When he eventually closed the deal, he comically walked into Twitter headquarters carrying a kitchen sink. Elon Musk promised sweeping changes when he completed his $44 billion takeover of Twitter in October 2022. Such include Twitter Blue, a new subscription service. On April 11, 2023, Musk announced that legacy verified accounts that failed to pay $8-about Ksh1,085 on the higher side of the exchange rate- would lose their blue checkmarks on April 20, 2023.
He had on November 1, 2023 condemned what he called a “lords and peasants system of verification”, promising to put an end to it. Musk’s view is that purchasing verification will amplify alternative voices as opposed to the previous verification model that amplified traditional journalists.
“The thing that a lot of traditional journalists don’t like is being put on the same platform as other citizens,” he said, “They don’t like their voice being the same.”
Social platforms locking features behind subscriptions did not begin with Twitter despite it being the most controversial. LinkedIn for instance has had a premium version costing Ksh3,219 ($23.77) for career users and Ksh5,149 ($38) for businesses. Similarly, YouTube Premium offers an ad-free experience to its subscribers for Ksh1,608 ($11.99) in addition to permission to download videos and music offline. Dating platform Tinder also offers four tiers to its users each carrying its special features. Tinder Platinum offers eleven additional features like messaging before matches for Ksh2,413 per month.
Aside from the blue checkmark the Twitter Blue subscription comes with a number of special features that include;
- The edit Tweet option- The user will have a thirty-minute window after posting to make limited changes to the tweets.
- Half as many ads on the For You page- The subscriber will see fewer ads, promoted tweets, or suggested accounts
- Posting longer Tweets- 10,000 character tweets up from the current 280 characters limit for unsubscribers.
- Bold or Italicized text tweets
- Longer Video Uploads- Twitter Blue enables users to share videos up to 60 mins long as opposed to the regular 140 seconds.
- Increased Visibility- Subscribers’ replies, mentions and engagements on Twitter will appear closer to the top.
Criteria for Verification
- Account must be older than 30 days.
- Users must use a phone number to sign up- This is an effort by Twitter to counter bots as Artificial Intelligence becomes smarter.
When this article went to press, Twitter had not yet provided an explanation for why it restored checkmarks on certain previously verified accounts, ostensibly those with more than one million followers despite their unsubscription to Twitter Blue.
There are grey and gold checkmarks alongside several badges aside from the regular blue checkmarks. What do they mean and how much does each color cost? Here’s a breakdown;
Blue checkmark
Twitter Blue Subscribers are required to confirm their phone number to sign up. Twitter further clarifies that the checkmark does not appear immediately after subscription but after a review process to ensure the subscriber meets the eligibility criteria.
Currently, it costs Ksh1,419 ($10.58) for Android users and Ksh1,475 ($11) for iOS to get a monthly subscription to Twitter Blue which comes with a blue checkmark among other features unavailable for unsubscribed Twitter users. The annual subscription cost is Ksh14,830 ($110.57) for Android and Ksh15,424 ($114.99) for iOS.
Clicking on the blue checkmark will reveal the type of verification. See screen grab below.
Grey checkmark
According to Twitter, a grey check indicates that the account represents a government/multilateral organization or a government/multilateral official. This verification is issued for free. Governments and organizations and their officials are required to apply if they meet the criteria set by Twitter. Essentially, a government’s main executive accounts and agencies or multilateral organizations such as the United Nations, EU and NATO.
The same checkmark is given to officials in government and multilateral organizations like heads of state (presidents, monarchs and prime ministers), parliaments, and national-level cabinet members. As well as the Pope. For instance, President William Ruto’s and State House official accounts have the grey checkmark.
Gold checkmark
The gold checkmark may be the most expensive and confusing of the three. It shows that an account is subscribed to a Twitter product called Verified Organizations. This is meant to enable the organizations and their affiliated accounts to distinguish themselves on Twitter.
For Ksh131,300 or $979 (exclusive of tax) a month, apart from having the gold checkmark, the organization will be able to verify an unlimited number of accounts affiliated with it. Accounts will receive a small image of the profile picture of the company in addition to the checkmark.
The subscription also comes with the assurance that Twitter will defend the organization and its affiliate accounts against impersonation among other features specific to verified Organizations.
Example: Chris Anderson is the head of TED. Since TED is a subscriber to Twitter Verified Organizations, it has a gold checkmark and Chris has an avatar next to his blue checkmark to show the organization he is affiliated with.
Such rolling changes have characterized Elon Musk’s stay at Twitter over the past six months. However, according to Yahoo Finance, more than a third of marketers on Twitter suspended their advertising on the platform when Elon Musk took over, citing brand safety concerns. Particularly, they were concerned that when revisions were made to Twitter’s content moderation system, their advertisements would show up alongside harmful content.
Advertising is Twitter’s main source of revenue, bringing in over 90% of total revenue as reported in a Q2 2022 earnings report, dwarfing subscriptions and other sources contributing less than 10% of revenue. Elon Musk said in a recent interview with BBC that most of the advertisers had reportedly returned but profits are yet to overtake spending.
The other rationale is that through Twitter Blue, Twitter is trying to shore up its subscription revenue which currently stands at under 10% of total revenue given a possible shrink in advertising revenue. Elon however disregarded the potential of subscription revenue as ‘a fairly smaller revenue stream compared to advertising’, emphasising that the central reason is to clamp down on disinformation and bots.
“My prediction is that any social media company that does not insist on paid verification will simply be overwhelmed by advanced AI bots,” Elon Musk posited.
This article by Wired demonstrates an uptick in hate speech since Elon Musk took over Twitter. The research looked at popular tweets with keywords that could indicate hateful intent. Another research by the Network Contagion Research Institute recorded a 500% increase in the use of the n-word within the first 12 hours of the Elon Musk take-over.
True to his words, on April 20, legacy checkmarks disappeared. Media outlets in Kenya had a long day flagging fake news shared by pseudo accounts on Twitter after their verified status was removed. Citizen TV flagged several fake digital cards as the fake accounts were nearly indistinguishable from the lagitimate accounts. See screen grabs below.
As it stands, Twitter appears to be a work in progress. The changes are far from over. Whether Twitter Blue will remain in its current structure is a question only time will tell.
This article was edited by Piga Firimbi Fact-Checking Editor Linda Ngari.
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