By Kaisar Andrabi
Elon Musk, the new boss of Twitter, cleared the air on verification and said that it will now cost $8 per month for users to keep their blue tick. This comes after much speculation and media reports since Musk took over the social media platform as its chief and suggested that Twitter will make the verification paid.
"Twitter's current lords & peasants system for who has or doesn't have a blue checkmark is bullshit. Power to the people! Blue for $8 per month," Musk tweeted.
As the speculations continued, On Tuesday morning Musk got on to Twitter to ask Stephen King if he would be willing to pay $8 per month to keep his blue tick after the angry author said that Twitter should be paying him instead of charging.
"Whole verification process is being revamped right now", Musk had earlier said in his tweet without giving more details on what may change. It was a response to a tweet by a user complaining that he has failed to get the verification badge despite meeting all the criteria.
What was Twitter's verification process? What was the 'blue tick' meant for? Was it misused? And what happens if Elon Musk makes it mandatory to pay for verification?
BOOM breaks it down.
Why Did Twitter Start The 'Blue Tick' Verification?
The 'blue tick' on an account on Twitter implies it has been verified. According to Twitter, a verified account is any account of public interest that's been authenticated by the company itself.
It's Twitter's way of letting everyone know that you are who you say you are.
Back in 2009 when the verification was introduced, there was no way to apply for it. Twitter decided who got the verification badge. It was started as a result of multiple impersonation accounts that landed Twitter in legal suits.
In 2016, the micro-blogging site opened its verification to the public but closed it in a year when multiple hate-spewing accounts started getting the 'blue tick', it.
It reopened the verification process again in 2021. The rollout, Twitter said, marks the next milestone in their plans to "give more transparency, credibility and clarity to verification on Twitter". With it, Twitter clarified their verification policy and eligibility rules for who can get a 'blue tick'.
There are 423,764 verified users on Twitter.
With the 'blue tick', Twitter's ambition may have been to keep the platform from misinformation but Prateek Waghre, Policy Director at Internet Freedom Foundation (IFF) said that "it is not in anyway a signal that the 'verified account' would be posting, sharing truthful or factual information."
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"Many verified profiles have been found engaged in spreading hate speech and benefitting from such acts rather than being censured for it," Waghre said.
Waghre is right. There have been multiple instances where verified accounts have put out unverified and often fake posts. BOOM has fact-checked many of them.
"Verification began to be perceived as an 'endorsement'. In fact, Twitter cited this as a reason when it suspended verification in 2017," he told BOOM.
Waghre explained that even if the badge indicates that the account belongs to the right user name, it is not necessary that the user won't share misinformation or share insensitive content.
"Twitter is a platform where huge information flows every day from its users. In this ecosystem, individuals and even news organisations prioritise on capturing attention and engagement. To accomplish this aim, sometimes the users turn insensitive and share partisan, sensational information to meet the target," he said.
What Happens If Twitter Starts Charging For Blue Tick?
One of the things that Elon Musk had said when offering to acquire Twitter in April was that he wants to "verify all the humans". Expanding the subscription service, that is making the blue tick payable could provide significant revenue.
In his announcement for paid blue tick, Musk said that the price would be adjusted according to the country and would be proportional to purchasing power parity. This indicates that the fee may be lower in India.
Waghre told BOOM that the "current state of information ecosystem is a complex product of many underlying issues" and that paid verification on one platform may not significantly affect the overall situation.
However, he pointed out that paying for blue tick could increase the probability of certain types of manipulation such as an increase in the impersonation of journalists, activists especially those undertaking adversarial work and are especially from vulnerable communities.
The chief of Twitter Elon Musk has given an ultimatum to his staff to introduce paid verification on Twitter by November 7 or they will be sacked, reported The Verge.
Waghre believes that if Twitter indeed starts charging for 'blue tick', then depending on the specifics (cost, exceptions) "one can reasonably expect the number of verified users to decrease significantly."
Also Read: Elon Musk Is Now Twitter Boss After Completing $44 Billion Deal
Aroon Deep, tech policy writer for Entrackr told BOOM that the blue mark holds different value for every user. For those who have built an engaging audience on the badge and believes that it has helped them in branding them as an individual, to retain the tick on their profiles, $20 a month option would work.
He believes that this will be preferred especially by people who are frequently imitated, abused and impersonated online, who might find more value in distinguishing their legitimate online presence.
However, being a regular monitor in the tech field, he doubts that there will be a decent number of people for whom this amount is well worth the money.
"I see myself paying initially, but just like others who will start out paying, whether I keep letting Musk charge my credit card each month depends entirely on what direction Twitter takes in the coming months," Deep said.
But Deep believes it's the scarcity of how many people get the blue tick that gives its value. "If Musk is planning on opening the floodgates to allow anyone to apply for one, and expects users who are already verified to pay $20 each month, he is about to learn an expensive economics lesson," he said.
The technology journalist says that being verified comes with greater reach. In the initial days following his verification, he said that the number of followers he had immediately increased in a few days; his account was also discovered more easily by people who did not know him.
"From personal experience, I know that my account is also less likely to have tweets taken down through auto-moderation tools (for instance, I can tweet "kill me", but unlike for a regular user, my post won't be removed automatically," Deep said.
Following the news about Twitter's subscription for continuing blue badge, scores of netizens expressed their concerns about it. One user called the step a "proposition totally backward."
"The idea of forcing people to pay for blue checks gets Twitter's value proposition totally backward. For Twitter to have value, it needs to provide valid information from legitimate sources. If anyone can pay for the appearance of validity, the site lose all value," Max Berger, a New York based digital product designer tweeted.
Senior editor and investigative journalist Megan O'Toole sees the decision that will erode Twitter's dwindling value.
"Many journalists, academics and rights workers who use this platform rely on the blue-tick system to verify their identity when conducting research. Making verification a pay-for-play feature would render it meaningless and further erode Twitter's rapidly dwindling value," O'Toole tweeted.Another journalist expressed that he is voluntarily giving up his blue tick and believes that by providing blue badges on money has lost its significance.
"I am hereby volunteering to give up my bluetick. It's either way lost its significance with every Tom, Dick and Harry getting a blue tick for penny and petty achievements @elonmusk," he tweeted.
After Musk's latest announcement of charging $8 per month for Twitter verification, many Indians have taken to the micro-blogging site to express their concerns.
Also Read:'Take It Back': Verified Accounts React To Elon Musk's $8 Twitter Deal
What Are Elon Musk's Plans For Twitter?
Hours after Musk completed his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter, one of the first things he changed was how Twitter appears for its users. "He requested that logged-out users visiting Twitter.com be redirected to the Explore page that shows trending tweets and news stories," The Verge reported.
He immediately asked the team to initiate a few new fast-track changes in the application. For example, he added a subscription features 'Super Follows' in its paid subscription.
Also, there are preparations going around of adapting his satellite-based internet service – Starlink at SpaceX. The step would make Twitter available in countries where accessing the application is hard.
