X Corp., formerly Twitter Inc., announced today that if users so choose, they can hide what they might now feel are their embarrassing checkmarks.

Twitter Blue, which was originally launched before Elon Musk took over Twitter as an ad-free service with some other paid-for inducements, supplanted Twitter’s verification badge altogether once Musk got his feet under the table and started wondering how his company would make money.

Previously, the badge of honor was given to people deserving of it – famous or popular – but Musk started charging $8 a month. It’s free for people with 1 million or more subscribers.

Now anyone could wear the badge on their page, but as an $84-a-year service, it lost a certain amount of esteem. In one court, there was the argument that the checkmark had previously been somewhat discriminatory, but having a mark that hasn’t been earned came with a spoonful of shame, so much so that users started being bullied for their acquisition.

X made that right today, stating that the new-sounding X Blue can be hidden from people’s accounts as part of the provided features. Twitter said that even if they do that, there’s no guarantee the mark will not appear somewhere, adding that some features may also be lost for covering up their subscription status.

Besides seeing fewer ads, having editing abilities, being able to delete embarrassing posts and joining a prioritized ranking queue, the service also gives paid users the opportunity to write a short story on their page. X increased the character limit to 25,000 while also allowing paid users to post videos up to three hours long. At the same time, Musk has said he will limit the number of direct messages that nonpaying users can send.

X’s long road to profitability is now one with many twists and turns, and though the service remains popular, it’s now in a battle with very similar platforms. Just recently, Meta Platforms Inc. Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg, who’s currently being played as a kind of nemesis to Musk, launched Threads, Meta’s version of Twitter. Even more recently, the embattled TikTok announced its new text-only feature.

Today Musk wrote on X that it will also offer a better deal to creators, which means he will have to talk to Apple Inc. about its 30% App Store commission.

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