Watching the blue checkmark as status symbol die in front of me has been immensely enjoyable. It only mattered because Twitter itself existed in a bubble of cultural relevance, propped up by journalists. That bubble is deflating slowly, and has been for awhile. If the checkmark actually represented something of value, it wouldn't be so easily wiped out.
One day, I hope we can laugh at the era of big social media, where we honestly believed that the most addicted users posting furiously on sites merited similar cultural prestige as people actually doing things out in the world, such as building things, researching, competing, or caring for people.
The only reason people are buying a checkmark is because of the cultural relevance the checkmark had. If they just rolled out a "Twitter Plus" subscription and gave users a different looking symbol, it would have nose dived even harder.
Now that cultural relevance has been muddled, now any random person can get one. So it's lost value for people who actually need verification as a security / fraud feature and for journalists and for the people paying for one.
Those were the people who were previously verified? I.E. they were notable enough to a _large enough cross section of twitter users_ in some way shape or form.
Sure, members of the media were given a check as a directive of public-facing policy and thus over-represented, but considering they actually _reported_ on events happening (including things that wouldn’t be so unfiltered on cable news or newspapers, but live feeds and videos of events in real-time, like the 2011 Egyptian Revolution), I personally thought it made sense they too were boosted by the algorithm.
Now every other blue check I see is someone shilling an ICO (in 2023?) or someone I don’t follow responding something transphobic/racist/whatever to someone else I also don’t follow.
I’ve been on Twitter since 2011. I’ve seen it change even under the old ownership. I thought the blue check feature was flawed in the past (in fact, it should’ve been MORE stringent), but now I just find it actively diluting the entire experience.
I really don’t care what ANON1234 with 8 followers thinks about covid vaccines just because they paid $8, and I don’t think most other users do either.
One day, I hope we can laugh at the era of big social media, where we honestly believed that the most addicted users posting furiously on sites merited similar cultural prestige as people actually doing things out in the world, such as building things, researching, competing, or caring for people.