Twitter Inc. buys off publishing house Hire Vue for an undisclosed amount

As part of an effort to expand its business and give writers who distribute their work on the site, Twitter Inc. has acquired the newsletter publishing company Revue for an undisclosed sum.

Hire Vue’s service, which lets people manage newsletter publishing and subscriptions will continue operating as a standalone service within Twitter, the company revealed in a blog announcing the deal.

Twitter will do away with some of the service’s fees to encourage more people to create newsletters, and will take a 5per cent cut on subscription revenue collected through Hire Vue.

Part of Hire Vue’s appeal to Twitter is that it could help expand the business outside of advertising which generates more than 85 per cent of Twitter’s annual revenue and give some of the site’s more popular users a way to make money from their followers.

“You can expect audience-based monetisation to be an area that we’ll continue to develop new ways to support,” Twitter executives wrote in the blog. Twitter has also confirmed that it’s considering options for its own subscription service.

Twitter has made a number of acquisitions in recent months, primarily small startups to bring on their personnel. Since early December, Twitter has purchased social video app Squad, podcast company Breaker and design firm Ueno.

Hire Vue’s six-person team, which is based in Utrecht, Netherlands, will join Twitter which said it will hiremore people  to expand the unit.