ANAHEIM, Calif. — As Twitter begins to roll out its new subscription-based verification model, Orange County cities, police and government organizations grapple with whether to pay the steep monthly price.
For many Orange County cities, Twitter is an essential communication channel for residents and the public.
For example, every day in Anaheim, city officials post public service announcements of upcoming severe weather, street sweeping reminders or cancellations, and messages from the mayor to its nearly 20,000 followers on Twitter.
Meanwhile, the Anaheim police department’s Twitter account, which has 36,000 followers, shares silver, adult, and missing children alerts, road closures, photos of criminal suspects and emergency information.
Both accounts have blue check marks next to its name, meaning they are verified. The check mark gives a sense of credibility and that the city truly owns the account.
“We value Twitter and will continue to use the platform,” said Mike Lyster, an Anaheim spokesman to Spectrum News. “We use Twitter to share timely information with our community, including on real-time events.”
However, come April 1, those blue verified check marks are going away unless those users — individuals, nonprofits, businesses and government organizations — cough up some dough.
Twitter, founded in 2006, is a social media company that allows users to quickly and succinctly message one another initially with a 280-character limit. The character limit has since gone up.
As Twitter grew and became more popular - and misinformation more prominent - the social media company introduced a free blue check mark to delineate and verify its celebrities, politicians, public figures, government organizations, and media reporters and personalities.
A blue check mark next to an account gave that user and readers a sense of authenticity, accuracy and reliability that the message came from the account holder.
But that was a free service under a different owner.
Starting April 1, Twitter will begin winding down its former verification system or blue check mark next to the handler’s name in favor of a paid subscription to the social media’s new Verified Organizations program.
Under the program, a verified business or nonprofit will receive a gold checkmark and a square avatar. Government or multilateral organizations receive a grey checkmark and circular avatar.
The subscription-based service will cost the business or organization at least $1,000 a month, and affiliate accounts would be an additional $50 a month. Individual or blue check marks can be had under the Twitter Blue subscription for $8 on the web or $11 on IOS.
The change comes several months after SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk, the so-called Chief Twit, purchased Twitter for $44 billion. Since acquiring the social media channel in October, Musk has made sweeping changes, including laying off staff, ending remote work, and developing ways to make Twitter profitable.
The subscription-based checkmark model is Musk's attempt to generate new revenue from what was a free service.
"We need to pay the bills somehow!" Tweeted Musk when he rolled out the idea in October. "Twitter cannot rely entirely on advertisers."
The initial rollout was a disaster. For $8, imposters and pranksters created fake accounts of real people and spread misinformation.
Musk paused the initial rollout and has supposedly tweaked the program since with April 1 as the new target date.
With the date approaching, several Orange County cities and government organizations are struggling with the decision to pay $1,000-a-month to have a verified account on the social media platform.
Many city officials are concerned about impostors and scammers creating government accounts and spreading misinformation under the guise of a “verified” paid check mark.
“We have questions about payment, rather than qualification, being the basis of verified organization status and want to see how this plays out,” said Anaheim spokesman Lyster. “In the past, a verified account helped provide authenticity for city and other official accounts. Going forward, it is unclear whether it will hold the same significance with a subscription service.”
“We continue to evaluate the situation and have not made a final decision,” he added.
Other Orange County cities shared Lyster's sentiment.
“We understand the concerns voiced below and are monitoring this development closely,” wrote Kristina Perrigoue, an Irvine public information officer, in an email to Spectrum News. Irvine has over 85,000 followers between the city and the police department’s official Twitter accounts.
Newport Beach Public Information Manager John Pope said the city, which has 12,000 followers, is also aware of the impending changes to Twitter.
“I’m aware of it, but at this point, we haven’t made a decision yet,” said Pope.
Others were unaware of the upcoming changes.
In Costa Mesa, the spokesperson said the city, police and fire departments had not received any notice from Twitter about the changes. Combined they have more than 29,000 followers.
“Until we receive something official from Twitter, we won’t be making any statements,” said Costa Mesa Public Information Officer Tony Dodero.
While those cities grapple with whether to keep their verified status, at least one Orange County city, Santa Ana, isn’t stressing about the situation.
The city of Santa Ana and its police department, which have more than 6,800 and over 24,000 followers, respectively, don’t have a verified check mark next to their name but continue to post daily public service announcements to its residents.
“We don’t actually have a blue check verification on our official city of Santa Ana Twitter account and it’s never been an issue, so it’s unlikely that we would pay for it now,” said Santa Ana PIO Paul Eakins to Spectrum News. “Frankly, we get much more community engagement on Facebook, Instagram and Nextdoor.”