Buyable verification inverted Twitter’s trust function toward right-wing content

Evidence

Musk purchased Twitter for $44 billion in 2022 and soon embarked on a deliberate campaign to destroy the platform as a home to liberal discourse. He stripped celebrities and media figures of their verified “blue-check” status and allowed anyone to buy verification for eight dollars a month. This worked against the original goal of promoting verified information from trusted sources. Over time, the platform’s algorithms instead began amplifying conspiracy theories and right-wing content. — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 704