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It originally was to verify identity. Then they started withdrawing it from controversial figures, as if those people stopped being who they really were overnig
by goatinaboat 7y ago
It originally was to verify identity. Then they started withdrawing it from controversial figures, as if those people stopped being who they really were overnight. Nowadays it just means “this persons views are endorsed by Twitter staff”.
- chrisseaton 7y ago> Nowadays it just means “this persons views are representative of Twitter staff”. For example both Sanders and Trump have a blue tick. They obviously can’t simultaneously be representative of a majority of Twitter’s staff’s views, can they? And I’d estimate Trump isn’t representative of a substantial number of these west-coast tech workers at all. So that doesn’t seem to hold up.
- mc32 7y agoTrump is a special case in that Twitter said that they would treat heads of state (both foreign and domestic) differently. They might have something internal for accounts with large followings (Kardashians). Assange is an interesting case in that despite renown and following they refuse to give him a check mark and suspended the WL account as well.
- chrisseaton 7y agoOk, excluding heads of state, and even other politicians, are for example the views of Jordan Peterson representative of Twitter employees? Seems unlikely.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- goatinaboat 7y agoI expect his is a holdover from before and it will be revoked as soon as they notice. PS I tweaked my comment after you started to write your reply but before I saw it; the wording is better now but the meaning is basically the same. Sorry!
- danbolt 7y agoI haven't researched it, but I'd assume that Donald Trump had a blue checkmark back when he was widely known as a media personality and landlord.
- SpicyLemonZest 7y agoThat's surely not true. Lots of people have blue checks even though Twitter staff would never endorse their views - Ben Shapiro, Steven Crowder, Candace Owens, and so on.
- wpietri 7y agoYou're correct that it's generally not true. But the grain of truth is that they did punish some notable jerks by removal of verified status: https://money.cnn.com/2017/11/15/technology/twitter-verification-remove-new-policy/index.html https://money.cnn.com/2017/11/15/technology/twitter-verifica... IMHO these were pretty clear anti-abuse actions. But of course those people claim that they were being punished for their views.
- mc32 7y agoI think the claim is a little more nuanced. Basically yes those people went over a line and got punished but at least some claim that others also go over that line but don’t get punished (as often). I don’t know how true that rings.