Twitter Teams With Stripe On ‘Ticketed Spaces’ Payments

Twitter is partnering with payments provider Stripe on the launch of the social media company’s “Ticketed Spaces” feature. The plan is to allow select U.S. users to host paid live audio rooms — and to give these “creators” a slice of the pie.

“There’s never been a better time to be a creator online,” Ellen Moeller, Stripe’s head of partnerships for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, said in a press release emailed to PYMNTS. “We’re delighted to be powering Ticketed Spaces to bring more revenue options to Twitter’s users,” she said, in a prepared statement.

The Ticketed Spaces feature means that hosts, who put time and effort into creating space for conversation and connection, can gain some monetary support, according to the press release. For their part, listeners get access to the conversations they care about.

Twitter said the program, in part, is meant to create new ways for its users to get paid for what they create.

The Verge reported that Ticketed Spaces hosts will receive 80 percent of revenue after Apple and Google’s in-app purchase fees are taken. The social media company said it’ll cover the cost of Stripe’s transaction fees.

To get into the for-pay hosting program, users must have 1,000 followers, have hosted three spaces in the past 30 days, and be at least 18 years old.

In the release, Stripe said that various platforms — such as Substack, Spotify Anchor and TikTok — turn to its payments setup because it’s an easy way for them to accept money from around the world, and to handle payouts to creators.

In addition, “consumers can quickly and easily pay creators” in their own currencies.

In its first-quarter 2021 report, Twitter said it is attracting more people to Twitter, with the results being revenues of more than $1 billion. The company predicted that second-quarter revenue would hit between $980 million and $1.08 billion.

Twitter predicted that its GAAP operating loss would be between $120 million and $170 million.

“People turn to Twitter to see and talk about what’s happening, and we are helping them find their interests more quickly while making it easier to follow and participate in conversations,” Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said in the earnings release.