create on the platform, and really having this new subscriber layer – a new community, essentially.”
This idea of community is central to Twitter’s new initiatives. Like Patreon, it believes that it isn’t about the quantity of content an audience member might get for their $2.99, but more about them recognising and rewarding creators whose work they value.
Ticketed Spaces has a similar community thrust: creators can charge a ticket price of between $1 and $999 in order to connect with their followers using voice, rather than the strict limits of a 280-character tweet.
Spaces has clear parallels with other new audio platforms such as Clubhouse and Greenroom, but Twitter is the first to offer paid admission (as opposed to a tipping feature), and Beykpour said that it’s “fundamentally Twitter”, for good or bad. It just has a new wrapper.
“I think the rise of this audio renaissance that’s happening right now is interesting,” he said. “[Having] serendipitous conversations with people, but doing it in a way that is synchronous rather than asynchronous, and powered by the human voice.”
After many years of remaining fairly static as a platform, these two new initiatives are part of a suite of features being added to Twitter as the firm seeks new revenue streams, including the forthcoming Twitter Blue subscription service, which is rumoured to include new features such as “undo tweet”.
Advertising accounted for 86 per cent of the platform’s revenue in 2020, according to Twitter's annual financial report, but a feature such as Super Follows could, if it works, net a new income stream for the firm, as well as the creators they’re trying to support.
Twitter's Super Follows will allow select users to accept subscription payments in return for exclusive content. Unsplash / Austin Distel
Twitter will take 3 per cent of the first $50,000 in revenue (that’s after Apple and Google’s inevitable commission on in-app purchases), which increases to 20 per cent thereafter.
But the jury is out on whether it will work. One of the attractions of Twitter over the years has been its level playing field, enabling people in and out of the public eye to freely converse in a way they were never able to before.
Putting content behind a paywall could create a platform that’s far less egalitarian; more of a “them and us” scenario, where some people broadcast and the rest listen.
Creators may also have to get used to smaller audiences. Currently, Twitter can direct thousands or millions of people to viral tweets in a very short space of time, but charging will hugely restrict its visibility. It’s a reiteration of the burning question at the heart of the creator economy: do you want exposure or do you want to be paid?
Some percentage of your super fans will totally be willing to pay for content that is exclusive
Kayvon Beykpour, product lead at Twitter
Lastly, there’s the ever-present question of whether people will want to pay for things they’ve traditionally had for free – particularly when there’s a massive oversupply of things for us to read, watch and listen to.
Bekypour’s take is, naturally, a positive one: “You have a tremendous amount of incentive to create some form of content for all to see, because that’s how you build an audience. And then some percentage of your super fans will totally be willing to pay for content that is exclusive.”
Patreon has shown that the idea of a closer community yielding a financial pay-off can work, but when YouTube tried it – with paid channels, fan funding and channel memberships – none caught on. Patreon’s Conte believes that enabling a flourishing, financially rewarded creative sector is really down to trust in the platform itself.
Whether we trust Twitter to successfully mediate between talent and audience is something that the next few months will slowly reveal.
Glossary of a stock market revolution
Reddit
A discussion website
Redditor
The users of Reddit
Robinhood
A smartphone app for buying and selling shares
Short seller
Selling a stock today in the belief its price will fall in the future
Saturday
Atletico Madrid v Sevilla (3pm)
Alaves v Real Madrid (6.15pm)
Malaga v Athletic Bilbao (8.30pm)
Girona v Barcelona (10.45pm)
Sunday
Espanyol v Deportivo la Coruna (2pm)
Getafe v Villarreal (6.15pm)
Eibar v Celta Vigo (8.30pm)
Las Palmas v Leganes (8.30pm)
Real Sociedad v Valencia (10.45pm)
Monday
Real Betis v Levante (11.pm)
Isle of Dogs
Director: Wes Anderson
Starring: Bryan Cranston, Liev Schreiber, Ed Norton, Greta Gerwig, Bill Murray, Jeff Goldblum, Scarlett Johansson
Direct flights from the UAE to the Nepalese capital, Kathmandu, are available with Air Arabia, (www.airarabia.com) Fly Dubai (www.flydubai.com) or Etihad (www.etihad.com) from Dh1,200 return including taxes. The trek described here started from Jomson, but there are many other start and end point variations depending on how you tailor your trek. To get to Jomson from Kathmandu you must first fly to the lake-side resort town of Pokhara with either Buddha Air (www.buddhaair.com) or Yeti Airlines (www.yetiairlines.com). Both charge around US$240 (Dh880) return. From Pokhara there are early morning flights to Jomson with Yeti Airlines or Simrik Airlines (www.simrikairlines.com) for around US$220 (Dh800) return.
The trek
Restricted area permits (US$500 per person) are required for trekking in the Upper Mustang area. The challenging Meso Kanto pass between Tilcho Lake and Jomson should not be attempted by those without a lot of mountain experience and a good support team. An excellent trekking company with good knowledge of Upper Mustang, the Annaurpuna Circuit and Tilcho Lake area and who can help organise a version of the trek described here is the Nepal-UK run Snow Cat Travel (www.snowcattravel.com). Prices vary widely depending on accommodation types and the level of assistance required.
How Apple's credit card works
The Apple Card looks different from a traditional credit card — there's no number on the front and the users' name is etched in metal. The card expands the company's digital Apple Pay services, marrying the physical card to a virtual one and integrating both with the iPhone. Its attributes include quick sign-up, elimination of most fees, strong security protections and cash back.
What does it cost?
Apple says there are no fees associated with the card. That means no late fee, no annual fee, no international fee and no over-the-limit fees. It also said it aims to have among the lowest interest rates in the industry. Users must have an iPhone to use the card, which comes at a cost. But they will earn cash back on their purchases — 3 per cent on Apple purchases, 2 per cent on those with the virtual card and 1 per cent with the physical card. Apple says it is the only card to provide those rewards in real time, so that cash earned can be used immediately.
What will the interest rate be?
The card doesn't come out until summer but Apple has said that as of March, the variable annual percentage rate on the card could be anywhere from 13.24 per cent to 24.24 per cent based on creditworthiness. That's in line with the rest of the market, according to analysts
What about security?
The physical card has no numbers so purchases are made with the embedded chip and the digital version lives in your Apple Wallet on your phone, where it's protected by fingerprints or facial recognition. That means that even if someone steals your phone, they won't be able to use the card to buy things.
Is it easy to use?
Apple says users will be able to sign up for the card in the Wallet app on their iPhone and begin using it almost immediately. It also tracks spending on the phone in a more user-friendly format, eliminating some of the gibberish that fills a traditional credit card statement. Plus it includes some budgeting tools, such as tracking spending and providing estimates of how much interest could be charged on a purchase to help people make an informed decision.
* Associated Press
THE DETAILS
Solo: A Star Wars Story
Director: Ron Howard
2/5
Warlight,
Michael Ondaatje, Knopf
OTHER IPL BOWLING RECORDS
Best bowling figures: 6-14 – Sohail Tanvir (for Rajasthan Royals against Chennai Super Kings in 2008)
Best average: 16.36 – Andrew Tye
Best economy rate: 6.53 – Sunil Narine
Best strike-rate: 12.83 – Andrew Tye
Best strike-rate in an innings: 1.50 – Suresh Raina (for Chennai Super Kings against Rajasthan Royals in 2011)
Most runs conceded in an innings: 70 – Basil Thampi (for Sunrisers Hyderabad against Royal Challengers Bangalore in 2018)
Most hat-tricks: 3 – Amit Mishra
Most dot-balls: 1,128 – Harbhajan Singh
Most maiden overs bowled: 14 – Praveen Kumar
Most four-wicket hauls: 6 – Sunil Narine
THE SIXTH SENSE
Starring: Bruce Willis, Toni Collette, Hayley Joel Osment
Priority access to new homes from participating developers
Discounts on sales price of off-plan units
Flexible payment plans from developers
Mortgages with better interest rates, faster approval times and reduced fees
DLD registration fee can be paid through banks or credit cards at zero interest rates
Some of Darwish's last words
"They see their tomorrows slipping out of their reach. And though it seems to them that everything outside this reality is heaven, yet they do not want to go to that heaven. They stay, because they are afflicted with hope." - Mahmoud Darwish, to attendees of the Palestine Festival of Literature, 2008
His life in brief: Born in a village near Galilee, he lived in exile for most of his life and started writing poetry after high school. He was arrested several times by Israel for what were deemed to be inciteful poems. Most of his work focused on the love and yearning for his homeland, and he was regarded the Palestinian poet of resistance. Over the course of his life, he published more than 30 poetry collections and books of prose, with his work translated into more than 20 languages. Many of his poems were set to music by Arab composers, most significantly Marcel Khalife. Darwish died on August 9, 2008 after undergoing heart surgery in the United States. He was later buried in Ramallah where a shrine was erected in his honour.
