First off, I want to preface this post by saying that, in the long-term, I don’t think the Internet can be made “profitable.” This is because the medium itself is inherently opposed to profit-making: it can be done, but only at the cost of either a quick death (for example, Napster) or a slow death (MySpace) of whatever kind of service is being offered. I firmly hold to the idea that the Internet is a new, intellectual form of the “commons” and while the commons can be deterritorialized and reterritorialized by capital, that model can’t be sustained for what is essentially free (in that all information ought to be free).

That being said, I like Twitter. Although I had an account for about a year before I really “got” it, I now use it more than once every day and have found it mostly useful for interacting with people I know and don’t know. That’s also why I’d like to see Twitter remain independent: thus far, the Twitter team has provided a great service and it would be upsetting if even a fairly humane company like Google were to buy it and turn it into a Google Ads farm. That’s also why Twitter should probably figure out a way to at least nominally turn a profit.

There are a few ways to do this. One is to take Facebook’s “flat tax” approach: instead of charging anyone, Facebook just inundates you with ads (in your profile, in your sidebar, as “gifts,” etc.). It’s pretty annoying and I think it ruins the experience. It’s also probably one of the reasons why I’ve stopped using Facebook (other than its poorly designed UI and the idiotic influx of “quiz” spam I now see every few minutes).

However, the Twitter team has made it pretty clear that they don’t want to take this approach. Which is why I propose an alternative to the “flat tax” (really “flat ad”) approach: a progressive system. This would involve two components: (1) on registration, “public” (i.e., individual) accounts would be free, while “private” (i.e., corporate) accounts would require a one-time fee. This is because the very nature of a corporate account is fundamentally different than a public account: while a public account simply involves posting about day-to-day activity and things you finding to be interesting, corporate accounts would largely, if not implicitly, involve promoting that corporate entity. Hence, they should have to pay a fee to do that. This would also lower the influx of corporate spam.

The second component is the more important one. Currently, my Twitter account has 58 followers and I’m following 51 people. On the other hand, Ashton Kutcher has 2,013,315 followers and is following 165 people. Now, both Ashton Kutcher and me have what I would call “public” accounts: certainly his isn’t “private” in the sense that it’s run on behalf of a company. Yet the difference between 58 followers and roughly two million is pretty big. Here is my suggestion: once a Twitter user has over, say, either 500 or 1,000 followers, they have to pay a monthly fee to maintain this number and the fee increases exponentially as the followers go up by powers of ten. While I can’t afford to have two million followers under this model, Ashton Kutcher certainly can. Moreover, this means that the top 1% of the Twitter node would cover at least 50% of the costs of operation, depending on how the fees are controlled. The other funds could come from the minimal ads on the right-hand column, as well as corporate accounts.

This model would have a number of benefits: it would help to monetize Twitter, reduce the amount of “EARN X MANY FRIENDS IN JUST A FEW MINUTES!” spam/viruses, and be a fair and equitable service without resorting to annoying ads for regular users. One of the problems I can foresee is that some might claim that the number of followers you have is out of your control, but I’d like to ask: are you ever really going to have more than 1,000 followers? If you think so or already do, clearly you’re someone who is at least somewhat notable. That level of publicity means that you should be paying for your account anyway.