Elon Musk Makes His First Big Strike in the Great Blue Check Purge, Pulls the NY Times’ Badge: ‘Their Propaganda Isn’t Even Interesting’
Elon Musk has made his first big blue check takedown, and his target is one of the most esteemed newspapers in the world.
Twitter previously announced that on Saturday, it would begin “winding down” its “legacy verified program” by removing badges they deemed “legacy verified checkmarks.” The move is designed to get users to pay an $8 monthly fee to retain the blue check as part of the company’s “Twitter Blue” service.
The New York Times, which has 54.9 million followers on the social media platform, became the most prominent account thus far to lose its blue check.
In a pair of Tweets, Musk — who owns Twitter — did not explain why the Times was losing its badge, but took a couple of broad swipes at the Gray Lady.
“The real tragedy of @nytimes is that their propaganda isn’t even interesting.” Musk wrote.
In a follow-up tweet, he added, “Also, their feed is the Twitter equivalent of diarrhea. It’s unreadable. They would have far more real followers if they only posted their top articles.”
The Times announced earlier this week it was not going to pay the fee to retain its badge, nor would it reimburse any of its staffers. Nearly all other major U.S. journalistic outlets have made the same decision.
