As Twitter does away with blue badges reactions range from crass humour to lambasting

Twitter has announced that its blue verification ticks, which signify a verified account, will no longer be free of charge. The company's Twitter Verified account stated on Friday that the verified program, which has been in operation for a long time, will be discontinued from April 1.

Individuals who want to maintain their verified status on Twitter will be required to sign up for the platform's paid service, Twitter Blue. "On April 1st, we will begin winding down our legacy verified programme and removing legacy verified checkmarks. To keep your blue checkmark on Twitter, individuals can sign up for Twitter Blue," it tweeted, adding a link for users and businesses to sign up. 

Reactions range from crass humour to serious criticisation

There were bound to be reactions from the hundreds of thousands of users of the social media giant. By now many individuals are used to the Elon Musk-led platform making big decisions and announcing them without any incubation period for the public to digest. The reactions ranged from users sharing many memes which could be categorised in the 18+ category to users also sharing their distraught while some also vowed to step down from Twitter and not use it as their primary social media platform.

One user named Mike Drucker expressed his gratitude writing, "Thank you for doing this. I’m not even being sarcastic. Some users on Twitter were starting to confuse me for the type of person who’d pay $8 a month to feel special. It was embarrassing."

Another user expressed, "Twitter making groundbreaking cultural statements by saying that “verified” doesn’t actually mean you’ve actually been verified. Words don’t NEED to have meanings."

Co-founder and CEO of consumer brand PillowFightCo took to Twitter to say that his company was cancelling their Twitter Blue subscriptions.

Many users lambasted CEO Elon Musk, with one user 'D3NNI' writing, "Elon's inability to make a single good change to this app needs to be studied."

Social Community Manager of gaming giant Call of Duty took to Twitter to express his anguish. 'It was a huge goal of mine to get verified and when it finally happened — I was at work. I came home to this little surprise from my wife and daughter. I’m sure you won’t care, but so many of these changes that seem unnecessary kinda ruin the vibe," he wrote.

Many users also shared memes where they are allegedly abusing the current owner of Twitter for the move.

Although Twitter has made a clear announcement regarding the discontinuation of its free verification program, some users are skeptical due to the chosen date. April 1st is widely celebrated as April Fools' Day, which has led to speculation that the announcement might be an elaborate prank by the company and its CEO, Elon Musk, who is known for his love of humor.

While some users speculate that the announcement might be a prank, others believe that it could be a genuine decision by the company, especially since Musk has previously expressed his desire to get rid of the blue verification badges. He has criticised the way in which the badges were initially handed out, calling it "corrupt and nonsensical."

Another possibility is that the announcement is true, and the date was chosen for fun, much like how Musk uses numbers like 420. Regardless, the decision to abandon the legacy checkmarks coincides with the company's rollout of Twitter Blue worldwide, although some features are still missing.

Twitter Blue is available for Android and iOS devices at a cost of $8 per month or $84 per year. For web users, the service costs $11 per month or $114.99 per year. In India, the service costs Rs 900 per year for Android/iOS and Rs 650 per year for web users.