Elon Musk: Twitter Blue-abo including verification costs $8 a month

Elon Musk, as the new owner of Twitter, announces that the monthly cost for a Blue subscription will increase to $ 8 per month in the US. That’s $3 more than the current price in that country. Earlier, $20 was mentioned. Verification is part of the subscription.

Until now, Twitter Blue looked different, with verification in the form of the blue check mark not being part of it. Currently is verification still being issued to a limited number of Twitter accounts that are “authentic, known and active,” such as government officials and journalists. Musk says the current system of having and not having such verification is “nonsense.”

Customers of the Blue subscription to get in addition to the option of verification, also priority when it comes to replies, mentions and the search option, which according to Musk is important to prevent spam. The number of advertisements will also decrease by half. In addition, Musk says that the option to bypass paywalls will become available to publishers who want to work with Blue and/or Twitter, which he says will also provide a flow of money that can be used to reward content creators.

The new subscription will also be available in other countries, where the price of 8 dollars in the US is adjusted proportionally on the basis of the purchasing power in those countries concerned. It is not yet clear when this new subscription and the prices will come into effect. It was already clear that it was being considered $8 a month after Musk commented to criticism from author Stephen King that $20 a month was too high. He says that the bills have to be paid from somewhere and that Twitter cannot exist only from advertisements.

Recently, The Verge reported that Twitter wanted to charge $20 for verification as part of the subscription and that users who have already been verified must subscribe to Twitter Blue within 90 days or they would lose their blue tick.

These current plans to ask for money for verification follow after Tesla CEO Elon Musk finalized his takeover of Twitter last week and became the new owner. As the new CEO, he is reportedly planning a major layoff. He already fired the Board of Directors and the content moderation team would also be severely limited.