Twitter's Japanese partner, Digital Garage , will soon introduce a micropayment system that will give Twitter users the option to charge for access to their tweets. According to Media magazine , users will be able hide access to images, external URLs and text behind a paywall and other users would only be able to see this content if they either paid for a monthly subscription or through a pay-per-tweet option. Twitter itself will take a 30% cut. Sponsor Kenichi Sugi, the COO of Digital Garage Mobile, announced this new business model at mobidec2009 earlier this week. The paid accounts will go live in January 2010. Twitter's Japanese subsidiary has always been somewhat different from Twitter's main site. Twitter Japan already offers advertising options, for example. Japan is also the only market where Twitter offers its own mobile application and mobile video service . Don't Pay for Twitter - Pay for Accessing Tweets According to today's reports, which still lack a lot of detail, Twitter users will have a number of options to pay for these account. According to Media magazine's Anita Davis , users can pay monthly subscriptions with their credit cards and the pay-per-tweet options could be "charged to credit card, convenience store top-up cards or carrier billing for Twitter-on-mobile users." Overall, this looks like an interesting business model for the Japanese market. Instead of charging its users directly for the use of Twitter, this option gives content producers the option to charge for their work. This new payment system will also give news organizations the option to experiment with delivering paid news, for examples.. Would You Pay To Access Premium Tweets? In the rest of the world, however, Twitter is more likely to make money through charging for premium accounts that add new features (analytics, verified accounts, etc.). Image credit: itmedia.co.jp Discuss

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Twitter Japan Will Allow Users to Charge for Access to Their Tweets

It's no secret that most magazines are struggling to hold on to their subscribers. Just like the newspaper industry is under a lot of pressure from the Internet, magazines are also having a hard time adjusting to the reality of the Internet. Now, Time Inc., Condé Nast and Hearst are planning to form an alliance that would bring more than 50 magazines to an iTunes-like online store that would sell digital version of these publications. The magazines that could be included in this program include Time, People, Vanity Fair, Sports Illustrated, The New Yorker and Esquire. Sponsor According to The New York Observer's John Koblin , a deal between these rival publishers is imminent. According to Koblin's anonymous sources, Time, Condé Nast and Hearst aren't planning to release their own e-reader for these magazines, but want to build a store and apps that would allow users to download and consume content on a large variety of devices. By grouping together, these publishing houses hope to save money. Koblin's sources also point out that this would be a risky venture for one publisher, but the three companies together could give users a single store to find all of the magazine content they want. Reinventing Magazines for Digital Distribution As the Atlantic's Derek Thompson rightly notes , however, these companies will have a hard time charging for content that they are already giving away for free online. To make this venture work, these publishers would either have to offer unique content in their digital magazines or they would have to erect a paywall around all of their sites. Most importantly, these companies will also have to reinvent their magazines for the digital age along the lines of Wired's app for the rumored Apple Tablet or Condé Nast's iPhone version of GQ ( iTunes link ). One of the reasons these publications are suffering is the long lead time that makes most of the content outdated by the time it arrives at the printer. While this still works for magazines like the Atlantic, which mostly publishes in-depth long form articles that aren't time-sensitive, gossip magazines can't really compete with TMZ or Perez Hilton . Just putting a digital copy of their magazines online simply won't cut it. Discuss

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Rival Magazine Publishers Plan to Launch iTunes for Magazines