Given the rising value of data sources, this could be a smart move from X.
Or a disastrous one, depending on the specifics of its implementation.
According to reports, X has started informing its top-tier Enterprise API subscribers that it will soon shift away from an access pricing model, to a revenue share one instead, which will see X take a percentage of any money made by projects that utilize its data.
As reported by Mashable:
“X recently began sending out emails to paid subscribers of its Enterprise API plans, which start at $42,000 per month, informing them of the upcoming change. The new API pricing scheme is scheduled to go into effect on July 1. X has not yet shared final details about the change, such as exactly what percentage the revenue share model will be, with its customers.”
So instead of these users paying $42k per month for access to all of X’s posts (Enterprise API has no post access limits), X will presumably determine a percentage share of what X contributes to any relative business offerings or systems, which will see X glean direct revenue from expanded use of its content.
Which could be more profitable for X, particularly in cases like LLM development, and AI projects that are accessing X posts to feed their tools.
In order to create an effective AI system, you need data input, and a lot of it, so you can ensure that your system is able to understand how people talk and pose different queries, while also providing relevant, timely answers.
The value of X in this regard is that it’s the home of real-time discussion, so X data can provide relevant, time-sensitive responses, in an always-on feed.
X data is also valuable for market research, and tracking stock market movements. When news breaks on X, that often, eventually, leads to market shifts, and staying on top of this can give analysts an advantage in respective trading.
How X might value such contribution is another question, as it could be difficult to suggest that X-sourced knowledge led to a relative increase in revenue intake. But the change here seems more pointed towards AI projects, and ensuring that X keeps getting paid for the use of its data, if such initiatives do choose to use X posts as their input.
And really, there’s not a heap of better options on this front. Meta’s data is locked down, and hidden behind various privacy settings, LinkedIn data is also restricted, while TikTok and Pinterest are more visually focused, making them less valuable in this respect (both of their API tools are also aligned with usage insights, not content).
Reddit is probably the best comparison, and Reddit has also reformed its API pricing to ensure that it’s maximizing benefit from expanded AI developer interest.
So X may be one of the best sources for conversational, topical data to inform AI models.
Though, strangely, at the same time, X has also updated its Developer Agreement documentation to seemingly stop external projects from using its data to train AI models either way.
As reported by TechCrunch:
“In an update on Wednesday, the company added a line under ‘Reverse Engineering and other Restrictions,’ a subsection of restrictions on use: ‘You shall not and you shall not attempt to (or allow others to) […] use the X API or X Content to fine-tune or train a foundation or frontier model,’ it reads.”
So it wouldn’t benefit from AI projects using its API anyway?
I don’t know, the revenue share model seems geared towards exactly this type of project, but X is also looking to stop people from doing just that.
Which means it’s seeking to take revenue from other uses, like the stock analytics use case. Which, again, will be much harder to put a value on, in terms of data use.
Yeah, it’s slightly confusing, and I would ask X’s comms department to clarify, if it had one. But essentially, X is looking for alternative ways to make more money from its data, which, depending on its demanded percentage intake, could see some Enterprise API users cut off their X data feed.
