Elon Musk is delaying Twitter paid verification to avoid Apple’s 30 percent cut

theverge.com

6 points·thesuperbigfrog··4 comments

"Twitter’s revamped Blue subscription might not be available as an in-app purchase on iOS when it eventually relaunches so that it can dodge Apple’s 30 percent cut of App Store purchases"

$8 * 30% = $2.40 per verified account if made as an in-app purchase.

How many Twitter users would pay for a verified account (or whatever they will call it) as an in-app purchase on iOS / iPadOS ?

The friction to transaction completion on iOS and Android is much, much lower. You don't need to go to a website and type out your entire information. Instead you just click a button, that's it.

Rationally it shouldn't matter - you either want to get it or not. But in reality it's not like that. Friction determines our actions.

It's like... you may not be hungry, but if I put an extremely tasty dish before you, you'll find your appetite.

And that's Elon's problem... if he enables this button, he'll have a lot more people subscribe in total than through the website. If he doesn't, then SOME of those people who would've clicked, would've gone to the site, but most would give up.

And the percent that would give up is higher than 30%.

He's just pissed off he can't have his eggs whole and omelet fried at the same time. The guy is a billionaire, he's used to getting what he wants. Not this time.

So, Elon Musk is going to put Twitter Blue Payment inside the app, forcing Apple to make a decision about excluding Twitter from the app store for violating their terms of service, or excluding subscription payments from the 30% cut, which from a business perspective they probably can't do.

Unclear what he wants to do. But I have the feeling, based on past experience from last 4 weeks, that it'll be desperate and stupid.

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