Twitter ‘blue tick’ for NZ

New Zealand has been included in countries where Twitter users can get the blue checkmark that verifies their accounts.

Twitter announced yesterday that for a US$7.99 (NZ$14) subscription fee, users would get a service that included the blue check.

The service would be available on Apple devices that downloaded a new update. Users could then subscribe to a new ‘‘Twitter Blue with verification’’ to get the blue check next to their names.

Twitter said users could have the mark ‘‘just like the celebrities, companies and politicians you already follow’’. The update and blue check was also available in the United States, Canada, Australia and Britain. It was not yet available on Android devices.

New owner Elon Musk tweeted yesterday you could ‘‘trash me all day but it’ll cost $8’’. Twitter employee Esther Crawford tweeted that the ‘‘new Blue’’ was not live yet but some users could begin to see changes as testing and updates were made in real time. However, there were concerns that being able to buy a blue tick would lead to an increase in misinformation.

The change would end Twitter’s current verification system, which was launched in 2009 to prevent impersonations of high-profile accounts such as celebrities and politicians.

Twitter had just over 400,000 verified accounts, many of them rank-and-file journalists from around the globe that the company verified regardless of how many followers they had. Experts said the verification system helped users identify if accounts were authentic and this new effort would undermine that.

Musk tweeted on Saturday that if anyone impersonated the likes of politicians, Twitter would suspend the account and keep the money.

Musk also claimed hateful speech had declined below previous ‘‘norms’’ this week, and that the blue tick was a ‘‘lords and peasants system’’.

Musk, who had earlier said that he wanted to ‘‘verify all humans’’ on Twitter, had floated that public figures would be identified in ways other than the blue check.

Currently, government officials are identified with text under their names stating they are posting from an official government account.

Musk on Friday said he was forced to make job cuts at Twitter as the social media company was losing US$4 million a day. Yoel Roth, head of safety and integrity, said about half of the staff of 7500 were let go. Frontline content moderation staff were the least affected by the job cuts, Roth said.

Twitter said quality content would soon get higher priority in searches, replies and mentions. This would lower the visibility of scams, spam and bots.