(San Francisco) Twitter launched an “Official” badge for government accounts on Wednesday, in such a cacophony that the long-awaited arrival of the new Twitter Blue, the paid subscription to authenticate your account, went almost unnoticed.
Updated yesterday at 9:31 p.m.
Twitter Blue now allows users who wish, for $8 per month, to obtain the famous blue tick, a guarantee of authenticity that was previously free, but reserved for governments and media personalities.
The revamped subscription is currently only available in the mobile app, on iPhones and in the United States.
At the same time, the social network has just as discreetly launched the “Official” badge.
But Elon Musk, the boss and owner of the social network for less than two weeks, tweeted on Wednesday morning that he had “deleted” it.
“The blue tick will put everyone on the same level,” added the multi-billionaire.
Shortly after, the director of products in development Esther Crawford nevertheless assured that the “Official” badge would be “activated”.
“We’re just starting with governments and commercial organizations. That [Elon Musk] mentioned is the fact that we are not giving the ‘Official’ badge to individuals at this time,” she clarified.
Accounts like that of American elected official Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Pope Francis in English or even controversial rapper Kanye West had received the “Official” badge before it disappeared.
“A lot of silly things”
Elon Musk fired half of Twitter’s 7,500 employees on Friday, ten days after buying the social network and launching several projects manu militari, including the overhaul of the paid subscription.
Since then, communication on the evolution of the influential platform has taken place mainly via its tweets and those of certain officials.
“Please note that Twitter is going to do a lot of silly things in the coming months. We will keep what works and change what doesn’t,” said the whimsical boss of Tesla and SpaceX.
“There are no more sacred cows in the products of Twitter,” added Esther Crawford, sharing the message of the general manager.
“Elon wants to try a lot of things — some will fail, some will succeed. The goal is to find the right mix of changes to ensure the long-term health and growth of the business,” she continued.
The gray “Official” badge is meant to distinguish accounts from official organizations from those of Twitter Blue followers, who will have a blue check mark and practical benefits.
It must allow, according to the leader, to fight against false profiles and automated accounts, because malicious actors will have to spend eight dollars each time, and have as many credit cards as accounts they want to create.
On Wednesday, several accounts posing as celebrities emerged on the network, including a fake Lakers basketball player LeBron James.
The impostor with his blue tick had time to request a transfer to another team before the account was deleted.
“Real, interesting and entertaining”
Elon Musk detailed his vision for the “digital public square” on Wednesday during a public online conference for advertisers.
The richest man in the world would like to have “80% of humanity” on Twitter, who would interact “in a more positive way”.
He spoke of “a vigorous quest for truth”, specifying that “anything that is neither true, nor interesting, nor entertaining” will be “stopped or in any case relegated to the background”.
“Messages from verified accounts will show up by default,” he said, while tweets from people who haven’t paid for Twitter Blue will be treated much like spam in an inbox.
The comparison is likely to make the many detractors of the multi-billionaire ironic, who says he wants to “give more power to the people” and abolish “the current system of lords and peasants, between those who have the blue tick and those who do not. “.
Elon Musk also hopes to diversify the platform’s sources of income, while several advertisers have temporarily withdrawn from Twitter, while waiting to see how content moderation, which is crucial for their brands, evolves.
The rate of evolution of the platform will be “out of all proportion to the past”, further underlined the boss.
On Wednesday evening, his account still had the old blue mark, awarded free for his “notoriety”.
On the accounts of subscribers to the new formula, the badge is identical, but it now indicates a “verified” account, because it is “subscribed to Twitter Blue”.