Elon Musk proposes charging government and commercial Twitter users

Elon Musk on Tuesday proposed charging commercial and government Twitter users but promised that the social media platform would always be free for casual users.

"Ultimately, the downfall of the Freemasons was giving away their stonecutting services for nothing," Musk tweeted.

He followed up, "Twitter will always be free for casual users, but maybe a slight cost for commercial/government users."

Musk secured a deal to purchase Twitter for $44 billion last week.

Conservative commentator Mike Cernovich replied to Musk's tweet voicing his approval of the proposal.

"Never made sense to me that companies and 'non profits' (lol) pay for email services but not twitter," he wrote.

"People will scream HOW DARE YOU CHARGE ACTIVISTS but they all pay for email newsletter services," he added. "I would gladly pay a large monthly fee for reasonable assurances that my tweets won’t be hidden by some far left wing activist who treats twitter as a super PAC."

Musk's proposal to charge some users comes the same day a Wall Street Journal report said Musk plans to return Twitter to the public market within a few years.