Elon Musk-owned X is taking new measures to address its copycat economy, specifically large accounts on the platform that have been “programmatically reuploading content from smaller accounts” in order to game its creator revenue-sharing programme.
X is now identifying such posts and “allocating the impressions entirely to the creator” as part of its efforts to ensure original posters (not aggregators) get paid under the programme, according to Nikita Bier, the platform’s head of product.
The social media platform’s creator revenue-sharing programme lets eligible creators earn money from engagement on the platform.
However, this has also created an incentive for some accounts to rapidly repost or repackage viral content before the original creator gets the credit.
When adding commentary to posts, X users can use the platform’s ‘Share Video’ or ‘Quote’ feature to ensure that attribution still goes to the original creator of the post. The move is said to be part of X’s broader efforts to reduce payouts for aggregators, whose business model has often depended on rapidly repackaging other people’s work for monetisable engagement.
“Over the past month, we have identified a number of large accounts that have been programmatically reuploading content from smaller accounts to game the revenue share program and circumvent crediting the original author,” Bier wrote in a post on X.
He also called out Mario Nawfal, the CEO of crypto consulting firm IBC Group and one of the platform’s most prolific posters. “Please do not reupload the author’s video: use Quote or Video Reshare. Your revenue was reduced by 90 per cent last cycle and we’re running out of room to reduce it more,” Bier said to Nawfal.
Last week, Nawfal reposted a video of an ABC News journalist reacting to gunshots fired outside the White House. “OP stole this video without providing credit,” a community note attached to the post now reads.
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In response, Nawfal said that while his account always uses the Video Reshare optionit does not work for longer tweets. His reply also has a community note attached, which reads: “No he doesn’t. Here are additional examples just from the last few hours.”
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