Owners of free Verified Twitter Bits warned they must pay to keep them

Described by Elon Musk as a sign for differentiating between “lords and peasants,” Twitter Verified ticks can now be rented by almost anyone for a monthly fee of $8 or $11, the value of the new Twitter Blue subscription.

Over time, the blue tick has proven to be a trusted identifier for obtaining information from credible sources, which could be a government agency, a political figure, a journalist, a brand, or a healthcare institution. Twitter never charged for verifying an account, but the verification process was quite rigorous. Whereas before Musk took the helm the purpose of the blue tick was to highlight notable personalities wielding influence on Twitter, under the new formula the blue tick is more of a whim you can indulge in by paying a monthly subscription

Trying to make the new “product” as marketable as possible, Musk even suspended the identity verification part, but that proved to be a disaster, as the platform was flooded with fake accounts bearing the blue tick. Forced to suspend the launch of the new Twitter Blue subscription with the blue tick included, Musk is back with almost the same formula, modified by introducing a longer waiting time for newly registered accounts and restricting changes that can alter profile identity, such as changing profile picture or name. In this case, the blue tick is removed until the verification process is repeated.

For old accounts that lose Verified status, it can be recovered by subscribing to Twitter Blue, preferably from the web browser or an Android phone (to avoid Apple’s 30% subscription fee).

As for the benefits of a Twitter Blue subscription, the company says users will be able to edit their tweets, upload videos with higher resolution than 1080p, and access Reader mode for reading articles in a non-intrusive way.