Twitter on Wednesday up to date the foundations round its new paid verification characteristic, a transfer that comes as customers started impersonating celebrities, athletes and politicians alongside their new examine marks.
The “About Twitter Blue” web page that features particulars concerning the $7.99-per-month service now has a observe detailing that solely individuals who had an account created earlier than Nov. 9 would be capable to entry the characteristic.
The transfer would theoretically stop individuals from creating new accounts to make the most of the brand new characteristic.
“Twitter accounts created on or after November 9, 2022 might be unable to subscribe to Twitter Blue at the moment,” the observe states.
It isn’t clear precisely when that replace was added, however variations of the webpage logged by the Web Archive’s Wayback Machine, which shops snapshots of many well-liked web sites, reveals that the language was added to the web page someday earlier than 1 p.m. ET.
Even with that rule in place, Twitter has needed to take motion in opposition to many accounts which have paid for the brand new examine mark and begun impersonating well-known individuals together with NBA star LeBron James and NHL participant Connor McDavid. Customers impersonating former President George W. Bush and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair have additionally been suspended.
Twitter launched the brand new Blue subscription Wednesday, a transfer that had been extremely anticipated as the primary main change since Elon Musk took management of the corporate. Musk has touted the brand new system as a means to herald cash, cut back the incentives for bots and trolls to make use of the platform, and provides extra customers a extra distinguished voice.
However these plans had been rapidly criticized by individuals who argued the brand new system can be abused to unfold misinformation or perpetuate scams. Some customers just lately started impersonating Musk seemingly in an effort to point out him how simply the platform could be abused.
Nonetheless, Twitter rolled out the brand new characteristic lower than two weeks after he took management of the corporate. Tech firms take months to develop and take a look at a characteristic earlier than introducing it out publicly.
Musk stated Wednesday that he’s pushing the corporate to roll issues out rapidly and that there’ll inevitably be issues.
“Please observe that Twitter will do a number of dumb issues in coming months,” he tweeted. “We are going to preserve what works & change what doesn’t.”
