Before verified accounts kids were “conversing” with me online, one went missing | Hacker News Reader

Before verified accounts kids were “conversing” with me online, one went missing

twitter.com

7 pointsmzs7 comments

This argument is missing a very important piece of information. Blue check marks no longer just mean an accounts identity is verified. They mean verified account and endorsed by twitter. See this thread by Twitter support, they talk about it and link to the rules: https://nitter.net/TwitterSupport/status/930926295034224641

I think this speaks to the more general missing piece in the "$8" plan. Why did Twitter originally verify Stephen King for free? It's not because it benefited Stephen King, it's because it benefited Twitter. It made it a better product if other users could trust that the famous account they saw post was actually the famous person they wanted to hear from. Why does Elon want to verify users? Not because it benefits the individual user, but because it benefits Twitter's efforts to distinguish real users from bots.

But if the one who benefits from checkmarks is Twitter, why would users pay for them? It's a backwards proposition.

That's true but being verified also benefits users at least when applied to famous ones.

It benefits Stephen King to have a way to show that he is the real Stephen King. It also benefits all other users to be able to find the real Stephen King.

Now, on the other hand, for the millions of 'anonymous' users, being verified has no obvious benefit.

Stephen King can easily show he's real: his publisher can mention his handle, he can print his handle in his books, his web page, facebook page, etc.

Similarly for journalists: they can add their twitter link on their author page. Or government officials and .gov sites. They all have trusted sites to use to authenticate.

But it's unclear on Twitter without the user doing work. The blue check / verified value accrues almost entirely to Twitter, and improves the user experience for Twitter readers.

That's not very practical and requires research. A blue badge does provide the simplest, most effective solution for users on Twitter: "oh there's a blue badge next to the name, that means it's the genuine account". Done.

Ah. The “protect the children” argument.

Doesn’t sound like it’s the children he wants to protect. He wants to protect himself from the damage that results if people pretending to be him hurt kids.

It’s not like they are saying we need to verify kids accounts, or that doing so would in any way protect them from anything.

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