Twitter has put a pause on its program offering “verified” blue check marks to users willing to fork over $7.99/month after a number of pranksters made use of the symbol to satirize various celebrities, corporations, and political lobbying groups.
As of Friday, the Twitter Blue subscription service was no longer available on the iOS store. The move seemingly came in response to a number of paying users who took advantage of the scheme to mock public figures and brands.
“I miss killing Iraqis 😔,” wrote one verified account purporting to belong to former US President George W. Bush. “Same tbh,” responded another user impersonating former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
Pro-Israel lobbying outfits were parodied too, after an impostor disguised as AIPAC – the most influent pro-Israeli group in the US – tweeted “We ❤️ Apartheid.” The Anti-Defamation League, a group with a history of seeking to silence critics of Israeli policy (and even anti-apartheid activists in South Africa in the 1980s), found themselves being ridiculed as well.
The three Big Pharma giants responsible for 90% of the global insulin supply shed tens of billions on the stock market after a user imitating Eli LIlly and Company declared “we are excited to announce that insulin is free now.”
Twitter had not commented on the shift in policy at the time of publishing. But Elon Musk, the tech billionaire who recently purchased the social media platform for $44 billion last month, announced an apparent prohibition on “accounts doing parody impersonations” on Thursday, and clarified Friday evening that Twitter is “adding a ‘Parody’ subscript.”