Musk Confirms Monthly Charges For Kenyans Verified On Twitter

Elon Musk, the world's richest person, has confirmed that all users verified on the platform will pay monthly charges to retain their blue verification badges, or blue ticks.

Stating on Tuesday, November 1, Musk revealed that the plan would upend the platform's "current lords and peasants system" and create a new revenue stream for the company.

Under the new regulations, Kenyans with the blue checkmark on Twitter will have to pay Ksh971.60 (US$8) per month (Ksh11,659.2 per year), with Musk warning that the prices might be adjusted by country.

"Twitter’s current lords and peasants system for who has or doesn’t have a blue checkmark is BS. Power to the people! Blue for $8/month.

A screenshot of Twitter Verified account. /FILE

"Price adjusted by country proportionate to purchasing power parity," he stated.

Musk also revealed that verified users enrolled in the monthly subscription service will get priority in replies, mentions and search, which is essential to defeat spam/scam. They will also have the ability to post long video and audio and will get half as many adverts.

There will also be a paywall bypass for publishers willing to work with the social media platform.

"This will also give Twitter a revenue stream to reward content creators," he added.

Musk also announced that there will be a secondary tag below the name for someone who is a public figure, which is already the case for politicians. 

The move was however questioned by a section of users who argued that the app would lose its credibility and expose it to all manner of fake news, making verified reports harder to confirm.

"Hey Elon Musk, I am not paying $240 (Ksh29,148) a year to stay verified. No one will. It's not a status symbol, it's a security feature. Making it a paid service will hurt a ton of journalists and make fake news spread more easily.

"Twitter's users are not the customers. We are the product. The advertisers are the customers. Charging journalists for a security feature (at a price no one will pay) will make this site less reputable and less attractive for your actual customers," Matthew Chapman tweeted.

Initial reports had revealed that Twitter was planning to charge Ksh2,500 per month to users verified on the platform.

The Verge on Sunday, October 30 indicated that Musk had ordered employees working on the project to meet the deadline of Monday, November 7 to have the feature launched or risk losing their jobs.

In addition, those currently verified on the platform would have 90 days to subscribe to the new service or lose their blue tick badges. 

The billionaire had hinted at restructuring the social media giant months before his takeover, and one of the areas that he would look at was Twitter's verification of accounts and handling of bots.

The verification process would be incorporated into Twitter Blue, a monthly subscription that gives the most engaged people on Twitter exclusive access to premium features. Currently, the service is available on Twitter for iOS, Android and the web in the US, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. 

Since the introduction of the blue badge in 2009, there were roughly 360,000 verified accounts by May 2021 according to Vox. The badge was introduced to show other Twitter users that the account genuinely belongs to the person whose name it is in.

Elon Musk laughing during a past conference. /SKY NEWS