Celebrities forced to check out after refusing to pay for Twitter ticks
Legacy verified Twitter users began losing their blue check marks Thursday, as the social-media platform moved to end its previous system for authenticating users in favour of paid subscriptions.
Legacy verified Twitter users began losing their blue check marks Thursday, as the social-media platform moved to end its previous system for authenticating users in favour of paid subscriptions.
Celebrities who suggested they wouldn’t subscribe when legacy verification went away include Chrissy Teigen, Mark Hamill, Dionne Warwick and “Seinfeld” actor Jason Alexander. All four appeared to have lost their blue checks as of Thursday.
Taking away legacy check marks represents another step in Twitter owner Elon Musk’s push to get users to pay for the verification and other features, as he seeks to bolster Twitter’s subscription revenue. Some celebrity users had criticised the move before it took effect, saying they didn’t plan to pay, as well as expressing concerns about potential impersonation.
Twitter, which previously didn’t charge for verification, used to award blue check marks to accounts the company deemed authentic, notable and active, as a way to prevent impersonation of high-profile users.
Mr. Musk said he wanted to end Twitter’s legacy verifications shortly after he acquired the social-media platform in October.
Mr. Musk had named April 20 as the final date for removing legacy blue check marks, which could be alluding to a marijuana joke. Mr. Musk has a history with the number 420, including his 2018 tweet about taking private Tesla Inc. (where he is also chief executive) at $420 a share and his bid last year to acquire Twitter at $54.20 a share.
Twitter began rolling out a new system last year in which users must purchase a subscription to be verified. The revamped subscription, called Twitter Blue, offers the check mark and other features, including prioritised visibility and the ability to edit tweets and post longer tweets.
The subscription costs $8 to $11 monthly, depending on whether users pay via mobile or web browser.
For businesses, Twitter recently launched a subscription program called Verified Organisations, which costs $1,000 monthly, plus $50 monthly for each affiliate account, such as for individual employees, according to Twitter’s website.
Twitter has offered some organisations a special deal to be verified at no cost, according to people familiar with the offer. It couldn’t be learned exactly which organisations qualify. Twitter didn’t respond to questions about it from The Wall Street Journal beyond an auto-reply of an emoji.
Some well-known accounts unexpectedly still had blue check marks, including LeBron James, who has nearly 53 million followers and had previously said he wouldn’t pay for a check mark. In response to a Twitter user who noted those check marks, Mr. Musk tweeted: “I’m paying for a few personally.”
Author Stephen King, who has more than seven million Twitter followers, tweeted that he hadn’t subscribed, but still had his check mark. Mr. King previously had said he wouldn’t pay to be verified. ” You’re welcome,” Mr. Musk said to Mr. King on Twitter Thursday.
Some impersonators quickly took to Twitter to pose as figures including the pope; late U.S. Sen. John McCain; and the New York City government. Twitter has said government accounts can apply for a grey check mark to verify their identity.
Mr. Musk has criticised Twitter’s legacy check marks as a symbol of classism. He has also said that charging for verification will help deter spam bot accounts.
Twitter Blue has as many as 635,000 subscribers, according to a recent estimate from Travis Brown, a Berlin-based software developer who tracks social-media platforms.
More than 400,000 accounts appear to have had legacy verification, according to Mr. Brown’s analysis of Twitter data.
When Twitter, under Mr. Musk, first attempted to relaunch Twitter Blue in November, some users exploited their check marks to impersonate brands and celebrities, sowing confusion. Twitter subsequently said it improved safeguards against impersonation, including requiring subscribers to verify their phone numbers before receiving a check mark.
One highly-followed account, the New York Times’s @nytimes handle, lost its blue check mark in early April, after the newspaper said it wouldn’t pay for one.
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