> Regardless of your opinion on Elon, I don't see the issue

The issue with the false notations that people are subscribers (whether its dead celebrities, live celebrities, organizations, or whatever—the specific example of the many Twitter has done in this rollout doesn’t matter) is false endorsement, which aside from being deceptive and unethical is a violation of federal law (the Lanham Act.)

There’s additional issues that come from the fact these are, for organizations (gold check), bypassing verification as well as payment, but the false endorsement one is the most general issue. Bypassing verification isn’t aj issue with Blue largely because Blue verification is meaningless.

Except they've made a big deal out of letting everyone know that verification isn't a thing anymore. (EDIT: or actually, by now it is a thing again, but not with a blue checkmark, but a golden one. So this is even more clearly pretending that the account pays for blue, not it being verified!)

Twitter is explicitly communicating that dead celebrities have actively subscribed (paid $8/month) and verified a phone number, which is just inaccurate. At the least, they should have just left the legacy copy, because this is tasteless.

I'm not convinced this is tasteless - dead celebrities may still have people that manage their affairs and accounts, and they could have subscribed. I know that doesn't cover all cases, but I think the journalism of this article is at least poor and doesn't consider all cases.

It feels ghoulish because it doesnt read as something done for their memory but something done using their memory.

This makes sense in isolation, but the way that Elon has approached managing Twitter has turned the verified status into a symbol of allegiance with one side or another. So now being verified doesn't just communicate something about your account, but about your political ideology and whether you agree with Elon's decisions or not. It's this aspect that's a bit of an ethical hot potato here.

I'm not confident about the entire statement you're making. Paying $8 does not equate to agreeing with Elon or what side of politics you sit, paying $8 only equates to whether or not you want a blue "verified" checkmark.

I really hate this culture of "cancel person X" and if you use anything "person X" has made, your a racist/bigot/whatever.

This whole blue check politic statement you are making is a strawman.

Like it or not, Musk has worked hard at tying Twitter to his personal brand since he took over. Consider that Twitter has no PR department outside of Elon himself. It's not as closely tied as something like Tesla, but still if you don't like Elon or his politics you're less likely to pay for verification. This means that the checkmark now has an associated political/social connotation. No it's not 100%, but it's there.

Edit: This applies in reverse as well. There are definitely fans/admirers of Elon who subscribed immediately as a show of support. But I admit all of this is anecdata, I don't have numbers on how widespread it is.

The checkmark means "paid $8", not "verified".

It means “verified” but only to the extent of “verified a phone number”, per the info provided when clicking on Blue checkmark account.

Of course, in addition to being meaningless, that’s also false in the case of the involuntary Blue accounts. But the absence of verification is a bigger deal with the involuntary gold checks.

Is that a "real" problem, though? Like does that blue checkmark actually change how you use twitter? Have all the historic "verified" accounts become invalidated and fake based on the blue checkmark being tied to the account?