The New York Times is the first major news publisher to lose its Twitter verification checkmark after stating that it will not pay the microblogging site a monthly fee to keep its badge. Some other news organizations have stated that they will not pay for verification; however, their checkmarks remain in place for the time being.
Elon Musk, Twitter new CEO, previously stated that the company will begin removing ‘legacy’ verified checkmarks from accounts that do not subscribe to Twitter Blue, the platform’s subscription service introduced last year that essentially allows users to purchase a verification mark, beginning April 1.
Individual users must purchase an $8-per-month subscription to Twitter’s Blue service to obtain the badge. Businesses that are currently unverified will have to pay $1,000 per month to have their accounts verified with a gold check mark. In March of this year, it was announced that users in India would have to pay Rs 900 per month for a monthly subscription to receive the Blue verified badge.
The subscription is less expensive on the web, costing Rs 650 per month. In India, Twitter offers an annual subscription on the web for Rs 6800 per year or approximately Rs 566 per month.
The Times appears to have lost its gold verification check somewhere between Saturday night and early Sunday morning; this removal might have been a reaction to a meme tweeted at Elon Musk that was tweeted. There are more than 55 million followers on the publisher’s account.
Many media organizations and celebrities, including basketball star LeBron James, who announced they would not pay for Twitter Blue, still have blue or gold checkmarks on their accounts.
Musk attacked the New York Times in a series of tweets early Sunday, saying, “The real tragedy of @NYTimes is that their propaganda isn’t even interesting,” and describing its main feed as “the equivalent of diarrhea” and “unreadable.”
While larger brands and celebrities can still get their content noticed on the platform due to the sheer size of their followers, smaller businesses that use Twitter to market their services and want their content to reach a wider audience may end up paying for the service essentially as an advertising expense.
Approximately 180,000 people in the United States paid for Twitter subscriptions, including Twitter Blue, as of mid-January, representing less than 0.2 percent of monthly active users.
