By Ibiyemi Mathew
Media reports had earlier disclosed that the new owner of Twitter, Elon Musk had instructed Twitter employees to quadruple the price of the Twitter Blue subscription plan from $4.99 to $19.99 which will become the only way to retain verified-user status.
However, some users don’t seem to like the idea of paying $20 for the privilege, with one user calling it an ‘outrageous’ price to pay.
The blue tick next to an account’s name indicates that an account has been verified and it lets people know that an account of public interest is authentic and not an imitator.
For Twitter users in Nigeria, the charge would amount to about N16,000 per month.
Users who are currently verified by Twitter with the blue check-mark badge for no charge will have 90 days to subscribe to the new $20/month Twitter Blue plan or have their verification revoked, according to the report.
A verified user @Psalmology1 reacting to this proposed change said, ‘Is this a joke? $20 for what? I think Twitter should come take back its blue badge, I don’t want it again’
Musk, who closed his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter on Oct. 27, has given Twitter employees a deadline of Nov. 7 to implement the change.
Musk has not commented on the reported plan directly, but he said in a tweet on Sunday that, “the whole verification process is being revamped right now.”
According to Twitter’s current verification requirements, “the blue verified badge on twitter lets people know that an account of public interest is authentic. To receive the blue badge, your account must be authentic, notable and active.”
Twitter Blue launched in mid-2021, offering various subscriber-only perks including the most recent addition of allowing users to edit tweets within a 30-minute window after posting them.
Twitter Blue also includes bookmarks, which allows users to save individual tweets into folders, and Reader Mode, which converts threads of tweets into an article-like view.