In a now-deleted tweet, Elon Musk said Twitter would give verified accounts “a few weeks grace” but take away their checkmarks if “they tell they won't pay now”
except from The New York Times Alka Jain / Livemint : Twitter removes ‘gold verified mark’ from New York Times main account Matt Novak / Forbes : Elon Musk Calls New York Times ‘Propaganda’, Strips Check Mark From Twitter Account Grace Dean / Insider : News organizations say they won't pay for Elon Musk's Twitter Blue because ‘verified checkmarks no longer represent authority and expertise’ South China Morning Post : Musk's Twitter phases out ‘blue checks’; LeBron, White House won't pay Mastodon: Charles Johnson / @Green_Footballs@mastodon.social : Look at this inept BS. — In the web version of Twitter, clicking my badge says what it has since Musk took over. — But in the mobile version, he's trying to make it impossible to tell if someone paid him for this crap. Jeff Jarvis / @jeffjarvis@mastodon.social : But I don't want the Blue checkmark of the #EightBuckSchmuck. I don't want people to think I'm stupid enough to pay Elon. I've been defamed. Tweets: Ben Goggin / @benjamingoggin : Is this just a strategy to make it seem like more people paid for Twitter Blue? This puts people who said they wouldn't pay in a weird place. Twitter is intentially creating doubt about whether a person is paying for verification or not. https://twitter.com/... Ben Collins / @oneunderscore__ : Just... lol. https://twitter.com/... Edward Ongweso Jr / @bigblackjacobin : lmfao this is such a funny outcome i don't think anyone anticipated it https://twitter.com/... Ryan Mac / @rmac18 : “or” https://twitter.com/... Drew Harwell / @drewharwell : @nytimes @elonmusk .@elonmusk had said old checkmarks would disappear as of yesterday but @nytimes is one of the very few affected so far, possibly because the badges have to be removed one by one. Since Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion, its ad revenue has plunged 90% https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ... https://twitter.com/... Eva / @evacide : What fuckery is this? Clicking on the blue check now reads “this account is verified because it is subscribed to Twitter Blue or is a legacy account.” https://twitter.com/... @evansverse : They have to remove legacy check marks one by one https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/... @hkesvani : Anyway look, it's really easy to tell who paid for twitter and who didn't! Ben Goggin / @benjamingoggin : Sooooo basically nothing changed from before? https://twitter.com/... @hkesvani : Really funny that this is the result of Elon needing to protect the losers that support him so much that he financially cannot act out his revenge fantasies https://twitter.com/... Kalhan / @kalhanr : Well, I don't pay for Twitter Blue but now when you click my badge (and other legacy badges), the pop-up says it's because the user is either subbed to Twitter Blue OR a legacy account. 🤔 https://twitter.com/... Brian Jay Jones / @brianjayjones : Interesting. Meanwhile, a lot of checks will be putting “I DIDN'T PAY FOR TWITTER” in their Twitter bios until this gets resolved. https://twitter.com/... Kalhan / @kalhanr : Interesting the NYT is the only one to lose verification when some celebs said they wouldn't pay either https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/... Dare Obasanjo / @carnage4life : The biggest celebrities in the world are making content for you for free in exchange for a few blue pixels beside their username and then you decide to throw that away for $8/month. This is stable genius territory. https://twitter.com/... Sami Fathi / @samifathi_ : Twitter seems to have changed its mind and will no longer strip “legacy” verified accounts of their blue check mark if they don't pay for Twitter Blue, at least according to Musk's deletion of one of his tweets from several weeks ago. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/... Larry Madowo / @larrymadowo : I still have a ‘legacy’ blue check - for now - because someone has to manually remove it https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ... Eric Michael Garcia / @ericmgarcia : In a deleted tweet from early Sunday morning, Musk had said Twitter would give verified accounts “a few weeks grace, unless they tell they won't pay now, in which we will remove it.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ... Thomas Maxwell / @tomaxwell : It's been reported that removing legacy bluechecks requires lots of manual work and Twitter's software for doing so is incredibly error-prone https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ... But slowing the process is a choice by Elon, apparently https://twitter.com/... See also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
Twitter had already signaled that its legacy verification program would be wound down, with a planned removal of legacy checkmarks beginning April 1 in the announced sunset of legacy verification. The reported grace-period message makes payment refusal—not simply legacy status—the immediate point of conflict.
That conflict was especially visible among publishers: the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and Washington Post were among outlets reported as declining Twitter Blue, while several organizations would not reimburse reporters for it in the newsroom pushback against paid verification.
First-order effects
- Verified accounts that publicly decline to pay face the prospect of losing their checkmarks after a short grace period, putting news organizations and other prominent users under direct pressure to subscribe.
- Twitter’s verification signal becomes less clearly tied to prior identity vetting as payment status and legacy status coexist; users had already reported uncertainty about what a checkmark represented.
Second-order effects
- Publishers that refuse Twitter Blue must weigh the reputational and distribution costs of an unverified-looking main account against paying for a badge they say no longer denotes authority.
- The policy heightens scrutiny of inconsistent enforcement, particularly after Twitter removed legacy checks broadly in the later legacy-checkmark purge while making exceptions or timing decisions account by account.
Third-order effects
- If verification is administered as a subscription benefit rather than a durable identity credential, the badge’s value may depend more on platform visibility and product perks than on institutional trust.
- The episode points to a broader platform-governance tension: monetization policies can turn formerly neutral account infrastructure into leverage over high-profile users, inviting continued resistance from media institutions.
The trend: Twitter’s paid-verification shift is one instance of platforms converting longstanding trust and status features into recurring subscription products.