Elon Musk's Big Announcement, Verified Twitter Accounts Are Now 'Prioritised'

On Tuesday, Twitter owner Elon Musk announced that a verified Twitter account will be a priority. The billionaire tweeted, "Verified accounts are now prioritized."

His tweet comes after Twitter stripped its once-coveted blue checkmarks on Thursday from accounts that were verified before Musk took over the company.

In another tweet, Musk wrote, "Sometimes, when you learn about something, you think you have it."

See the tweet here:

Blue ticks started disappearing from many verified accounts. This comes months after Musk announced the date to press users to sign up for Twitter Blue, its paid subscription service.

With the launch of Twitter Blue, only users who are subscribed to it will be able to have a blue checkmark in front of their names along with access to some brand-new features. These include edit tweet, which allows users to edit their Twitter posts within 30 minutes, custom app icons, NFT profile pictures, and bookmark folders. The service is available for web, iOS and Android devices. As per the microblogging website, the monthly subscription fee for iOS and Android users in India is Rs 900 while the fee has been kept lower at Rs 650 per month for the web version.

According to a report by Rolling Stone, several users who have at least one million Twitter followers discovered recently that the blue ticks they had until Friday, April 20 have returned to their accounts. But the blue checks that were restored display that the accounts are verified because they are paying for Twitter Blue.

Bollywood actors like Alia Bhatt and Shah Rukh Khan, cricketers Virat Kohli, MS Dhoni, former US President Donald Trump, and billionaire Bill Gates, who also lost their blue ticks because of the new update, have the blue checkmark back on their profile. Although, it is not clear whether they have paid for the verification or not.

In a strange occurrence, even profiles of celebrities and noted personalities who are no more, have a verified checkmark next to their account indicating that they are subscribed to the new paid verification feature.