A number of users on the social media site say that they have not paid for their blue checks
Twitter Pauses, the New York Times, and the Petaluma-Oklahoma-Lasinio: Insights into the Feature Change on Twitter
The change to a verification program for accounts was announced by Mr. Musk, who said he is a champion of free speech. In November a user who paid for a check mark and pretended to be Eli Lilly said on his account that he would give out free leUIDs to customers. Eli Lilly’s stock fell after the message. Other brands faced similar hoaxes, forcing Twitter to pause the sign-ups for Twitter Blue.
The New York Times’ main account lost its blue check over the weekend after telling CNN it wouldn’t pay for verification.
After an account that often engages with Musk posted a meme this weekend about the Times declining to pay for verification, Musk responded in a tweet saying, “Oh ok, we’ll take it off then.” The billionaire lashed out at the Times, saying the outlet’s coverage is boring and propaganda.
The weekend moves are just the latest example of Twitter creating confusion and whiplash for users over feature changes — and in this case, not just any users, but many of the most high-profile accounts that have long been a key selling point for the platform. It also highlights how Musk often appears to guide decisions about the platform more by whims than by policy.
In a separate puzzling move, Twitter’s blue bird logo at the top of the site was replaced on Monday with doge, the meme representing the cryptocurrency dogecoin, which Musk has promoted. The price of dogecoin rose 20% on Monday.
A subscription to Twitter Blue, which also allows users to edit tweets and enable text message two-factor authentication, costs $8 per month or $84 if you pay for the whole year at once.
William Shatner and Monica Lewinksy were among the users who opposed the concept of paying for a feature that keeps as power users that draw attention to the site.
The new label could make it easier for people to scam or impersonate high-profile users if they muddy the reason accounts are verified. Experts in inauthentic behavior have also said it’s not clear that reserving verification for paid users will reduce the number of bots on the site, an issue Musk has raised on and off over the past year.
He said last week that there shouldn’t be a different standard for celebrities. The paid feature could also drive revenue, which could help Musk, who is on the hook for significant debt after buying Twitter for $44 billion.
Musk last week also said that starting on April 15, only verified accounts would be recommended in users’ “For You” feeds alongside the accounts they follow.
For a long time, celebrities, politicians and other notable people were given badges on the social media site to show their identities, as a way to differentiate themselves from those who attempted to mimic them. A large amount of engagement on the service is due to public figures, including celebrities, who could post freely without fear of being impersonated, according to a former head of marketing and partners.
Elon Musk tried engaging with the Federal Trade Commission as the agency intensified an inquiry into Twitter’s privacy and data practices, documents show, but he was rebuffed.
According to an email that Musk sent to his employees, the company’s value has fallen from a previous $44 billion to $20 billion.
An associate professor at the New York University Center for Social Media and Politics told NPR that people with ulterior motives could exploit the paid service to gain a larger following and drown out better information.
When one iteration of Twitter Blue was rolled out last year, a user with a blue check pretended to be the pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly and tweeted that the company was offering insulin for free. The company denied the news and apologized, but not before the fake tweet received hundreds of retweets and thousands of likes and sent Lilly’s stock price down temporarily.
