What do Twitter’s blue check marks signify? After this weekend, it’s increasingly difficult to figure out.
On Thursday, Elon Musk’s Twitter finally followed through on its plan to remove blue verification check marks from accounts that were not paying $8 a month for the Twitter Blue subscription service, which Musk is counting on to become a key revenue source.
The vast majority of verified accounts did not pay up — including such politicians as President Joe Biden and Donald Trump, celebrities, sports figures, and journalists — and had their check marks revoked. But on Saturday a number of prominent Twitter users suddenly found their verification badges restored — even though many stressed that they were not paying for the subscription service. In some cases the newly restored badges appeared almost to punish or embarrass those who have been Twitter Blue’s most outspoken critics.
From the archives (November 2022): What does Twitter verification really mean? And what may happen to it?
“This account is verified because they are subscribed to Twitter Blue and verified their phone number,” a message on the affected accounts said, though many of those affected said neither was true.
There was widespread speculation that all accounts with more then 1 million followers had their check marks restored — whether they wanted them or not. And many were vocal that they did not.
The revived check marks even applied to the accounts of some dead people, including Kobe Bryant, Anthony Bourdain, Chadwick Boseman and Jamal Khashoggi, a development many found distasteful.
Some complained that the latest move was unethical at best, illegal at worst, since federal law prohibits false endorsements of a product — and critics said that’s exactly the scenario Twitter appeared to have brought about. Musk has flouted federal regulations in the past, and it was unclear whether he would take any additional action regarding the check marks.
Per Musk’s new media-relations policy, Twitter replied with a poop emoji when emailed by MarketWatch on Sunday to explain the situation.
Some people who wanted to get rid of their newly restored but unpaid check marks found they could hide them by changing a screen name, then changing the name back again.
One prominent Twitter account, though — that of Dril, a massively popular comedy account which was also a leader of the #BlockTheBlue movement to uniformly block Twitter Blue subscribers as aligned with Musk’s recent far-right predilections — had his unwanted check mark restored multiple times Saturday in an apparent real-time, tit-for-tat battle with Twitter as he kept trying to disable the badge, all the while trash talking the social network.
“Its ok he fired the people in charge of telling him its illegal,” Dril posted at one point.
By late Sunday Dril’s check mark appeared finally to have vanished.
Last week, Musk conceded he was personally paying for Twitter Blue accounts for prominent personalities Stephen King, LeBron James and William Shatner, after it was publicly observed that those badges remained after most so-called legacy verification check marks were gone.
Many users who lost their check marks were assailed by Musk fans on Twitter, accusing them of being elitists or cheapskates, willfully or naively overlooking the true nature of their aversion to having their accounts affixed with Musk-era badges.
Musk joined the trolling Saturday, posting a photo of a crying child after Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman complained about the reappearance of his blue check mark.
While the blue check marks originally signified the account-holder’s identity had been verified, in an effort to serve users by reducing misinformation, impersonations and fake accounts, Musk’s changes made them available to anyone willing to pay — in essence rendering them meaningless.
Saturday’s actions appeared to devalue the check marks further.
On Friday, Twitter also stopped labeling media organizations as “government-funded” or “state-affiliated,” including NPR and the CBC, which both paused their Twitter usage in protest of that inaccurate labeling. Friday’s move also resulted in actual state-sponsored media from Russia and China losing those labels, leading to speculation that the latter had been Musk’s goal all along.
Key Words: Elon Musk’s Twitter has decided NPR is state media. That doesn’t make it true.
