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Elon Musk has finally outlined his plans to charge verified Twitter users to keep their blue tick.
There were initial reports of the monthly fee being as high as $20 a month, however the tech billionaire has revised that down to just $8.
Musk believes having a payment system for a verification badge is the only way to 'beat the bots and trolls'.
He's outlined there will be several benefits for users with the blue tick who agree to fork out a couple of bucks a month.
Those benefits include 'priority in replies, mentions and search, which is essential to defeat spam/scam', ability to post long video & audio, 'half as many ads', and 'paywall bypass for publishers willing to work with us'.
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Musk said this new payment system will give Twitter 'a revenue stream to reward content creators'.
He wrote: "Twitter’s current lords & peasants system for who has or doesn’t have a blue checkmark is b******t."
"Power to the people! Blue for $8/month. Price adjusted by country proportionate to purchasing power parity."
However, his bold plan to charge users for that beautiful blue tick could backfire on him as people who already have the verification badge say they won't pay for it.
Entrepreneur Jason Calacanis posted a poll to ask people if they would fork out for a blue tick and the overwhelming majority said no.
The options he gave were $5, $10 or $15 a month or simply wouldn’t pay.
Musk replied: "Interesting."
The Twitter owner also weighed into a debate with iconic author Stephen King, who has 6.9 million followers on Twitter, when there were reports of the blue tick badge costing $20.
King tweeted: "$20 a month to keep my blue check? F**k that, they should pay me. If that gets instituted, I’m gone like Enron [an American company that ceased operations in 2007]."
Musk responded: "We need to pay the bills somehow! Twitter cannot rely entirely on advertisers. How about $8?"
King stated: "It ain't the money, it's the principal of the thing."
There are about 400,000 verified Twitter users currently on the platform as of 2021.
After completing his $44 billion (£38 billion) takeover of the platform last week, Musk’s first few days as the new Twitter boss has been action-packed.
He became the sole director of the social media giant after dissolving the entire company board.
The Independent reported on a new filing which shows that all nine of Twitter's board members have gone, leaving the tech investor as the sole person at the top.
The filing, made public on Monday (31 October), indicates that all of Twitter's board have been shown the door as part of Musk's company takeover.
Rachel Lang