Since Elon Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion last year, things have been, well, interesting, to say the least.
From Elon Musk’s many policy changes to the company’s many layoffs, it’s clear that the social media company looks very different now than it did at this time last year.
The famous blue ticks are one of the things that Tesla’s founder has changed, which has caused him to get a lot of criticism.
Before Elon Musk, verified badges on the social media platform went to users and businesses with a lot of followers. That has changed a little bit now.
Now, you don’t have to go through a verification process to get either the blue mark on a single user’s page or the yellow mark on a company’s page.
Users who want a badge for their Twitter account must now pay $8 a month for the privilege.
Companies, on the other hand, will have to pay a whopping $1,000 for the tick.
Elon Musk took away the verification badges of about one million Twitter users on Friday, April 21.
It looked like he did this all at once.
But since then, some people have reinstated or not even removed at all, which means they get to keep it while everyone else has to pay for it.
One of them is the famous author Stephen King. On April 20, he sent out a tweet to clarify that he had not signed up for Twitter’s new subscription service, even though his account had a blue tick next to it.
My Twitter account says I’ve subscribed to Twitter Blue. I haven’t. My Twitter account says I’ve given a phone number. I haven’t,
he wrote.
Elon Musk actually replied to the tweet saying:
You’re welcome namaste.
After that, there wasn’t much talking for a few days, until King answered Musk again.
He said:
I think Mr. Musk should give my blue check to charity. I recommend the Prytula Foundation, which provides lifesaving services in Ukraine. It’s only $8, so perhaps Mr. Musk could add a bit more.
From what it seems, it sounds like King is not happy with the gift from the head of Twitter.
But Musk has since answered the writer in typical Musk fashion.
I’ve donated $100M to Ukraine, how much have you donated?(We turned down the DoD money btw),
he replied.
We don’t know if this is the end or not, but if King hits back again, we could be looking at some pretty interesting Twitter beef pretty soon.
