On April 20, Twitter removed verification from all users not subscribed to Twitter Blue.
Twitter Blue is the premium version of Twitter that Elon Musk rolled out after buying the social media platform in an effort to help the company become profitable. At $8 a month, Twitter users get a blue checkmark next to their name, previously reserved for celebrities and official brands, and access to other features like longer tweets or tweet edits.
Some people said paying for the blue checkmark defeated the purpose of verification in the first place. If anyone can just pay $8 to be verified, anyone can impersonate other celebrities and brands while appearing official, users argued.
Twitter users that weren’t subscribed to Twitter Blue reacted to Musk’s changes by starting the hashtag #BlockTheBlue and blocking anyone who had a blue checkmark next to their name. The goal of this was to remove all Twitter Blue users from their timelines.
Twitter Blue users were not happy with being blocked en masse and vented their frustrations.
Dril, a Twitter user with over 1.7 million followers known for making humorous and sometimes absurd tweets, led the charge to block any Twitter Blue subscribers. However, in retaliation, Twitter decided to give Dril Twitter Blue for free.
Twitter then appeared to walk back removing checkmarks for other accounts as well. Many popular accounts that had previously lost their checkmarks for not subscribing to Twitter Blue are now verified, despite claims that they never paid for it.
However, when you click on the checkmark next to these accounts it says, “This account is verified because they are subscribed to Twitter Blue and verified their phone number.” Even some celebrities who have died were given checkmarks that had this message, despite them having no way of subscribing or providing a phone number.
Some Twitter users claimed that Musk was using these checkmarks to annoy popular accounts who were actively critical of Twitter Blue.
Elon Musk even replied to a tweet that said Twitter was intentionally trolling Twitter Blue critics and seemed to confirm that he is actually trolling these users on purpose.
Though no one is really sure how or why some accounts had their verification removed just to have it added back the next day, it has spawned some entertaining tweets.
