A Swedish charity is claiming a first after setting up a paywall on Twitter in which people pay to read Tweets from some of the country’s celebrities.
Author Susanna Alakoski, pop singer Niklas Strömstedt, music journalist Fredrik Strage, director and actor Felix Tobias Herngren and television host Gry Forssell are among 15 noted Swedes who have spent the past week Tweeting for Stockholms Stadsmission, a charity that focuses on homelessness in the Swedish capital. More than 500 people have forked over the equivalent of $4 U.S. to follow the celebrities in the fundraiser, which ends Wednesday.
In return for their contributions, viewers have had access to more than 3,000 tweets, with many touching on the issue of homelessness. Participating celebrities started tweeting to @betalvaggen on Dec. 14 and will continue tweet there through Dec. 21. The account is protected and readers are only granted access after making a SMS-message donation.
The group behind the campaign notes such Paywalls could solve push-button activism, a common complaint about social media awareness efforts. “People who are homeless can’t fill their stomachs with Facebook likes. Retweets will not keep them warm at night,” the group said in marketing statements on its Web site.
“The tweets behind the wall are on all sorts of topics,” the group said in a release. “Famous Swedish writer Susanna Alakoski tweets about politics and how Sweden has failed to provide for those in need. Journalist Sofia Mirjamsdotter tweets excerpts from her alcoholic, now deceased, father’s diary. Another journalist, Niklas Orrenius tweets about the situation for the homeless in the town of Malmö.”
