Chipzel, one of the most well-known chiptune artists (and video game composers) on the planet, is among several high-profile users who have had their Twitter account suspended after apparently breaking, but not breaking, some new rules. Musk, who bought the social media platform despite not knowing what to do with it, how to run it or be able to afford it, began his tenure last month by celebrating the return of free speech, quickly reminding anyone that the people who defend “free speech” the loudest rarely care about that. One of the big reasons why his brief reign proved so unpopular—along with mass (probably illegal) layoffs, uncertainty about paid membership fees, and just general Divorced Guy screw-ups—was his promised overhaul of Twitter’s verification process, which grants public figures (and those in impersonation-filled lines of work such as journalism) a small blue tick next to their names. It’s a tiny little thing designed to simply let the masses know that you are in fact the person you claim to be, but for the sake of brainworms, the Free Speech and MAGA freaks have spent years obsessing over them, highlighting an administrative feature in what they believe is a discriminatory, digital caste system. As such, one of Musk’s first orders of business as Twitter owner was to float the idea of replacing the current verification process – one where Twitter manually verifies with your people/company that it’s actually you – with…a system where anyone can pay $8 for a blue tick (a move that has since been delayed until after the US midterm elections). G/O Media may receive a commission Because this is an incredibly stupid (and dangerous!) idea, many verified users have spent the last few days changing their usernames and profile pictures to the same ones Musk himself uses, in clear and obvious examples of what’s to come in global scale if the verification process is revised in this way. Musk, in over his head and having spent the last few days chirping like a substitute teacher who missed class, has tried to end this practice – just a taste of what’s to come! – earlier today when he said “Moving forward, anyone on Twitter who engages in impersonation without clearly identifying the ‘spoof’ will be permanently suspended.” Popular Australian satire site The Chaser appeared to be one of the victims of these new guidelines, as their account was locked shortly after changing their name to resemble Musk’s, despite clearly following this rule and pointing out their account as a parody (also they didn’t even change their name to ‘Elon Musk’, they changed it to ‘Elom Musk’). However, their account has since been reinstated, under the new name ‘Elon Musk Fondles Dogs’: They are not alone. Chipzel, who is not only a huge chiptune artist but has also done the soundtracks for games like Super Hexagon and Dicey Dungeons, found his own account suspended today after earlier changing his name to “🌈elon musk” parody”, which he does again. not to break the rule as stated by Musk himself. UPDATE 11:59 p.m. – Chipzel’s account has been somewhat restored, although this warning page appears before viewers can access her feed: Screenshot: Twitter What they both seem to be breaking is a different rule he hastily introduced soon after, which incredibly seeks to prevent verified users from changing their display name (tweets will always display two names, a display name that you can edit and your real Twitter username, which I can’t). In a subsequent Tweet, he says “Any name change will cause a temporary loss of the verified mark,” which given how often people do this — for everything from sporting events to Halloween to the holiday season — is incredible funny: Former NFL player (and Kotaku commenter) Chris Kluwe is another verified user who has been suspended, having also changed his profile picture and display name to match Musk’s (along with tweeting some nasty things about the Tesla cars). This is a pretty hefty rule just to try and stop people making fun of you on the internet! If only Twitter had some sort of verification process in place that could easily tell which accounts were real and which were fake. Ah well! It’s strange that all of these accounts were locked down completely, instead of temporarily losing their verification, as he clearly said, but with half the Twitter staff fired and the other half burned in intense, I guess, confusion, hasty policy decisions, not knowing what hare idea you were suspended for and the billionaires are shouting “I am not property! I am not property!!” will be the norm for the foreseeable future. I’ve reached out to Twitter for clarification on which rule the affected accounts broke and will let you know if they ever find out and get back to me. UPDATE 2, 1:25am ET Nov. 7: Here’s a notice another verified user received detailing the ways his account information violated Twitter’s new rules and the steps needed to lift his suspension (basically delete his profile Elon photo and name):
