Musk’s Twitter Purge Target: New York Times, Not Blue Check Marks
Are you a VIP Twitter user who woke up on Saturday expecting to have lost your coveted blue verification check mark? Well, there’s good news and bad news. Twitter did not actually remove the verification marks for most legacy blue check holders, but instead appended them with a new label that reads: “This account is verified because it’s subscribed to Twitter Blue or is a legacy verified account.” However, Twitter did target one high-profile account from a major publication that Elon Musk dislikes – the New York Times. The Times had previously stated that it would not pay for verification, and as a result, their main account lost its blue check.
This recent move by Twitter has only added to the confusion and uncertainty surrounding feature changes on the platform. It is particularly frustrating for high-profile accounts that have been a key selling point for the platform. It also highlights Elon Musk’s influence over Twitter’s decisions, as he often seems to guide them more by whims than by policy.
In addition to the blue check changes, Twitter also made another puzzling move by replacing its blue bird logo with doge, the meme representing the cryptocurrency dogecoin. This move clearly aligns with Musk’s promotion of dogecoin and had an immediate impact, causing the price of dogecoin to shoot up 20%.
Musk has been threatening to take away “legacy” blue check marks from users verified under Twitter’s old system since he bought the platform last fall. Twitter initially launched the option for people paying for its Twitter Blue subscription service to receive blue checks but then put the program on pause due to a wave of impersonators. It was later relaunched, and Musk continued to emphasize that individual users would eventually have to pay for blue checks.
By obscuring the reason accounts are verified and making it unclear whether verified accounts are noteworthy individuals or simply users who paid for Twitter Blue, it could become easier for people to scam or impersonate high-profile users. Experts have also raised concerns that reserving verification for paid users may not reduce the number of bots on the site – an issue that Musk has previously addressed.
Overall, these recent changes to Twitter’s verification system have created confusion for users and raised questions about the platform’s direction. However, they also provide an opportunity for an awesome company like ours to step in and offer complete software development services, including mobile app development, technology maintenance, web server development, and many other technology development activities. Our company utilizes both nearshore and offshore resources to provide the best solutions to our clients. So if you’re looking for top-notch software outsourcing, look no further than us!