The New York Times has said it won’t pay for a Twitter ‘gold’ ticker, which denotes fully verified official accounts and entails a monthly fee.
Confirmation came just hours after the social network pulled the check mark from the newspaper’s official account.
With around 9.33 million subscribers, who collectively have 10.75 million paid subscriptions across the publication’s print and digital channels, the New York Times is one of the world’s most read publications.
NYT won’t pay $12k/yr for gold check
The new Twitter policy states that organizations will move from being issued blue tickers and instead given gold check marks.
While this new development will brighten the accounts of several firms, it comes with a $1,000 monthly subscription fee – an amount the New York Times is flatly refusing to pay.
Although the organization as a group is not interested in gold check marks, a spokesperson said the company may reimburse certain personnel for Twitter blue tickers in cases where statuses are highly essential for reporting accurate news.
🚨BREAKING: Twitter has Un-Verified The @NYTimes pic.twitter.com/zpJ3vJ6tsj
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) April 2, 2023
With that said, blue tickers will be maintained for individual subscribers interested in showing check marks on their accounts. US residents can get one for $8.
The New York Times is not alone. According to Cable News Network (CNN), Vox, the Washington Post, BuzzFeed, Politico, and the LA Times will not pay for gold checks. Neither will they offer subscription tips to their staff to retain their verification status on Twitter.
All that glitters
While the blue ticker was a way of confirming the real identity of the person or institution behind a particular account, the aforementioned media powerhouses believe this vision has been changed. Now, they say, the only reason for having a gold check mark… is to enrich Twitter through subscription fees.
According to Business Insider, the White House will continue to disseminate information to the public via its gray, non-paid check-marked official government Twitter accounts.
Mainstream athletes such as NBA star Lebron James, NFL players Patrick Mahomes and Darius Slay, entertainer Dionne Warwick, and actor Ben Stiller have disclosed that they won’t pay $8 monthly for Twitter Blue.
Subscription fees for becoming a verified Twitter account-holder hit the wires last November, a short time after Musk became the company’s owner in a $44 billion deal.
“Twitter’s current lords and peasants system for who has or does not have a blue checkmark is bullshit. Power to the people! Blue for $8 per month,” Musk tweeted on November 1.
While Musk continues to attract a backlash from many users, some analysts believe it is a step in the right direction for a company which has failed to report positive net income since 2019.
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