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Okay, I’ll admit it: I did not expect the Twitter checkpocalypse to result in Dril accusing Elon Musk of violating federal consumer protection laws.
It’s been four days since Musk removed the last “legacy verified” checkmarks, leaving Twitter’s blue checks in the hands of people who pay $8 per month for Twitter Blue. Or, at least, that was the idea. As of Monday morning, here’s how it’s gone:
- Legacy checkmarks did, in fact, disappear, leaving only checks bestowed through the paid Twitter Blue service.
- Elon Musk revealed that he was comping “a few” Twitter Blue subscriptions for celebrities, mainly ones who had criticized Twitter Blue verification, like LeBron James and Stephen King.
- As this was unfolding, a group of users, including Weird Twitter legend Dril, launched a “Block the Blue Checks” campaign to mass-block anyone with a checkmark.
- Twitter responded by slapping free blue checks on more accounts — including Dril, journalist Matt Binder (who reported on #BlockTheBlue), and possibly all living or dead users with over a million followers.
This is all consistent with the nonstop forum drama that is Elon Musk’s Twitter, but there’s one detail that’s particularly rankled King and others. It’s that Twitter doesn’t make clear these people aren’t paying for its services. For now, here’s what you get if you hover over King’s (or another comped user’s) checkmark:
“This account is verified because they are subscribed to Twitter Blue and verified their phone number.”
King simply mentioned this fact with annoyance, but others have gone further and suggested it might be grounds for a lawsuit. The argument is that Twitter violated rules against false endorsement with its message — in other words, that it’s wrongly implying celebrities are paying for a service they actually despise. Over the weekend, Dril quote-tweeted a post citing Section 43(a) of the Lanham Act, a US federal law that bars connecting someone’s identity to a product in a misleading way.
