As many of the product updates Twitter teased months ago begin to roll out, yesterday the company revealed more, building on the creator and monetisation push it began earlier in the year.
Some of the plans are pretty straightforward. The tip jar feature (which saw a limited launch earlier in the year) is rolling out to all iOS users worldwide now, with Android to follow in the next few weeks. And support for Bitcoin tips should come as no surprise to readers familiar with Jack Dorsey’s cryptocurrency obsession.
But beyond that there was a creator fund! Yes, Twitter was the last holdout from throwing money at creators to develop content on its platform. However, it’s a bit different here, as TechCrunch explained:
Twitter views its creator fund as one not aimed at rewarding creators for the content they produce… but rather at helping creators get started with audio productions on Twitter Spaces.
“The goal of it really is to provide that technical and marketing expertise,” noted Twitter Product Lead for Creator Monetization, Esther Crawford. “We think of it as kind of a stopgap solution. We want to onboard these folks into other long-term monetization features. But we want to give them an initial boost,” she said.
So don’t expect a chunk of cash just to do a live podcast on Spaces. The people who do that kind of thing tend to have Twitter audiences anyway (
hello!).
One other announcement was more unexpected. Just like Instagram has been spotted dipping its toe into the world of NFTs, Twitter could soon let you showcase NFTs you own on your profile. This seems like a vague plan for the time being, so don’t expect it to launch soon.
There were updates on other upcoming features too, but the one that I’m really looking forward to is
recorded Spaces. We’ve still got “a few months” to wait for that one, sadly.
