Elon Musk is trying to shake up Twitter Inc. by using his favorite tool: Twitter.
Musk, Twitter’s TWTR, -3.75% newest board member and largest shareholder, used the social-media platform on Saturday to share his ideas on how it can improve its services, making apparent jokes and taking aim specifically at the company’s Twitter Blue subscription model.
In a series of provocative tweets, the chief executive of Tesla Inc. TSLA, -3.00% and SpaceX said Twitter Blue should ban ads, lower its $2.99-a-month price and consider accepting dogecoin cryptocurrency as payment for the subscription service. He also said subscribers should get an authentication checkmark.
“Price should probably be ~$2/month, but paid 12 months up front & account doesn’t get checkmark for 60 days (watch for CC chargebacks) & suspended with no refund if used for scam/spam,” he wrote on Twitter.
“And no ads. The power of corporations to dictate policy is greatly enhanced if Twitter depends on advertising money to survive,” said Musk, who has roughly 81 million Twitter followers. Twitter gets close to 90% of its revenue from advertising.
It is difficult to ascertain how serious Musk was about the suggestions as some of the tweets were seemingly intended as humor.
Musk continued on Sunday by asking his users if it would make sense to “Convert Twitter SF HQ to homeless shelter since no one shows up anyway” in a tweet poll.
While Musk is known for causing controversy with his public comments, it’s highly unusual for a major shareholder and board member to call out a company in such a public manner.
An expanded version of this report appears on WSJ.com.
Also popular on WSJ.com:
Warren Buffett’s protégé is building a mini Berkshire.
Interest-rate surge ripples through economy, from homes to car loans.
This article was originally published by Marketwatch.com. Read the original article here.
