KEY POINTS
- Twitter CEO Elon Musk “laughed” at a meme suggesting that Mark Zuckerberg is copying him
- Meta’s paid service would cost $11.99 for web users and $14.99 for mobile users
- Zuckerberg said the paid service would allow users get “extra protection” against impersonators
Twitter CEO Elon Musk “laughed” at Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, for introducing a paid subscription service for users to receive a verified blue badge.
On his Twitter account, Musk replied with a laughing emoji to a meme posted by a user that implies that Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg is copying his fellow billionaire’s idea of a paid verification subscription service.
In a separate tweet, Musk said Meta’s decision to roll out a service similar to Twitter Blue was “inevitable.”
On Sunday, Meta announced that it is testing a monthly subscription service called Meta Verified, which would allow its Facebook and Instagram users to receive a blue badge.
Reuters reported that the subscription would cost $11.99 per month on the web and $14.99 per month for iOS and Android users.
Zuckerberg said the new product would provide “extra protection” against account impersonation.
“[It’s] a subscription service that lets you verify your account with a government ID, get a blue badge, get extra impersonation protection against accounts claiming to be you, and get direct access to customer support. This new feature is about increasing authenticity and security across our services,” Zuckerberg said on his personal Facebook account.
The Meta CEO also announced that the product will be launched in Australia and New Zealand this week.
But some users railed at Zuckerberg’s announcement, arguing that they should not have to pay to get their profiles verified.
Zuckerberg replied to one such user’s comment, explaining that verifying accounts and providing customer support for billions of Facebook and Instagram users cost his company a “significant amount of money.”
“[V]erifying government IDs and providing direct access to customer support for millions or billions of people costs a significant amount of money. Subscription fees will cover this and will also pace how many people sign up so we’ll be able to ensure quality as we scale,” Zuckerberg said.
Meta is the latest social media company to introduce a paid subscription service after Twitter, Snapchat, Telegram and other apps launched their own.
Last year, following his $44 billion takeover of Twitter, Musk said its users could get the prized blue check mark by subscribing to Twitter Blue, which costs $8 per month.
Like Zuckerberg, Musk was also criticized for his plan, but he defended it by saying it would “democratize journalism [and] empower the voice of the people.”
But users’ criticism of Twitter Blue persisted as the social media platform announced that it would remove two-factor authentication (2FA) using text messages from those who do not subscribe to the service.
According to its press release Wednesday, Twitter said non-Twitter Blue users would have until March 20 to deactivate 2FA on their profiles or subscribe to the paid service.
Musk’s company argued that its decision stemmed from the “bad actors” abusing the authentication system, CBS News reported.
