> Nobody is going to pay for something that is no longer a status symbol because it can simply be bought
Tell that to all the luxury brands that make low-end products for everyone now. This is extremely naive. There is a price point where the blue checkmark will sell like wildfire, and then it's basically free money because there's no operational cost associated to it.
Let's say 5$/year for some kind of BS "verification" process that gives you a blue checkmark? Free money! Want to spend 20$/year for "extra-secure verification" to get a gold checkmark? FREE MONEY...
It most definitely does not, in the eyes of enough people to still be valuable. They will purchase the appearance of exclusivity, even if it's not actually that exclusive.
Of course there will be a minority of people who understand (and deride) the fake-exclusivity, but not enough for the blue checkmark to lose enough value.
‘Just charge for the check mark’ seems quite likely to fail in the ways your interlocutor alludes. Moreover, this particular status symbol is explicitly not a marker of wealth, but rather of a more nebulous type of status.
it is obviously worth testing and requiring a small payment is a good way of verifying they are a real person (not a bot).
> Nobody is going to pay for something that is no longer a status symbol because it can simply be bought
2. make "twitter blue" actually valuable (e.g. detailed analytics on your followers, tools for composing threads, actually monetizing revue)
> Or just give people these metrics because if they care about them they probably care about creating quality and engaging content and seeing how well it performs.
3. payments
> Perhaps - but for what? I don't see myself going to Twitter, let alone to find something to buy and then pay for it using Twitter-dollars or whatever they dream up.