X is truly living up to its reputation as the leading social media platform for breaking boundaries and pushing limits. The ever-evolving platform, formerly known as Twitter, is now rumored to be working on a groundbreaking addition to its already innovative Communities feature – the introduction of X-rated communities. This exclusive development was discovered by app researchers, who have unveiled the potential for X users to create groups for NSFW material.
Upon reverse engineering the app, Daniel Buchuk of Watchful, a company that specializes in app analysis and performance, shared exclusive screenshots with TechCrunch. These screenshots give us a glimpse of what X’s NSFW Communities could look like.
Nima Owji, an independent researcher, also caught wind of this groundbreaking feature in development last month, sharing his findings on Twitter.
This is how it’ll look like on the community page! pic.twitter.com/Sou18ze7Va
The introduction of Communities on Twitter was a game-changer when it was first introduced in 2021. This feature allows users to post within smaller, interest-based subgroups, similar to popular Reddit communities. However, when billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk acquired Twitter last year, he brought about even more significant changes to the app’s branding, verification systems, and creator monetization efforts – but some features, such as Communities, remained stagnant.
Another area where X has yet to fully tap into is the vast population of online sex workers who utilize the platform to promote their paid offerings from sites like OnlyFans. “Twitter really is the primary advertising venue at this point for sex workers,” says Dr. Olivia Snow, a dominatrix and researcher at UCLA’s Center for Critical Internet Inquiry, in an interview with TechCrunch. With a more lenient policy on adult content, X has become a crucial platform for online sex workers to expand their businesses.
X did not respond to a request for comment regarding this rumored NSFW Communities feature.
While adult creators are allowed to post explicit content on X, they are currently unable to monetize it on the platform. However, the potential introduction of NSFW Communities could provide an avenue for these creators to directly reach their target audience.
But before we get too excited, let’s keep in mind that X may not necessarily follow through with this feature. Shortly after Musk’s takeover, reverse engineers uncovered possible features that would allow creators to monetize paywalled videos or charge for DMs. These mockups bear a striking resemblance to features on popular platform OnlyFans, and it’s possible that Musk’s investment of $44 billion could be recouped through the monetization of “X videos”.
Twitter’s stance on adult content monetization is still uncertain.
Yet, amid all this speculation, X has yet to publicly announce any plans for changing their stance on adult content monetization. In fact, even before Musk’s takeover, Twitter was already working on a potential OnlyFans competitor. Unfortunately, this project was shelved due to the platform’s inability to effectively detect non-consensual content and child sexual exploitation (CSE). Nevertheless, X has made it a priority to address these critical issues and CEO Linda Yaccarino announced in 2023 that 12.4 million accounts were suspended for violating child sexual exploitation policies – a significant increase from the 2.3 million accounts removed in 2022.
