Twitter's blue check-mark verification regime will soon be a history. The social media giant on Friday announced that from April 1, it will begin removing legacy verified program and legacy verified checkmarks from user accounts. It will allow only paid subscribers and members of approved organisations to have the respective status.
The company in a tweet said, "On April 1st, we will begin winding down our legacy verified program and removing legacy verified checkmarks. To keep your blue checkmark on Twitter, individuals can sign up for Twitter Blue and Organizations can sign up for Verified Organizations".
Individuals paying for Twitter Blue, costing $8/month via web and $11/month through in-app payment, will have verified blue check-marks. Earlier Thursday, the company announced that Twitter Blue is now available across the world.
{{/usCountry}}Individuals paying for Twitter Blue, costing $8/month via web and $11/month through in-app payment, will have verified blue check-marks. Earlier Thursday, the company announced that Twitter Blue is now available across the world.
{{/usCountry}}For companies, Twitter recently introduced a gold badge and assigned government accounts a gray check-mark. Twitter introduced the verified accounts feature in 2009 to help users identify the genuine accounts of celebrities, politicians, companies and brands, news organisations and other accounts "of public interest". Twitter didn't previously charge for the service.
The announcement was one of the earliest policy changes announced by owner Elon Musk, after he described the Twitter’s old system of verification as "corrupt" shortly after taking over late last year. "Far too many corrupt legacy Blue ‘verification’ checkmarks exist, so no choice but to remove legacy Blue in coming months", he had tweeted in November.
He subsequently opened up blue check-marks to any paying customer — a move to democratize the status symbol. Paying Blue users get higher priority in replies and searches, helping to fight scams and spam, according to the company. They also receive half the ads and are able to edit tweets.
In Musk’s first companywide memo to Twitter staffers, he said the company would need roughly half its revenue to come from subscription services. "Without significant subscription revenue, there is a good chance Twitter will not survive the upcoming economic downturn", he wrote.
Musk launched Twitter Blue with the check-mark badge as one of the premium perks within two weeks of the company's takeover. Meanwhile, he recently announced that the social media giant is also working to solve Twitter’s bot problem.
(With inputs from agencies)