| Hi everyone, it's Aisha in San Francisco. Twitter's blue check mark has gone from a symbol of credibility to proof of membership in the Elon fan club. But first… Help us make this newsletter better by filling out this survey Today's must-reads: • Rents doubled in India's tech hub
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• Activision Blizzard will settle US esports claims Twitter Inc.'s blue check mark used to be an internet status symbol, a sign that you were someone important and your voice mattered. It also helped distinguish the identities of celebrities, politicians and other public figures from trolls and fraudsters. Chief Twit Elon Musk has long been vocal about his disdain for this system he inherited. In the past, he called it both corrupt and unequal because it separated elites from regular Twitter users. When Musk bought Twitter back in October, he vowed to make the platform a bastion of free speech and equality by, among other things, allowing anyone to get a check. Instead, Musk has just created more confusion by blurring legacy and Twitter Blue check marks and announcing a series of arbitrary changes, including ones that would boost the tweets of people who pay over those who don't. He has also been removing legacy check marks of accounts he doesn't like (such as the New York Times). Now that Musk is charging people $8 for the privilege of a check, it has become more like a calling card than the symbol of credibility it used to be. To some, the main thing the check now signifies is where you stand on the political spectrum and in particular, how much you love Musk himself. "I fly the blue checkmark not for status, but to support Elon Musk and the Twitter platform," wrote one conservative user who calls themself the Tesla Cowboy. Other conservative tweeters have suggested going to extreme lengths to support Musk, supposedly using US Social Security checks to pay the $8 or forgoing student loan payments. "I paid for it, and I can't afford to get water at my house," wrote one user named Starfigher General. At the other end of the spectrum are people who refuse to pay because they don't want to support the world's second-richest person and the polarizing issues that — in their minds, at least — he has come to represent. "I won't give Elon or any friend of fascists a dime for a blue check mark. Having one now will mark you like a scarlet letter," wrote Bruno Amato, an actor in the TV series Yellowstone. Over the weekend Twitter made yet another change to the blue check, so that it's no longer apparent whether someone paid for their status. As a result, several Twitter users whose identities had been verified under the old system asked Musk to remove their check marks so it won't look like they support him. "This is awful. Musk has now set this up such that a person might mistakenly believe I signed up for Twitter Blue," wrote Matthew Yglesias, who pens a popular Substack newsletter and a column for Bloomberg Opinion. "Is it possible to get myself de-verified so people won't think this?" Musk vowed to make Twitter a more equal place for everyone, but by removing a robust verification process, he has instead allowed a surge of misinformation, impersonation and confusion. In this new age of Twitter, blue checks no longer represent credibility and status but who and what you stand for, said Rick Smith, the host of a political podcast and a Never Musker. "It's like the MAGA hat for Twitter." —Aisha Counts The Biden administration's anti-hacking "dream team" was undone by internal strife. Meta is impressing Wall Street, with analysts turning more bullish as they applaud cost cuts and stabilizing advertising trends.
The price of Dogecoin rose as much as 30% after Twitter adopted the dog meme as its logo on the website. YouTube will livestream all six of Coachella's festival stages during this year's event. Wall Street banks will lose more than $1.3 billion on the sale of ultra-risky debt tied to the leveraged buyout of Citrix. Watch: The founder of a startup called DeepAI explained in a TV interview on Bloomberg Technology why he signed the petition calling for a pause on AI development. Ubisoft will close some European sales offices as part of a cost-cutting plan at the video game publisher. Walmart.com got a new look. It's modeled in part on the stores, which emphasize seasonal products and new sales trends. | 
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