Source: NurPhoto / Getty
Elon Musk, aka Phony Stark, aka “Chief Twit,” is on a mission to ruin Twitter, and so far, he’s doing a pretty good damn job.
The Musk era at Twitter has officially begun at Twitter, and it’s already a clusterf*** thanks to some critical firings, the rise of N-Word usage, the return of problematic Twitter users, and one decision that has Twitter users already scratching their heads.
The Verge reports that Elon Musk has told his company to find a way to implement a way to start charging people to have the highly-coveted blue verification check next to their names.
The Tesla chief has given the Twitter team to get the plan up and running by November 7, or Musk will fire them.
Per The Verge:
The directive is to change Twitter Blue, the company’s optional $4.99 a month subscription that unlocks additional features, into a more expensive subscription that verifies users, according to people familiar with the matter and internal correspondence seen by The Verge. Twitter is currently planning to charge $19.99 for the new Twitter Blue subscription.
The website also reports those who already have a blue check can lose their verified status if they don’t subscribe to the new service in 90 days.
The “blue check” was once a status symbol many users hoped to acquire, but its sole purpose was to verify legit accounts for celebrities, news outlets, athletes, and other public figures.
It was necessary at a time when fake accounts of celebrities and public figures were popping up left and right and sharing false information.
Now, Musk is on a mission to cheapen the blue check’s value, and it looks like there is nothing that will stop him.
Twitter Sounds Off on The Verification Subscription Service
As expected, this dumb idea is not sitting well with current users roasting Musk, who is spearheading Twitter’s downfall.
“Between the embarrassment of tweeting out then hurriedly deleting fake news from an outlet notorious for it to the eye-wateringly bad paid verification plan it’s hard to see how the first 48 hours of Dollar Store Ozymandias buying a $44bn website could have gone much worse,” screenwriter and author Gary Whitta tweeted.
Another user noted, “charging for verification is how you get a lot of the legitimate accounts to drop their blue checks, and a bunch of spammers to buy them because it increases the chances they’ll be able to empty wallets.”
You can peep more reactions to Elon Musk’s dumb a** verification subscription below.
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Photo: NurPhoto / Getty
1. Accurate
Twitter: “We charging $20 a month for verification”
Everybody: pic.twitter.com/671TYTPow1
— Josiah Johnson (@KingJosiah54) October 31, 2022
2. Yup
The point of Twitter verification is that for certain individuals/organizations it’s useful to be able to verify their statements are coming from them. (This is why so many journalists/reporters are verified.) It’s supposed to help combat disinformation, not be a status symbol.
— Katie Mack (@AstroKatie) October 31, 2022
3. LOL
Twitter with verification vs. Twitter when I refuse to pay $20 a month for it pic.twitter.com/knP5vEGg2v
— Lynda Carter (@RealLyndaCarter) October 31, 2022
4. HA!
When the Twitter Blue verification badge you paid for arrives pic.twitter.com/mPGCDcHRPx
— TrivWorks (@TrivWorks) October 31, 2022
5.
Verification is a tool to protect people from catfish scams. It’s not meant to be for clout it’s for safety. As someone who’s been harassed and stalked IRL because of scams I don’t have much choice but to keep it, but thanks for the jokes about clowning people if they pay for it.
— Emily Sears (@emilysears) October 31, 2022
6.
I, like many journalists, initially became verified because I worked for a news org that took care of it for us. If Musk goes through with requiring payment for verification, it will be interesting to see if news orgs pony up for their employees. (1/2) https://t.co/X2GLaXeTfi
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) October 31, 2022
7.
Twitter now charging 16k monthly for verification, so if some artist/influencer lose their blue tick, we go understand
— SEUN
(@_oluwaseun9) October 31, 2022
8.
dude has owned the app for 2 days and made N-word use skyrocket literally 500% and put a dev team on hyper-crunch to take verification away from everyone but americans with money (Twitter Blue is US only) https://t.co/qLnViEsgsb
— Singto Conley
(@singtoconley) October 31, 2022
9.
Hilarious thing is, I’m a current twitter Blue subscriber, but I’ll need to unsubscribe if they make verification conditional to having a Twitter Blue subscription because paying for a check mark is 100% cringe. @TwitterBlue https://t.co/i3XmiF66TF
— Hank Green (@hankgreen) October 30, 2022
10.
Multibillionaire tech bro has let his big mouth and ego trap him into overpaying by 3x to buy a problematic platform in the worst deal of all time, and now he wants to charge $240/year (N192k) to keep a blue tick on verified user profiles.
LOL pls take ithttps://t.co/Sqrx5chZJy
— David Hundeyin (@DavidHundeyin) October 31, 2022
11.
When fake news websites start buying verification and it sparks a global crisis, we'll come back to this.
This is why Tony Stark is a fun fictional character to watch at the cinema, but he should never exist in real life.
— David Hundeyin (@DavidHundeyin) October 31, 2022
12.
Badge or no badge. That is fucked.
The purpose of verification is to confirm the real identity of people. Journalists use it as a security feature all the time.
This is fucking stupid… https://t.co/n4Q2Oq5DTT
— My name is Byf (Lore Daddy) (@MyNameIsByf) October 31, 2022
13.
I am not paying $240 a year to be verified.
Absolutely the fuck not.— David Hogg
(@davidhogg111) October 31, 2022
14.
Ironically, if you have to *pay* for the blue check, it nullifies it’s utility as an earned verification/credential. So NOT having one will begin to serve as a better indication of cred than having one. Which reminds me of a story… pic.twitter.com/6LNNdcUUNu
— Dr. Brandy Schillace (@bschillace) October 31, 2022
15.
Firing everyone, bashing his own employees, publishing their internal messages, charging for verification because he thinks it’s just a clout thing. These are all quick ways to degrade the company and the quality of the platform. Advertisers are going to leave very quickly.
— Scott Nover (@ScottNover) October 31, 2022
16.
I think the idea must be to get journalists, government officials, and other accounts for whom verification is actually important to pay for the checkmark. But I can’t imagine many will pay $240/year for it, and this place is going to become a cesspool of fake accounts. https://t.co/Af4PN0r6hi
— Ian Millhiser (@imillhiser) October 31, 2022
The post Chief Twit Elon Musk Is Pushing For Twitter To Charge For Verification, Users Think That’s A Bad Idea appeared first on The Latest Hip-Hop News, Music and Media | Hip-Hop Wired.