"Now, Twitter verification has absolutely nothing to do with verifying one’s identity. Instead, the blue check-mark is granted to anyone who pays Twitter $8 a month. In other words, it’s a completely pointless marker beyond letting others know that Twitter charges your credit card."
John, an Uber driver explained to me that why he left the Cab business and went to Uber is that you know the passengers because of a credit card. I'm not familiar with Twitter but isn't a credit card the best ID?
I'm not talking about the business side of Twitter. People in Twitter's sales department may well have access to their paying members' contact info. I'm talking about the user side.
Previously, the point of the blue check was to let other users know that you were indeed who you claimed to be on the platform, and not an impersonator. Bernie and I both had blue checks because we individually submitted official identification to Twitter (which was then verified), thus other users knew that the statements they read coming from our Twitter accounts were indeed our own (not someone else's).
Now, I can create a Twitter account with the name of "Tim Holmquist" (or "Cracker Jack" or "Lightning Bolt" for that matter), and get a "verified" blue check just by giving Twitter my credit card number. "Verification" is now pointless, as far as the user experience is concerned.
You may not remember this, but years ago someone in this website's comment section changed their screen-name to "John Daly", and posted a bunch of racist stuff to try and get me in trouble. Situations like that is why identification-verification online is a good thing.
"Now, Twitter verification has absolutely nothing to do with verifying one’s identity. Instead, the blue check-mark is granted to anyone who pays Twitter $8 a month. In other words, it’s a completely pointless marker beyond letting others know that Twitter charges your credit card."
John, an Uber driver explained to me that why he left the Cab business and went to Uber is that you know the passengers because of a credit card. I'm not familiar with Twitter but isn't a credit card the best ID?
I'm not talking about the business side of Twitter. People in Twitter's sales department may well have access to their paying members' contact info. I'm talking about the user side.
Previously, the point of the blue check was to let other users know that you were indeed who you claimed to be on the platform, and not an impersonator. Bernie and I both had blue checks because we individually submitted official identification to Twitter (which was then verified), thus other users knew that the statements they read coming from our Twitter accounts were indeed our own (not someone else's).
Now, I can create a Twitter account with the name of "Tim Holmquist" (or "Cracker Jack" or "Lightning Bolt" for that matter), and get a "verified" blue check just by giving Twitter my credit card number. "Verification" is now pointless, as far as the user experience is concerned.
You may not remember this, but years ago someone in this website's comment section changed their screen-name to "John Daly", and posted a bunch of racist stuff to try and get me in trouble. Situations like that is why identification-verification online is a good thing.
Thanks for the info. I don't use twitter so I didn't realize their process.
Happy to help clarify. I probably should have described it better in the column.
No, I think you were clear. Interesting I saw on the Fox website that they are stating the same as you about Musk and Twitter.