After having suspended its $8 verification program in early November, Twitter has again launched its paid verification program, with a few tweaks to the process. Is this tweak a verification process that actually verifies the user as who they say they are?
No.
The main tweak is that users on an Apple device will have to pay more than the standard $8 subscription fee. This is due to Musk’s argument that Apple is taking too much of a cut of app downloads, 30% to be exact, feeding into Twitter’s (and other apps’) profits. Musk, therefore, plans to pass those cuts onto the user.
It doesn’t really solve the problem of the verification process on Twitter, though, does it?
Other benefits include the idea that Tweets from verified users will rank higher in replies, mentions and searches, meaning that your tweets have more validity. A pro for marketers. Twitter Blue subscribers will see half the ads. A con for marketers. And Twitter Blue subscribers will be able to post longer videos. A pro for marketers.
So, there’s a mixed bag of features here as it pertains to the marketers of the world—all not really touching the real problem of the state of Twitter as a problem.
As Social Media Today noted: “You can take that as a criticism of Elon Musk and his ‘free speech’ idealism if you want, but the fact is that Twitter’s going to need tens of millions of people to sign up to this scheme, paying for little more than a graphic on their Twitter account, in order for it to achieve its stated goals.”
