People don't wanna see ads. And yeah, shitposting is fun, but entertainment value is one of the cheapest forms, and the one that's most easily replaced.

More importantly: it's dangerous.

The incentive of reaching a payout every month means people are gonna go to extreme lengths to put out content that outrages, engages, and gets people talking no matter what.

This is usually controversial content.

People are gonna spew garbage just for the sake of reach and engagement.

People already do this for free. Imagine how it's gonna be now that they're getting paid for it.

Screenshot of Twitter/X announcing ads revenue sharing.
Screenshot of Twitter/X announcing ads revenue sharing.

The platform (in this case, Twitter) has no incentive to moderate or limit this type of content, since it means a flywheel of attention/engagement, and ultimately, thought/behavior manipulation.

Another thing to consider with sharing ad revenue is that you're not sharing a slice of the pie. I saw someone comparing ad-sharing revenue to equity.

Let's be clear: sharing ad revenue with you is not equity. You don't own any part of the platform. If it goes public, gets acquired, or has some sort of liquidity event, you're not getting a piece of that pie.

Your ad revenue will likely be affected by the event, but not to the same extent that owning actual shares of the company would.

Sharing ad revenue sounds nice, and sure, if you're a creator who's putting out content for free anyways, it's better than nothing.

But there's levels to it, and we should always consider a more holistic view of what this means for everyone involved.

The weaponization of social media is nothing new. We saw it at scale with Facebook first.

The difference now is that users now have more of an incentive to stay locked into the engine, creating content that—at best—may or may not be valuable, all the while dangling a rotten carrot in front of us in the form of a payout.

And with the way hyperinflation is right now, that rotten carrot may not look so bad.