I'd gladly pay $25 a year just to have a verified account. Be worth $10-20 million a year in earnings anytime they choose to simply turn it on.
A vanity item for sure, but if they had something like a 'star user' that gave you a gold star next to you name if you pay $5 a year, they'd likely make millions from it too.
* an I Support Twitter! star on your name/icon/whatever * AND NO ADS EVER
On the plus side, users who pay Twitter monthly are less likely to be throwaway accounts.
As long as they price the subscription higher than that they come out ahead.
Disclaimer: ex-Twitter employee, views own, etc.
I don't believe this.
Suppose it is true. This would be an excellent reason to start with a "quota" (say 10000 per day) - sort of a queue based FIFO system.
But each day, there will also be a few (say 100) which will open up for bidding allowing you to jump the queue.
If $25 a year is really too low, then some variant of this system should work.
One more thing, it's 2017 and if I am paying you money let me edit my tweets for a certain period after posting to correct spelling and grammar errors.