X's Creative Revenue Sharing program is paying creators to flood the platform with AI-generated melodramas masquerading as true personal stories, with one creator earning $500–$700 every two weeks and some reporting thousands per payout cycle.
The stories—featuring wronged protagonists triumphing over villains—reliably draw hundreds of thousands to millions of views by exploiting viewers' desire for justice, despite being formulaic fabrications designed for maximum engagement and minimum effort.
X has sued some creators for fraudulent revenue claims and removed millions of plagiarized posts, but has not disclosed how it treats AI-generated narrative fiction within the program.
What happened
X's Creative Revenue Sharing program—which requires Premium membership, 500 verified followers, and 5 million impressions over three months—is paying creators to post AI-generated fictional stories presented as true first-person narratives. One Nigerian creator using the handle BIGBEN, who admits using Grok or ChatGPT to write stories, received a post with 1.5 million views in two days and reports earning $500–$700 every two weeks from X's payouts; others report earning thousands per cycle.
Why it matters
The program, officially designed to encourage "authentic, high-quality content," has become a vehicle for low-effort AI spam that exploits the platform's engagement-based payment model. These formulaic melodramas—featuring wronged underdogs, public humiliations, and sealed documents that reverse injustice—reliably generate hundreds of thousands to millions of views by tapping into viewers' hunger for fairness and retribution, creating a financial incentive for fabricated content that masquerades as real.
What to watch
X has already taken enforcement action in some areas—suing Vietnamese creators and "John Does" in May 2025 for fraudulently drawing revenue via phony AI content and bot comments, cutting payments to aggregators in April, and removing millions of posts in July—but the company has not clarified its stance on AI-generated narrative fiction or responded to questions about how it treats such content in the program.
The proliferation of AI-generated melodramas on X began catching readers' attention as their feeds filled with formulaic tales of wronged protagonists and villain comeuppances. One such story—narrated by a woman falsely accused of theft by her husband, vindicated in court by her 9-year-old son with evidence from a hidden digital recorder—appeared in a reader's feed one day. Upon investigation, the narrator turned out not to be a mother on trial but a self-identified 21-year-old stock trader in Nigeria operating under the handle BIGBEN, who uses AI to generate stories and monetizes them through X's Creative Revenue Sharing program.
The program requires creators to maintain Premium X membership, accumulate at least 500 verified followers, and achieve a minimum of 5 million impressions over a three-month period. Its stated purpose is to encourage "authentic, high-quality content," but the engagement-based payment model has created fertile ground for exploitation. BIGBEN, who was willing to discuss his process, explained that he writes prompts for Grok or ChatGPT and lets the AI generate the narrative. One of his recent posts—a story about a second wife abused by her in-laws—reached 1.5 million views in two days. BIGBEN reports receiving paychecks every two weeks ranging from $500 to $700, while other creators claim earnings in the thousands per cycle.
According to Rob Cover, a professor at RMIT Digital Ethnography Research Centre studying AI-generated content, these stories follow a rigid structural formula: an opening in which an innocent person is wrongfully fired, evicted, scammed, or subjected to judicial overreach; followed by a turnaround where the underdog is redeemed, the adversary is defeated and humiliated, and often sealed documents (such as divorce evidence or inheritance paperwork) reverse the injustice. Jenna Russell, a PhD candidate at the University of Maryland studying AI writing, notes that creating such content is "blindingly simple"—creators have "simply optimized for the least effort and the most engagement, which means using easy, well-known tropes and prompting AI to write something that fits the bill." These stories routinely garner hundreds of thousands to millions of views, hundreds of likes, and dozens of reposts, suggesting they tap into viewers' hunger for fairness and retribution.
X has taken steps to police fraud elsewhere in the program. In May 2025, it sued 8 Vietnamese creators and 25 unnamed defendants alleging they fraudulently drew revenue by posting phony AI-generated content amplified by bot-driven comments. In April, X moved to cut payments to "aggregators" primarily reposting news from other sources and threatened sanctions against those overusing the BREAKING tag. On July 16, X revealed it had removed millions of posts that plagiarized already-published content. However, the company declined to answer questions about how it regards AI-generated narrative fiction within the program, leaving ambiguous whether such content violates its terms. Compared to other forms of problematic X content—rage-baiting, misinformation, pornography, and stolen material—these redemption melodramas appear relatively benign. Yet their proliferation, driven by direct financial incentive, raises questions about the difference between storytelling and fabrication dressed in the clothes of authenticity.
X's Creative Revenue Sharing program was framed as a way to encourage authentic creators, but the engagement-based payment model has created a financial incentive for low-effort AI-generated content. The mechanics are straightforward: creators generate melodramatic stories using tools like Grok or ChatGPT, present them as real first-person narratives, and collect payments based on views and engagement. The formula is highly optimized, as Rob Cover from RMIT Digital Ethnography Research Centre describes it: a setup in which an innocent person suffers wrongful treatment, followed by a redemption arc where the underdog triumphs and the antagonist is humiliated. This structure reliably triggers engagement because it satisfies a deep human appetite for justice and retribution.
The problem is not that the stories are obvious fictions—many creators disclose themselves as "storytellers" in their profiles—but that they are presented as true experiences and packaged with an implied authenticity. X has shown it can enforce rules elsewhere in the program: it sued creators for bot-driven fraud, cut payments to news aggregators, and removed millions of plagiarized posts. However, the company has not clarified whether AI-generated narrative fiction violates its program terms, leaving a gray zone that creators like BIGBEN are exploiting. As long as posts drive engagement and comply with the stated requirements, they generate revenue regardless of authenticity.
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