Twitter reportedly considers selling inactive usernames as new revenue stream
Yahoo Finance tech editor Dan Howley details how Twitter is considering auctioning off inactive usernames as a means for diversifying its revenue, according to a new report.
Video Transcript
DAVE BRIGGS: Elon Musk throwing more up against the Twitter wall and just seeing if it sticks. The latest proposal outlined in "The New York Times" has Twitter considering selling user names to generate some new revenue. Engineers have reportedly discussed running online auctions for in-demand names.
Now Elon tweeted last month that he wants to free up some of the 1.5 billion usernames that have remained inactive for a year or more. As of now, Twitter's rules forbid the buying and selling of handles. This on-- look, on the 30,000-foot view, looks like a good idea, but one that really tinkers with the margins. How significant could the revenue be for selling a few--
SEANA SMITH: Or how many people would do it?
DAVE BRIGGS: Right. I mean, maybe businesses. I just can't imagine what a generator this is.
DAN HOWLEY: I mean, there's, obviously, the idea of businesses or celebrities maybe, but when we were talking about Twitter Blue, right, the $8 or $10, I think, if you buy it through iOS, the big thing about that was it's a revenue source, but it was never, ever, ever going to be a replacement at all for ad revenue, right? So I mean, that's $10 a month. How much are you going to expect for people to pay for this? I mean, there are some services where you can buy extras for your account.
I think Discord, you can upgrade your account and get special avatars. So it's not as though-- same thing with Reddit. I think-- I'm not positive on that. But the idea is that there are things like this out there where you would try to purchase something that-- I don't know-- gussies up your account. Maybe you are a sandwich shop, and you want, like, you know-- I don't know-- you know, Fat Sandwich. Maybe that's someone's name already. It's mine, by the way. But maybe you want that.
DAVE BRIGGS: Dan Howley at Fat Sandwich, yeah.
DAN HOWLEY: You'd have to pay me big time to get that. But so I think there's an opportunity there. But this isn't the cure-all to his problems. He spent $44 billion on something that he didn't want. And now he's trying to figure out how to get that straight. And it's just not working. And I mean, all the reports are negative. So I just-- it's going to continue this way, I think, until you can figure out the advertising aspect.
SEANA SMITH: Yeah, and who knows whether or not this actually will be implemented? But I really think that it speaks to the larger picture of what we've all been talking about, just the dire straits that it seems like Twitter is in at this point. They're really struggling to diversify their revenue. They're kind of throwing anything-- everything against the wall and really seeing what sticks. And you got to question-- I mean, we don't know what exactly, potentially, usernames they want to sell, but say it's everyone.
I don't think I would be using Twitter. Outside of my job, there's no reason I would be on Twitter. So you'd think that it would have a huge impact on the number of users, which could then-- you would think, also, impact ad spending and ad revenue and what they're able to charge some of their participants out there. So I don't know. I could see this really backfiring here for Elon Musk. So it's just a report at this point.
DAVE BRIGGS: Indeed. Dan Howley, thank you. Good stuff.
