Twitter’s new reading limits policy draws mixed reactions

Twitter’s controversial move to apply temporary reading limits on posts have generated mixed reactions and condemnation from social media users globally.

Elon Musk, the owner of the Microblogging platform said the step was taken to address extreme levels of data scraping and system manipulation.

Verified accounts were temporarily limited to reading 6,000 posts a day, Musk said, adding that unverified accounts and new unverified accounts were limited to reading 600 posts a day and 300 posts a day respectively.

However, the tweet which has generated over 227 million views and 65,000 retweets since it was disclosed on Saturday, June 1, 2023, have been condemned, with many calling on the microblogging platform to redress their step as it is positioned to affect subscribers and businesses on the platform.

Jake Wujastyk, founding member and VP of Business Development at TrendSpider expressed displeasure on the recent move of the social media platform despite being a fan of the Tesla CEO.

He questioned the reason why users who subscribed to the platform but are not verified should lose access to tweets despite paying for the service.

“I’m a fan of you for sure, @elonmusk, but this was EXTREMELY poorly thought out. Anyone who isn’t verified now and has access to a subscription on Twitter loses access to the subscription tweets after their 600 limit. They are paying for the subscription, they shouldn’t be limited,” he tweeted.

Carlos Maslaton, a financial analyst and trader, condemned the actions of the platform on his official Twitter account, asking Musk to explain the meaning of ‘reading’ and stating clearly that he is against the decision despite having a verified account.

“Elon, please define the term “reading”. In any case let me manifest, as a verified account, that I’m totally against your decision,” he tweeted.

Another verified social media handle identified as Billy Green was on the view that Musk limited the reading in favour of verified accounts to force users to buy the Blue-tick.

“To make everyone buy Twitter blue, we’ve applied the following temporary limits.
“Verified accounts are limited to reading 6M posts/day, Unverified accounts to 5 posts/day, New unverified accounts to 3/day,” Green tweeted.

Also, John Junyszek, community manager at 343 industries said the Twitter reading limits will end up affecting users who rely on the platform solely for business.

“I may be overestimating, but it feels like I usually see more than 6,000 posts a day as part of my job. It feels like it could negatively impact people who use this platform the most.”

He went further to question if there will be room to increase the limit if it eventually causes damage for people who depend on the platform for revenue.

According to him, “If this does end up causing issues for folks, would you be open to increasing the view limit.”

In a later tweet, the CEO of Tesla added that rate limits are increasing soon to 8,000 for verified, 800 for unverified and 400 for new unverified accounts.

Meanwhile,few also complained that Musk still remains in charge of the platform and contributed to the controversial decision despite his decision to step down as the CEO of the company while some question why he proceeded to purchase the microblogging platform since it can’t be well managed.

“Why did you Even purchase this app when you can’t handle it,” Twitter handle identified as @FCB-ACE tweeted.