Blue check Twitter pans Elon Musk's fee for verified accounts: ‘Not paying a gazillionaire $8 a month’

Blue check media figures railed against Elon Musk's announcement about implementing a new charge for verified Twitter accounts.

Musk has already made big waves since becoming the owner of Twitter and Tuesday was no different as he rolled out a plan taking aim at accounts with the iconic blue checkmark. 

"Twitter’s current lords & peasants system for who has or doesn’t have a blue checkmark is bulls---. Power to the people! Blue for $8/month," Musk began a thread. "Price adjusted by country proportionate to purchasing power parity. You will also get: - Priority in replies, mentions & search, which is essential to defeat spam/scam - Ability to post long video & audio - Half as many ads. And paywall bypass for publishers willing to work with us."

He added, "This will also give Twitter a revenue stream to reward content creators. There will be a secondary tag below the name for someone who is a public figure, which is already the case for politicians."

MUSK OUTLINES PLANS FOR TWITTER VERIFICATION CHARGE, SLAMS CURRENT SYSTEM AS ‘BULLS---’

"It’s populism but with a smidgen of capitalism thrown in!" podcast host Molly Jong-Fast reacted.

ESPN reporter Stephen Holder tweeted, "This doesn't make any sense. The point is verification, not creating a tiered system. I mean, I'm not a billionaire but I'm not THAT dumb."

"Blue checkmark as status indicator is something invented by users on the platform," CNN opinion columnist Jeff Yang wrote. "Verification was never intended as a sign of social status, but of certified ID for users with public person status as creators, media figures etc so that other people can’t catfish as them."

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"I tell you what I would value: ID on sign up. Bots denied access and trolls held accountable. Now, that’s worth something," The Yorkshire Post editor James Mitchinson told Musk. 

MSNBC columnist Ruth Ben-Ghiat exclaimed, "Musk ‘the populist.’ Pandering to authoritarianism anti-elitism and anti-intellectualism. Punish those blue checks!" 

"If verification has truly been tainted by its perception as a status symbol -- and there's little doubt that it has -- then the course correction should involve refocusing on identity confirmation. Positioning this potential revenue grab as democratizing is totally disingenuous," blogger Evan Blass wrote. 

Others were attempting to circumvent the $8 monthly fee while preserving their blue checkmark. 

"I just screenshot my blue check and made it my banner. That was easy. And free," liberal TV pundit Asha Rangappa tweeted. 

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"Im just screenshotting my verification as is now and pinning a tweet with it. I might have paid $1 to keep it. Not paying a gazillionaire $8 a month to let people know I’m a trustworthy source of info," journalist Laurel Pfahler wrote. 

Musk officially took ownership of Twitter last week following a lengthy battle with the tech giant following his initial $44 billion acquisition.

His first action was firing Twitter's top brass including CEO Parag Agrawal and chief legal officer Vijaya Gadde. He later dismissed Twitter's board of directors, making him the sole director of the company.

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Musk's takeover of Twitter has won over many conservatives as the Tesla billionaire has promoted free speech principles while his liberal critics accuse him of allowing hateful content and so-called "misinformation" to run rampant on the platform, fearing he will reinstate banned accounts like former President Trump.