New York Times Twitter Account Loses Its Blue Label

On April 1, Twitter was intended to formally delete old verification checkmarks. The Elon Musk-led social network has changed the label on the check mark to make it nearly hard to tell who earned it and who paid for it, even though it appears to have put those intentions on hold for the time being.

When users tap or click on the blue checkmark, the label now reads, “This account is verified because it’s subscribed to Twitter Blue or is a legacy verified account.”

After Twitter introduced verification through the Blue subscription plan, the label on the legacy verified accounts read, “This is a legacy verified account. It may or may not be notable.” On the other hand, the label on the Blue account showed, “This account is verified because it’s subscribed to Twitter Blue.”

This made it feasible to distinguish between two groups of confirmed accounts. Yet, the new symbol makes it challenging to distinguish between the two distinct verifications and recognise prominent accounts.

The New York Times similarly lost its verified check over the weekend after declining to pay for the service. In response to users who made a meme about how the magazine didn’t pay for verification, Twitter CEO Elon Musk said, “Oh okay, we’ll take it off.”

New York Times says It Won’t Pay For Twitter Verification 🤣 pic.twitter.com/eLDE21lBzB

— DogeDesigner (@cb_doge) April 2, 2023

Over the last few days, many celebrities including LeBron James, Patrick Mahomes II,  Darius Slay, Monica Lewinsky, and William Shatner have said that they won’t be paying for a check mark.

The post claiming Twitter would allow legacy verified account holders “a few weeks grace” to subscribe to Twitter Blue before removing the verification marks from those who don’t pay was deleted, as noted by reporter Matt Binder. In the deleted tweet, it was also stated that accounts that specifically refuse to pay for Twitter Blue will have the checkmark removed by the social media platform.

Musk has promised that after April 15, the “For You” algorithmic timeline will only show verified accounts along with the accounts a person follow. Over the weekend, the Tesla CEO also mentioned that Twitter will soon add the date of verification to user profiles.

The social network is also reportedly working on a government ID verification feature for Blue subscribers, which will let them hide their checkmarks.