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Twitter’s app on iOS has been updated to support Elon Musk’s $7.99 per month Twitter Blue. The app’s latest update on the Apple App Store says you have to pay for Blue to get verified on the platform “just like the celebrities, companies, and politicians you already follow.”
The new Twitter Blue subscription doesn’t seem to be available just yet, though.
What is live immediately within the updated app is a revamped notifications screen that defaults to displaying tweets from Verified users in the first tab — helping to promote the idea that paying for the new plan is the best way to make sure people actually see your tweets.
The app displays a “Blue looks good on you, enjoy your verified checkmark” pop-up when users sign up to Blue, but without the actual opt-in for displaying a “verified” label on your profile, although we have an idea about what that will look like thanks to Jane Manchun Wong.
It’s still not clear when verification through Twitter Blue will go live (or when it will arrive on Android), but it seems like it’s happening soon. Musk initially gave the developers working on Blue until Monday, November 7th, to complete these changes or else face getting fired.
It looks like verification will be the only feature available with the Twitter Blue subscription to start. Other perks, like fewer ads, the ability to post longer videos, and priority ranking to help “lower the visibility of scams, spam, and bots,” are listed as “coming soon.” Twitter Blue is only available in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and the UK for now.
When Musk announced the new Twitter Blue subscription last week, he hinted at providing access to paywalled articles, but this feature isn’t among those listed in the update. He also pulled the ad-free article perk that came with the previous $4.99 / month Twitter Blue subscription and reportedly pushed to make Twitter’s “edit” button available to all users, not just subscribers. On Friday, Musk laid off around half of Twitter’s employees across several departments, including product trust and safety, policy, communications, tweet curation, ethical AI, and others.
wazup.