Twitter on Wednesday launched an “official” badge for accounts of governments and media personalities, then “deleted” Elon Musk, then the social network’s administrator reinstated it, but for a more limited circumference, in a cacophony of its becoming the platform’s communications standard.
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“Just removed it,” GM tweeted about the “official” badge, responding to a user who noticed the badge had already disappeared.
“The blue tick will put everyone on the same level,” added the billionaire, owner of Twitter for less than two weeks.
Twitter began rolling out an “Official” badge on Wednesday, indicating the account’s health and notoriety, and distinguishing itself from the blue check mark, which has played that role so far.
This should soon be offered to all users, for $8 per month to subscribe to Twitter Blue, a project launched by Elon Musk’s Manu Militari.
But a few minutes after the new boss was announced to be parting ways, product manager in development Esther Crawford confirmed that the “official” badge would be in place.
“The ‘official’ badge will be activated upon launch of Twitter Blue. We simply start with governments and commercial organizations. What (Elon Musk) mentioned is the fact that we are not giving an ‘official’ badge to individuals at this time,” Esther Crawford tweeted.
Novels such as those in French, English, and Spanish of US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Pope Francis in English, or even controversial rapper Kanye West, have received an “official” badge before it hasn’t disappeared.
Elon Musk laid off half of Twitter’s 7,500 employees on Friday, ten days after buying the social network and launching several manu Militari projects, including redesigning the Twitter Blue subscription.
Since then, communication about the evolution of the influencer platform has been mainly communicated via her tweets and the tweets of some officials.
“Please note that Twitter will be doing a lot of ridiculous things in the coming months. We will keep what works and change what doesn’t,” said the eccentric head of Tesla and SpaceX, who has 115 million subscribers on his profile.
“There are no more sacred cows in Twitter products,” added Esther Crawford, reposting her boss’s message.
“Elon wants to try a lot of things – some will fail and some will succeed. The goal is to find the right mix of changes to ensure the health and growth of the business in the long term.”
On a Tuesday-Wednesday night, she detailed the logic for gray “official” badges.
Ms Crawford tweeted: “Many people are wondering how it will be possible to distinguish TwitterBlue followers with blue ticks from verified accounts as official.” “That’s why we’re introducing the ‘official’ label to some accounts when we launch.”
Since this weekend, on iPhones, the Twitter mobile app is already referring to the arrival of the new Twitter Blue, in these terms: “Power to People: Your account will receive a blue check, just like the celebrities, companies, and politicians you’ve previously followed.”
But the new formula, which mixes practical tools and identity verification, raises many questions and criticisms.
Many users and observers fear that this system underestimates the guarantee of authenticity that the blue tick was supposed to represent.
On Sunday, Elon Musk insisted that “all-inclusive verification will democratize the press and give more power to the people.”
He also asserts that Twitter Blue will help combat fake accounts and diversify the platform’s revenue sources, while many advertisers have temporarily pulled out of Twitter immediately after the acquisition.
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