Elon Musk pauses relaunch of Twitter Blue subscription indefinitely

Elon Musk on Monday put an indefinite hold on the launch of Twitter Blue Tick, saying that the pause will be in effect until there is high confidence in stopping impersonation. The development comes days after the social media platform’s new chief executive officer announced that the Twitter Blue verification mark will be launched on November 29. 

In a tweet, Musk said, “Holding off the relaunch of Blue Verified until there is high confidence of stopping impersonation. Will probably use different color check for organizations than individuals.” 

Earlier this month, the Tesla CEO said that the Twitter Blue Tick subscription will cost $8/per month. The new feature was slated to be rolled out in countries like the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the UK this month. Musk said that the subscription cost will be utilised in ramping up the social media platform’s dampening revenue. 

However, days later following Musk’s announcement on the launch of Twitter $8 blue tick subscription, billions of dollars were wiped out from US Pharma giant Eli Lilly's market capitalisation after the company’s official Twitter handles were impersonated to spread disinformation. 

Musk said that he is on a mission to make Twitter the most accurate source of information. In order to curtail the fake verified accounts on the social media platform, last week Musk said that Twitter will soon enable organisations to identify which other Twitter accounts are actually associated with them. Moreover, in order to identify parody accounts the Tesla CEO said that accounts engaged in parody must include “parody” in their name and not just in their bio. He also announced that any Twitter handles engaging in impersonation without clearly specifying “parody” will be suspended without any warning. Moreover, any name change at all will cause a temporary loss of the verified checkmark.

Notably, the pause on the Twitter Blue tick subscription comes on the heels of mass layoffs at the social media platform. Last week, several disgruntled employees resigned from the company after Musk’s ultimatum of go ‘hardcore’ or go home with severance pay. Musk told Twitter staff that going forward the company will be revamped to Twitter 2.0, which would require long hours of working at high intensity. He further added that Twitter will be much more engineering-driven, and while design and product will still be very important, engineers will have the greatest sway. 

Earlier this month, the social media platform sacked 50% of its workforce or 3,700 employees of the company’s 7,500 strength. The company is planning another round of layoffs across sales and partnership teams.