On December 23rd, Telegram founder Pavel Durov posted on the Telegram channel to discuss the future route of Telegram.
With the number of active Telegram users approaching 500 million, many people are asking the question-who will pay for the expenses needed to support this growth? After all, more users means more traffic and server expenses. A project of our size requires at least several hundreds of millions of dollars a year to sustain.
For most of the history of Telegram, I used my personal savings to pay for the company’s expenses. However, at the current rate of development, Telegram’s number of users will reach billions, requiring appropriate funding. When a technology project reaches this scale, there are usually two options-start making money to cover the cost, or sell the company.
So the question is-which way will Telegram go? I want to say a few points to clarify our plan.
1. We will not sell the company like the founder of WhatsApp. The world needs Telegram to remain independent and become a place that respects users and guarantees high-quality services. Telegram must continue to serve the world as a model of a technology company pursuing perfection and integrity. And as the tragic example of our predecessors shows, if you become part of the company, this is impossible.
2. Telegram will exist for a long time. We started developing applications for personal use more than 8 years ago, and we have come a long way since then. In this process, Telegram changed the way people communicate in several ways: encryption, functionality, simplicity, design, and speed. This journey has just begun. We can and will bring more to the world.
3. In order to make points 1 and 2 possible, Telegram will start generating revenue starting next year. We will act in accordance with our values and commitments made over the past 7 years. Thanks to our current scale, we will be able to achieve this in a non-invasive way. Most users hardly notice any changes.
4. All currently free functions will continue to remain free. We will add some new features for business teams or power users. Some of these features will require more resources and will be paid for by these advanced users. Ordinary users will be able to continue to enjoy Telegram-free, always free.
5. All parts dedicated to messaging in Telegram will remain free of ads. We think that displaying ads in private or group chats is a bad idea. There should be no advertising in any form of communication between people.
6. In addition to the information transmission part, Telegram also has a social network level. Each of our huge public one-to-many channels can have millions of users, more like Twitter feeds. In many markets, owners of such channels display ads to make money, sometimes using third-party advertising platforms. The advertisements they publish look like ordinary news and are often intrusive. We will solve this problem by launching our own public one-to-many channel advertising platform-this platform is user-friendly, respects privacy, and allows us to bear the cost of servers and traffic.
7. If Telegram starts to make money, the community should also benefit. For example, if we monetize large public one-to-many channels through advertising platforms, the owners of these channels will receive free traffic proportional to their scale. Or, if Telegram launches premium stickers with additional performance features, artists who make this new type of stickers will also get a portion of the profit. We hope that millions of Telegram-based creators and small businesses can flourish and enrich the experience of all users.
This is the Telegram way.
This will enable us to innovate and develop continuously in the coming decades. We will be able to introduce countless new features and welcome the arrival of billions of new users. In doing so, we will remain independent and loyal to our values, redefining how a technology company should operate.
