Thank the bots, your blue check is back on X
- Reference: 1712246534
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2024/04/04/x_blue_checks_twitter/
- Source link:
The X overlord decreed on March 27 in a somewhat confusingly worded [1]post that all X accounts "with over 2,500 verified subscriber followers will get Premium features for free and accounts with over 5,000 will get Premium+ for free." That doesn't mean the numbers are only pulled from followers that actually [2]subscribe to an individual's account – it tallies them from followers that are paying X Premium members, we understand.
In other words, if you're popular on X and have noticed your [3]blue check has returned from the dead, you can [4]thank the bots that Musk once [5]railed against , but have become a [6]hallmark of Twitter 2.0.
[7]
The not-called-Twittersphere blew up yesterday with a number of once-verified accounts noting that they had been [8]tagged with blue checks against their will while receiving [9]notes that they were getting complimentary X Premium subscriptions because they are "an influential member of the community."
[10]
[11]
What this effectively means is that [12]legacy verification for notable accounts has returned, albeit in a manner indistinguishable from paid verification.
For those who forgot what happened in late 2022/early 2023, Musk [13]scrapped the old way of getting a vaunted blue check on Twitter, reserved for "active, notable and authentic" accounts that had to apply for the privilege, in favor of handing them out to anyone who paid him $8 a month.
[14]
From that point the only way to get a blue check was to be a Twitter/X Premium subscriber. That's now changed, albeit in a way that rewards users not for actually being notable or authentic, but instead for attracting the attention of folks who are already paying for a blue check.
[15]Employees saved Musk from himself over Twitter Files
[16]Twitter's ex-CEO, CFO, and managers sue Elon Musk for $128M
[17]IP address X-posure now a feature on Musk's social media thing
[18]Twitter, aka X, tops charts for misinformation, EU official says
As is the case with much of Musk's flailing to keep X afloat, it's yet another way to artificially inflate the success of the many changes made to the platform since his purchase in 2022, most of which have [19]chased away advertisers , [20]empowered hate speech , and driven the value of his $44 billion purchase downward.
Fidelity, which helped finance Musk's purchase of Twitter, has been a bellwether of the platform's worth in the past two years. It's repeatedly marked the value of its stake in X down, and did so [21]again recently . According to the investment firm, the company has lost 73 percent of its value since Musk took the helm.
After one year under Musk in October 2023, internal documents from the company placed its value at just $19 billion. Based on Fidelity's adjustments in late February, X is worth just $11.9 billion – a loss of more than $7 billion in just four months. ®
Get our [22]Tech Resources
[1] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1773147956041978257
[2] https://www.theregister.com/2023/04/14/twitter_strikes_back_substack/
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2023/04/21/blue_tick_removal_from_twitter/
[4] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2023/sep/09/x-twitter-bots-republican-primary-debate-tweets-increase
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/17/elon_musk_twitter_spam_bots/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2023/10/18/twitter_not_a_bot_fee/
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2Zg8i-F-iCBXwrmjWvGXT@QAAAMI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[8] https://twitter.com/molly0xFFF/status/1775695153971216567
[9] https://twitter.com/pkafka/status/1775681325661614401
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Zg8i-F-iCBXwrmjWvGXT@QAAAMI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Zg8i-F-iCBXwrmjWvGXT@QAAAMI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2023/04/03/paid_and_legacy_twitter_verification/
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2022/11/10/official_twitter_musk_payment/
[14] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/personaltech&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Zg8i-F-iCBXwrmjWvGXT@QAAAMI&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[15] https://www.theregister.com/2024/02/22/twitter_staffers_saved_musk/
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2024/03/05/twitter_management_sue_musk/
[17] https://www.theregister.com/2024/03/05/ip_address_xposure_now_a/
[18] https://www.theregister.com/2023/09/26/twitter_eu_disinformation/
[19] https://www.theregister.com/2023/11/30/musk_murders_x/
[20] https://www.theregister.com/2024/03/25/musk_lawsuit_hate_speech/
[21] https://fortune.com/2024/03/30/fidelity-x-stake-73-decline-since-elon-musk-twitter-takeover/
[22] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
You're the asshole who made a bunch of racist comments about a week ago in another Xitter related thread. No one is going to believe that you're some kind of middle of the road type in your politics. Maybe among racist assholes you're more reserved, but among the population as a whole, you belong with the nazis, white nationalists, and xenophobes who tend to congregate on the right.
And I quote
I don't want to apologise for being white and I don't want to "smash whiteness". It's all come from bullshit theories created in universities in the early 90s, such as dismantling the "nuclear family" as if that's a bad thing.
https://forums.theregister.com/forum/all/2024/03/25/musk_lawsuit_hate_speech/#c_4834988
Your twat-shaming is much appreciated. Don't forget [1]his apparent anti-lockdown and [2]slightly loony BigPharma posts , or [3]his general ranting about that old chestnut, the "Mainstream Media" , favoured enemy of conspiracy theorists everywhere.
[1] https://forums.theregister.com/forum/containing/4788479
[2] https://forums.theregister.com/forum/containing/4745506
[3] https://forums.theregister.com/forum/containing/4745387
I guess by his standards, Pat Buchanan would be a "far-left blogger".
How is "failing to apologise for being white" racist?
Just admit you're a racist POS, Steve. Speaking only for myself, but I'll have an ever so tiny bit of respect for you if you at least own up to being the racist POS we all know you are. It won't be even remotely enough to make me have even a neutral opinion of you, let alone positive, but it will be ever so slightly less negative.
Also, may as well not bother with the coward option, because it's like "asking for a friend." Everyone knows its you.
I think we're still on track to reach X Zero before Net Zero.
The age old algebraic formula: X = 0
Xitler keeps learning all the wrong lessons from his many failures at Xitter. He's even in denial about his many Xitter antics starting to bleed over into Tesla because... narcissism.
It was never about verification
Leaving aside most of Steve's comment, it is indeed true that the old verification was never about verification, it was always about status.
To get verified, you needed either
1) Be a journalist with a well known news organization (that probably had some partnership/deal with Twitter, i.e NYT)
2) Be a corporation
3) Have a PR team ready to nag Twitter to death
The original blue checkmark was less of an indicator of verification (since many people with hundreds of thousands of followers never got verification) and more a symbol of a twat. In fact, if Twitter didn't like what you said, but didn't want to ban you, they could take away your blue checkmark, as they did to some well known actor (whose name escapes me, was apparently in Star Trek)
So I for one don't really care for the commoditization of the blue checkmark, because it was always a commodity, just the price has gone down.
How long until
Musk threatens to sue Fidelity for making Twitter look bad with their continual writedowns?
He probably won't though - he only sues people who he has a massive monetary advantage over like non profits, hoping they will be afraid of a costly legal battle with someone with infinitely deep pockets.
"What this effectively means is that legacy verification for notable accounts has returned, albeit in a manner indistinguishable from paid verification."
Well not quite. There were quite a few examples of left wing bloggers who had a few thousand followers getting a blue tick, whereas right wing "influencers" who had hundreds of thousands of followers being refused.
I'm neither hard left or hard right myself*, but I do prefer a level playing field. I'm not saying what we've got now is really any better, but it was definitely skewed before.
* so if you feel strongly either way, please feel free to give me a thumbs down and don't bother explaining why. I'll take it as a compliment.