Elon Musk Just Had His Most Humiliating Weekend at Twitter Yet

Twitter finally introduced the paid Twitter Blue verification scheme cooked up by Elon Musk last week, and it’s not going well. 

Rather than being a much sought-after status symbol and revenue driver, the new blue check is being seen more like a scarlet letter, and Musk spent the weekend personally giving them to famous people who were forced to loudly clarify that they don’t want them. 

Musk’s takeover of Twitter put the company deep in debt, searching for ways to cut costs and make more money. Besides cutting the company’s staff down to a fraction, Musk devised a plan to remove all of Twitter’s legacy verified checks—implemented early in the platform’s history after a lawsuit over impersonation—and institute a pay-for-play system called Twitter Blue. While Musk fans crowed at the supposed ownage of legacy blue checks as they lined up to pay the $8, people like Stephen King, LeBron James, Halle Berry, and many others, said they wanted nothing to do with it. 

Starting on Thursday, Twitter Blue checks began appearing on some of those people’s accounts. And no, they hadn’t paid for Twitter. “My Twitter account says I’ve subscribed to  Twitter Blue. I  haven’t,” King wrote in a tweet more chilling than his novels. “My Twitter account says I’ve given a phone  number. I haven’t.”

The trend continued over the weekend, with Musk making famous people look like they paid for Twitter, forcing them to declare they have not paid for Twitter. Musk confirmed that he was paying for some Twitter Blue subscriptions himself, and even alluded to trolling people by giving them a check. 

“Despite the implication when you click the blue badge that has mysteriously re-appeared beside my name, I am not paying for the ‘honour,’” actor Ian McKellen wrote on Saturday. Musk even appeared to get in a personal back-and-forth with celebrity shitposter Dril, who coined a “Block the Blue” campaign on Twitter to mass block verified users. Dril was given a blue check, but changed his name so that it disappeared. 

“wait I’m crying they’re giving them for punishment now !!?!!” Chrissy Teigen tweeted, weighing in on the Dril situation. Teigen is not verified. 

Twitter even verified scores of dead celebrities and notable people, which struck many as a low blow given the widespread negative perception of Twitter Blue. Currently, the Twitter account for Jamal Khashogghi, the Washington Post journalist murdered by the Saudi royal family—who are also major investors in Twitter—says it is a paid subscriber to Twitter Blue. 

Some unwilling subscribers, such as King and fellow author Neil Gaiman, suggested that Musk donate money toward Ukraine’s war effort rather than buying blue checks for people who don’t want them. On Sunday, King tweeted that Musk had donated $100 million to Ukraine. So, the verification scheme has cost him at least that much. 

No amount of claiming to be trolling and I’m-not-mad-I’m-actually-laughing can change the cold reality of what has transpired here: Elon Musk’s big plan to financially save Twitter is so far an embarrassing disaster, one so heinous that he’s actually punishing people by giving what was supposed to be a sought-after status symbol to them. However, it is making for some great posting.