Twitter to Launch “Super Follows” and Its Thoughts on Apple’s Subscription Fee

Twitter last month enlightened the public about a new feature it is introducing called “Super Follow.”

The super follow would allow users to follow influencers, creators and other people online by making an in app payment through App and Play Store in order to receive exclusive content from them that will only be visible and accessible to the super followers.

But Apple’s in App payment methods had recently been on a verge of some controversies. The In-App payment method by Apple requires the developing companies to give the Tech Giant a 30 percent commission of every In-App purchase made through the App Store from a particular developer. Some companies like Epic Games had claimed that the commission was unfair to the developing companies and was very high. Therefore, in order to avoid the commission, they made a different separate way of payment within their game Fortnite due to which the game was banned from the App Store.

However, Twitter has different views about the in app commission from Epic Games. In an interview with a well-known news media platform Kayvon Beykpour, Twitter's head of consumer product, said that Twitter is not in a habit of breaking or going against ground rules created by the platform. This means that Twitter does support Apple taking its commission one way or another and this was a subtle taunt towards Epic Games as well. When questioned about Twitter having to pay a 30 percent commission on every purchase and what were his views on this. The Head of Consumer Product said that they are looking towards a positive side while making this new feature. They are building a feature which was not present before and even if they sell it off for 10 dollars and have to pay a 30 percent commission of it, it will still be 7 dollars and if you look it from a positive side that is seven dollars Twitter did not make before the existence of this feature. So even though as much as they would love to keep the whole amount they are not at all double minded about paying their commissions.

All of this was answered in a series of questions and when asked about why are they willing to pay the 30 percent commission to the company Beykpour said that it takes a lot of time and cost to stand and empire like Apple and build a platform like App Store to accept payment methods.

He also said that Twitter (even after some criticism) has big hopes from the new feature “Super Follow” and if all goes well good things will happen for the company in the coming weeks. As to when will this new feature be launched has not been said by the company but we for sure know that Twitter will tell more about this new feature soon.


Photo: Alexander Shatov
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