X cuts payouts for aggregators and clickbait accounts

X is implementing a new monetization policy that reduces payouts for accounts identified as aggregators—defined as accounts that repost content from other sources—and habitual clickbait posters. According to Nikita Bier, the head of product at X, all aggregators had their payouts reduced to 60% this cycle. Bier wrote on Saturday that these accounts will see another 20% reduction in the next pay cycle. Additionally, X will be reducing payments for habitual bait posters who use the term BREAKING on every post. Bier explained that flooding the timeline with 100 stolen reposts and clickbait every day crowded out real creators and hurt the growth of new authors.

The policy changes have drawn criticism from some creators on the platform, including Dominick McGee, who posts under the name Dom Lucre and has 1.6 million followers. McGee alleges he was demonetized—meaning his eligibility to earn money from the platform was removed—without any insight. McGee wrote, “I was the first creator demonetized on this platform and I was for an entire year. I got it back and just lost it without any insight. How could this be possible? I am one of the hardest working creators on X.” McGee first became popular for posting conspiracy theories related to the 2020 presidential election. While he was temporarily banned from X in 2023 and demonetized in 2024, he previously stated he was making $55,000 a year from the platform.

The policy shift coincides with broader debates regarding the health of X’s ecosystem, including disputes over traffic data accuracy and the prevalence of clickbait. McGee complained that X was listening to complaints from non-creators, claiming that very few of his hundreds of posts use the term BREAKING. However, other users disagreed, pointing to a community note—X’s crowdsourced fact-checking feature—that flagged 91 times he had used the word BREAKING in the past week. The changes also follow a dispute between Bier and data analyst and pundit Nate Silver. Silver had complained about the difficulty of driving traffic from X to external websites, but Bier stated that Silver’s data regarding traffic from X is not accurate.

Why it matters

This move signals a shift in how social platforms manage creator economies, prioritizing original content over viral aggregation to maintain platform health and user growth.