New users in New Zealand and the Philippines will be the first to pay the new fee as X rolls out its “Not A Bot” test program for unverified accounts. The $1 USD or $1.43 NZD/₱42.51 PHP, per year fee is part of X’s latest efforts to prevent bots and spam accounts from getting onto the social media platform and it has been stated the fee is not a profit-revenue measure. Existing users will not have to pay the fee. New users in these regions who opt out of paying the fee will have minimum account functionality.
Starting today, we're testing a new program (Not A Bot) in New Zealand and the Philippines. New, unverified accounts will be required to sign up for a $1 annual subscription to be able to post & interact with other posts. Within this test, existing users are not affected.
— Support (@Support) October 17, 2023
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Not A Bot Details (per Twitter help page):
“As of October 17th, 2023 we’ve started testing “Not A Bot”, a new subscription method for new users in two countries. This new test was developed to bolster our already significant efforts to reduce spam, manipulation of our platform and bot activity. This will evaluate a potentially powerful measure to help us combat bots and spammers on X, while balancing platform accessibility with the small fee amount. Within this test, existing users are not affected.”
As X rolls out its “Not A Bot” beta program in New Zealand and the Philippines it has added that new users in those regions who opt out of paying the fee will be unable to do anything but read posts or watch videos on the platform. In other words, they will not be able to post, reply, quote, or use other common features for the platform from their new accounts.
“New users who opt out of subscribing will only be able to take “read only” actions, such as: Read posts, Watch videos, and Follow accounts.
This new program aims to defend against bots and spammers who attempt to manipulate the platform and disrupt the experience of other X users. We look forward to sharing more about the results soon.”
Not-a-Bot Program Description (via Terms and Conditions page):
“The Program is a recurring subscription service from X that provides your account with write-level functionality on the X platform, such as the ability to post content, like posts, reply, repost, quote, and bookmark other accounts’ posts and take other write actions on the platform as defined by X in our Help Center documentation. Upon payment you will be immediately provided with the write-level functionality for use. This constitutes a paid feature as described in X’s Terms of Service.”
The “Not A Bot” program marks the second measure in recent weeks by the platform to combat bots and spam accounts. Chairman and CTO Elon Musk announced in September that new monthly fees would be forthcoming for the same reasons.