Elon Musk: Twitter owner responds to blue tick complaints

Mr Musk made similar declarations in a recent tweet.

“Twitter will not allow anyone who was de-platformed for violating Twitter rules back on platform until we have a clear process for doing so, which will take at least a few more weeks”

It is unclear whether any changes to the Twitter platform are a result of Mr Musk so far.

Mr Musk has said banned users will not be reinstated until after a review by a “content moderation council”.

Employees and users are waiting to hear more from Mr Musk about his plans for the platform, amid concerns over his support for loosening content moderation and reversing permanent bans on controversial accounts.

Mr Musk’s latest comment appears to mean no immediate return to Twitter for several high-profile and polarising figures who had been previously banned, including former US president Donald Trump.

Writing on Twitter, Mr Musk said: “Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints.

“No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes.”

Mark Finchem, a conspiracy theorist and election denier running on the Republican ticket for Arizona secretary of state, has credited his return to Twitter to Elon Musk.

“WHOA. Arizona Secretary of State candidate @RealMarkFinchem was suspended on Twitter. @elonmusk this shouldn’t happen a week before the election!” former Trump lawyer Jenna Ellis tweeted on Monday night.

Mr Musk responded that he was “looking into it”.

Mr Finchem’s account was soon back online later on Monday night.

“We are back!” he wrote. “Thank you Elon Musk for stopping the commie who suspended me a week before the election. Twitter is much better with you at the helm.”

Mr Finchem has rejected the fact that former President Donald Trump lost the 2020 election, and he has become famous for his support for baseless conspiracy theories, even more so than many other pro-Trump Republicans, according to The Daily Beast.

If Mr Finchem wins the race for Arizona Secretary of State, he will have extensive power over elections in one of the key states in Mr Biden’s 2020 victory.

Shortly before he won his August primary, Mr Finchem was recorded falsely claiming that former Vice President Mike Pence had orchestrated a “coup” to remove Mr Trump from power. He also accused Mr Pence of planning to “steal” the presidency in the next election in 2024.

Elon Musk could also potentially revive Vine, the short-form video app that was bought and then shut down by Twitter.

Twitter engineers are working on a reboot of the app, which could be released by the end of the year, Axios reports.

Some Twitter employees have already been assigned to look at Vine’s old code base, which hasn’t been changed or updated since it closed in 2016. “It needs a lot of work”, one employee reportedly said.

Vine, which published short, six-second long videos, was shut down by Twitter in 2016 because it did not have enough users and did not make enough money. Platforms like Instagram and Snapchat introduced longer video clips, and some big creators began negotiating for payment for posting, while also sharing videos less frequently.

Twitter explored selling the app, but never found a buyer. It also mulled introducing it into the main Twitter app, but did not.

Twitter’s safety board should also have ‘people from all viewpoints’, Mr Musk said in another tweet.

He was replying to a conservative commentator currently calling for the firing of Twitter’s current head of safety, who tweeted that Mr Musk had “paid a massive price to free this platform from Marxist goblins.”

Elon Musk has said he wants “Twitter [to be] the most accurate source of information on Earth, without regard to political affiliation.”

He made the comments in reply to a screenshot of a White House tweet, which said that senior citizens would be receiving larger social security cheques. A box underneath, where users provide context to tweets, said this was due to inflation.

Mr Musk also replied to a tweet stating that expanded verification was to tackle “bots, fake, and ‘keyboard warrior’ accounts.” Mr Musk replied: “Exactly”.

Twitter is also seemingly pushing forward with a paywalled video feature that could launch as soon as this month.

It would let people post videos and charge users to view them, with the company taking a cut of the proceeds, the Washington Post reports.

“When a creator composes a tweet with a video, the creator can enable the paywall once a video has been added to the tweet”, an internal email apparently states. Users can choose from a preset list of prices, such as $1, $2, $5 or $10.

However, there are concerns that users could use the tool to share copyrighted material or to scam others. Twitter employees have “identified the risk as high,” according to the email, which was sent by an employee on Twitter’s “Product Trust” team.

The email cites “risks related to copyrighted content, creator/user trust issues, and legal compliance”. The feature will undergo an internal review on those issues before launching – however that review could be as short as three days.

The price of dogecoin has surged by more than 50 per cent since the weekend amid speculation that the cryptocurrency will be integrated with Twitter.

Newly-appointed Twitter chief executive Elon Musk tweeted a picture of a Shiba Inu dog – used as the logo for the meme-inspired cryptocurrency – wearing a T-shirt with the Twitter logo, together with a winky face emoji.

When asked by one of his followers if he was “working on a doge solution for Twitter or working with devs for a doge payment system on Twitter”, Mr Musk replied the sideways-looking eyes emoji.

Elon Musk’s net worth has dropped by about $9bn since his takeover of Twitter, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.

The Tesla titan’s fortune is down to $204bn, about a quarter of his worth before the beginning of this year.

The decline in Mr Musk’s net worth can also be attributed to the fall in shares of Tesla, which has dropped by 43 per cent since the beginning of this year.

Mr Musk had to sell over $15bn in Tesla stock to finance his Twitter acquisition.

Reports had previously indicated that Mr Musk was planning to charge $20 per month for the subscription to Twitter Blue, but was rebuked by author Stephen King.

“$20 a month to keep my blue check? Fuck that, they should pay me. If that gets instituted, I’m gone like Enron,” Mr King wrote.

Mr Musk esponded that the change was an attempt to generate revenue, and that it would help reduce rather than encourage spam. He appeared to confirm that the change was coming, insisting that he would explain it before it is introduced.

He also began to barter with the author about how much the monthly charge should be for the verification process.

“We need to pay the bills somehow! Twitter cannot rely entirely on advertisers. How about $8?” he wrote.

“I will explain the rationale in longer form before this is implemented. It is the only way to defeat the bots & trolls.”

Twitter launched verification in 2009, with the aim of easily showing official accounts and combatting a run of impersonators.

The company has never been entirely clear about how it sees the blue tick that marks verification: though it claims that it should not be seen as an endorsement from Twitter, it has removed it from some accounts in the past.