Verification

Are you absolutely certain you wish to be an asshole?
Published November 10th, 2020; Last Updated October 21st, 2021

So this is how it ends.

In my quest to write in a way that pleases every human being who reads it, I've struggled with two apparently-incompatible extremes: the reality of how I want to express myself, and the unspoken social demand from strangers that I write the things that they want to read, in the exact way that would please them, and only them.

I could quote somebody famous here, but I'm honestly tired. I'm tired, and done. I would rather please myself than please any human being. So I'm going to put this in the exact way that I want it to be put.

If you've struggled with the same demands, I want you to realize that these people don't know you. They just want something from you. They want you to tell them what they want to hear, in a way that benefits only them. That is, of course, not how any of this works. No one is a tool; and I especially am not going to be used like one. So if you find this article difficult to extract information from, that is entirely by design.

The fact of the matter is, for the vast majority of my life, I've been doing things for other people. And I've been doing them at the detriment of myself. Now is the time for me to write for my own sake; and not for the sake of brevity.

This article is about me. It's about my adventure. It's about what I learned, and how I learned it.

It's a few hours before October 21st, 2021. My birthday. I turn 35 today. And, years prior, I told my father that I would eventually get Verified on Twitter. Having been in the news so much, I thought it would just be an eventuality. I thought, at the time, that it would be a fun thing to brag about. Dad's been dead for about four years now. It's one of those things I never accomplished in his lifetime.

I had the desire to get Verified on pretty much every social platform because of how my name has been drug through the mud. I don't really feel any sort of pain or sorrow about the entire process: journalists are shitheads, and they prey on whomever they think is vulnerable. So the fact that a few of them tried to claim that I was a terrorist, and then quickly redacted and/or covered up what they had done to me, I'm not surprised. Moreover, I'm kind of amused. However, if I'm going to be made (in)famous by force, I also required that I was given all the trappings of such a status. Unfortunately, when it comes to that meaningless little checkmark, everybody who guards it is not going to give it to me.

On one of the days I was thinking about why I wanted it so bad, I remembered a story. This is the story of why I pursued in.

When I was in preschool, I loved stickers. They'd give these things out, 3 of a kind: green star stickers; red star stickers; and gold star stickers. Sometimes, silver. I didn't like those at all, due to an incident in which the teacher had been short with me, while giving me one. I'm a synesthete, and it painted the meaning of the silver star sticker as being the same as that very feeling. A silver star meant pain.

Like checkmarks, none of the stickers really meant anything: the ladies there at the school just wanted to make the children happy. None of the stickers were any better than the others. There were no meanings; and, in fact, when I inquired what the meanings were, the teachers launched into polling the entire 'classroom', who tried to sort out what the possible meanings could be. There were no real meanings, fo course. The entire process confused me. Meaning, as associated by committee? Of ignorant people who really had no idea what they meant in the first place, just guessing? Perish the thought.

One day, this guy that worked there, this adult that nobody trusted, a guy that the ladies kept trying to keep away from the kids, he picked up a basket of stickers— the stickers were in this wicker handbasket— and, he started passing out the stickers, around. But to only white kids.

I wasn't white.

At the time, I already knew what racism was. I had experienced it enough that I knew what its main feature was: exclusion. There was no real defense, nor offense, against it.

My mother's advice of confronting racism directly, and politely asking for the things I deserved, and was entitled to, in theory, would have worked in a perfect world. At the very least, it got me the few things that I wasn't receiving due to an accident, or being forgotten about. Because, sometimes, it wasn't racism. Sometimes, maybe someone just forgot about me.

Lots of people forgot about me. When I was a kid, and the power went out, our house always seemed to be the last one to have its power restored. When other kids had high-speed Internet, I was still dealing with dialup. To paraphrase Bane— to make you laugh— I didn't see speeds of over 300 kilobytes per second until I was already a man. By then, it was too late: the Internet was shit, and it was like driving a fast car in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. All dressed up, with no place to go.

Sometimes, it wasn't racism. Well, in this case, it was. He called me a nigger, to my face. I think his exact words were, "I don't give presents/nice things to niggers."

He, of course, was instantly fired. Amusingly, I still remember, photographically, the way that my 'home-room'(?) teacher gasped. I think the word had more of an emotional effect on her, a nice white lady, than it had on me, a mixed black and white child. Still, the incident left an impression on me. That impression was, I had to pursue everything that I wanted. Because, there were going to be people like him, out there, in the World. And I had to confront them.

Or else, I'd never get my precious stickers.

30+ years down the line, I can tell you that confronting racism, and politely asking for what you are owed, has never worked for me. I was given only what racists did not want. I have been treated like shit by most every person in power. I would be bitter, if I hadn't recently mentally detached from all of this.

In any case, that's why trying to get Verified once meant so much to me. Because, it was my sticker. It was the last attempt of mine to be recognized, rightfully. They had dragged my name through the mud; I was merely asking them to confirm the receipt of the infamy they so callously tried to deliver unto me.

I'm not going to get my sticker.

Not ever.

It is, of course, a bygone conclusion. By that, I mean— were I to open up all my social media, right now, and see a checkmark bestowed unto me, I wouldn't even feel anything. It's over. It's been like 7 years. It's too late to feel happy about such a thing. Because I know that it's meaningless. I know, in my heart, that it doesn't mean anything. And, it's just too late.

If there's one thing I want to articulate, it's this: I got fucked. Without a doubt, I got fucked. I was accused of things that no one should be accused of. Once, while trying to help suicidal people, a journalist implied that I was trying to murder them. By tweeting out a suicide hotline, they implied, or actually accused me, of trying to jam those phone lines. When I talked to them about it, they removed that part of their article so fast and stayed so mum about the entire thing that I think they were genuinely terrified of being sued for defamation.

I don't sue. I have no interest in the legal system.

I just wanted human beings to be nice to me.

I wasn't trying to hurt people. I was trying to rescue them. I was trying to help them. And, despite everything— despite regularly being punished for trying to help people— I thought that, if I kept on doing that, kept on doing what my heart told me was right, that I would eventually stop being hurt for it. That never happened. Journalists tried to fucking bury me, for helping people.

Over the course of my life, I've built up tough mental shielding. I often claim that things do not hurt me; but that's just because I do not want to be hurt any further. Showing emotional pain is like a drop of blood in the water Humanity swims in. I don't want any of these monsters smelling it.

So I will admit this, here and now. Helping people and being repeatedly punished for it by people with power, hurt me. It hurt me, deeply, emotionally. That is the reality of it. They hurt me, and there will never be any legal repercussions for what they did to me.

Three people in academia either misgendered me, or wrote entire scientific papers on whether or not I have a dick. Okay?

That's just a small taste of what these motherfucking humans did to me, this time.

I know very well why they did it. They were unscrupulous, and they wanted to hurt the people I was trying to protect. I saw people getting bullied, and I worked my hardest to protect them. And for that, I was so often made a target. They tried to bring me down, because they saw me as being a bulwark.

And I was.

Lots of people have hurt me, and pretended that they were righteous in doing so. But there was no righteousness in these people's actions. They hurt me either because it was easy, and they needed a victim; or because it pleased them.

When I protected people, I did so selflessly. For decades, I've done such a thing. But, as time goes on, and my emotional wounds accumulate, I've longed for some form of recognition. Mostly, I wanted people to see the good in me. But, nobody in power really ever did.

In the end, I wanted to be Verified because I wanted to feel some form of acceptance, by people in power. I wanted the fact that I was helping, to be acknowledged. And I wanted some form of amelioration, for how I've been hurt.

I'm never going to get it. No matter what I do, it seems like whomever is responsible for letting people in, they are intent on keeping me out. So all these good deeds, they are going to remain both punished, and unrewarded.

It's funny how people in power will pretend that I'm the Antichrist one day. And then, the next, they'll pretend to not even remember who I am.

A lot of the time, when people say that they deserve to be Verified, there's usually this sense of entitlement. Here's my case.

I got on every single American and Canadian broadcast news network. I was mentioned on the BBC. To this day, I'm still finding news articles that mentioned me. And, at the time, Twitter's criteria was: you had news articles about you. I had mountains of news articles about me. Still, I was denied, every single time.

I got fuckin' interviewed by Vice. That's not enough?

When the rules for Verification changed, I re-applied. Under their Entertainer criteria, I qualified. I was denied, and then they changed the rules so that I no longer qualified.

To say that I'm disheartened is just the start of it. No matter what I do, it seems they're always going to deny me. And it's not because I'm not good enough, or that I haven't met the requirements: it's that, when I do fit the requirements, they either summarily deny me, with no explanation... or, they change the requirements.

Why this is, I don't know. Either somebody at Twitter hates me; or, Twitter is just plain fucked up. One of the two. Maybe even both.

As far as it stands with how Twitter regularly enforces its own rules, I've been getting impersonated on Twitter for pretty much my entire time using it. Twitter has never done anything about it. Even when I submitted the legal documentation they required, they found, multiple times, that a person who said, point-blank, 'hello, I am @icze4r', was not impersonating me. This same account has done its level best to say every horrible thing in the book. It's racist; sexist; homophobic; transphobic; and anti-semitic. And it's been claiming to be me since 2015. Twitter doesn't do shit.

I've been getting shit on for doing good things my entire life. But, before I fuck off and stop caring, I've wanted something. A final prize. One checkmark.

I know it's shit. I know that Verified users are the bane of all social media. And I know it doesn't mean anything. But I want it as a final trophy, before I go away.

Mostly, I want it as an apology.

And I know that it's not something I should be pursuing.

Verification is not the sign of a good person, or even someone worthy of being listened to. It is, in fact, quite the opposite. I've never seen such ignorant, racist, sexist, misogynistic, and transphobic shit, as I've seen from Verified accounts on Twitter. So why would I ever want to stand alongside them?

I don't.

It's not that it's a symbol of prestige. It's that it's something they'll never let me have, even though I met all the requirements for it.

It's the sticker that the racist guy refused to give me.

I can try to justify my desire for it. It's visceral. It's a desire bordering on psychological need. I want some token that shows me that this wasn't all for nothing. I want something to make me feel better. And that's exactly what it is.

I want it because I got shit on, a lot. Other people went through what I did; but they never tried to help people. And they have the 'mark. Why not me?

Twitter can verify rapists; people who have harassed children; actual neo-nazis. The worst people in the whole damn world. And I can be impersonated, and messed with, and fucked over, all they want. But they'll never give me the honors that they've given to these horrible people.

Do you have to be a horrible person, in order to be Verified?

It seems like it.

No matter what I've done, I've always gotten fucked. When I stood up against the administrator of a Sailor Moon community who was grooming kids, boom; I got banned, and ostracized.

That's happened a lot, actually. Every time I've ever protected kids online, I've gotten fucked. Like, when I used to play World of Warcraft? I actually had multiple GMs come up to me, and threaten to permaban me. Why? Because I kept reporting pedophiles who were grooming kids.

No good deed goes unpunished.

It sucks for me, because— this entire crusade was born out of my desire to be loved. To be appreciated. For people to know that I was not a bad person.

And I never really got that.

It means that the company finds you useful. That's all it means. Twitter originally came up with Verification because someone got impersonated on the service. So, at some fucking point, it actually had something to do with authenticity. You can see a lot of examples of this, early on. Best I can tell, it was a way for Twitter to cover their ass, legally.

As it stands right now, though, the company seems to be using it as a way to increase profits. They seek out accounts that they think people will want to follow, so that they can drive more engagement to the website. By Verifying these people, they give the people an incentive to use the service. Make someone feel special; they're usually going to want to cooperate with you, more than they otherwise might want to.

Twitter claims that Verification is a lot of things. It's just a way to drive people to the service. It also serves as a carrot-on-a-stick for people who will never, ever get Verified, to continue using the service, especially on their best behavior. Twitter has long pretended that, if you just try hard enough, and you're on your best behavior, you might just be eligible! But mostly this is bullshit.

Good people don't seem to get Verified. At least, not at all at the rate bad people do. This is because bad people generate 'controversy'; and 'controversy' generates views. And anything that brings new eyes to the platform, good or bad, allows Twitter to sell ads.

This means, in general, that bad people get Verified. Because bad people being Verified on the platform generates a lot of anger; and angry people spend more time on the website.

This is why Nazis get Verified.

Twitter also claims that it's not an endorsement, but I think that's mostly just legalese. Legally, an endorsement is something a lot different from tacit approval. 'Endorsement' in the colloquial, layperson sense is synonymous with the concept of tacit approval. It's obvious that Twitter tacitly approves of bad people on their platform, simply because it Verifies the worst of them.

To be Verified on the service means that Twitter thinks you'll make them ad money. That's all it currently is. It's a business arrangement, and you're working for free.

Getting Verified is pretty simple. If you fit the requirements, they just let you in. It's currently why, as of this writing (October 21st, 2021), there are myriad Verification scams currently running. Twitter desperately wants eSports people bringing eyes to their platform; so, they're just verifying anyone who's even tangentially eSports. This has resulted in people hijacking Verified accounts, changing the names, and pretending to be eSports accounts. These people then use the Verified eSports account as a reference on their application; and, they've gotten Verified this way. Granted, many of them are currently being deVerified, because they got caught— but. You know there are people who never got caught.

As for me, I've been Verified on several websites, simply because I fit their criteria flawlessly. It's also why I will probably never be Verified on other websites: I'm just not the sort of person that they want around.

I was Verified on Vid.me because they were nice, but also because they believed that I (c/w)ould bring people over to the service, from YouTube. They were wrong, just like everybody else who's Verified me, but the people running Vid.me were nice to me. So, it's more kind of sad that I couldn't really do much for them. For the record, though, I did try. As much as I could in my state of grief.

I was Verified on Pornhub because I satisfied their ID requirements. That's all they needed. Why?

Because what Pornhub desires the most is people that they can legally, positively identify. So they hand the badge out as a 'reward.' It doesn't even mean anything; but, just like a sticker to a child, it has that allure.

I'm Verified on Amazon because they Verify based on raw engagement numbers (to the best of my knowledge, gleaned through experimentation). What this means, is, if you have ~300,000 monthly views on all your tweets, their machine is just going to Verify you. It's automatic. Instantaneous, when you're applying.

Amazon, bless their soul, thinks that having that sort of engagement, means that you can move product. I am the world's worst salesman.

I am also a gay space communist.

I'm Verified on Google because Google is desperate, and thirsts for celebrities to claim their Google Knowledge Panels. Their Verification criterion is so loose that people often get their panels claimed by other people. Google doesn't give a shit: it just wants to make it easy for people to claim them, because the Knowledge Panel project is— and this is just what I think, I have absolutely no evidence that this is the case— it's Google's mini-project to make Wikipedia completely irrelevant. It's already eating away at Wikipedia's numbers, using Wikipedia's own data against them. Funny as Hell. Fuck Wikipedia.

Getting Verified on Google is fun and easy, and I've written a guide to it. You can also Google "Jason Barnard": he's the expert on this. It's fun and easy because Google's desperation has made it possible to generate Knowledge Panels from as little as just the same statement across social media accounts... oh, and, you know. A WikiData dataset on you /coughs

This, however, raises a great point: the more-desperate the service, the easier it is to get Verified on it.

Take Instagram, for example. Probably the hardest place to get Verified on, simply because its Verification Request system was, until quite recently, absolutely a black box. Instagram doesn't fucking like you. Instagram doesn't like anyone. And it doesn't need you, or anyone. So it makes Verification hard.

... compare this to ASKfm, which, surprisingly, still exists, and you'll see how the 'desperation' angle, works. ASKfm will Verify you if you use the service for six months, consistently, without calling anyone a slur. That's how low the bar is. And it also lets you know what they want. Verification is just an incentive to get you to do what they want. And what they want, mostly, is to be profitable.

Google's desperation once spurred them to make it easy to get Verified on YouTube, by getting Verified on Google+. See? They wanted people to use Google+... so they dangled two checkmarks, in front of you.

As it stands, right now, they're desperate for their Knowledge Panel experiment to work. So, all you need to do is flash a selfie with your ID, and they'll accept you. It's kind of sad, really. (And the Interface is bare as fuck, when you get in.) It also doesn't help that you never really have any real 'direct' control over the information displayed. You can suggest that things be changed; but, you can never add anything. They still have all the power.

YouTube's a little bit different, these days. Because, with Google+ gone, nobody's getting Verified through any tricks. In the olden days, it might've been easy to get Verified by being impersonated (a trick that still sometimes works on Twitter); but, now, they don't care. They don't even give it out consistently to people who fulfill the only requirement: have 100,000 subscribers. And why?

Because YouTube is so big, it doesn't need you. In fact, it fucking hates you. (Probably.)

Pinterest is an interesting thing to study. Pinterest verifies people who post images of clothes, and model them, themselves. Anyone who provides Pinterest with original, fashion-related content, is bound to get Verified. Because that's what Pinterest thinks— quite accurately, I might add— allows it to thrive.

Pinterest is probably one of the easiest to get Verified at. I know this because I talked to a few very kind women there, who were incredibly helpful, and basically gave me the most information I've ever received from any such service. If you should ever have about a million views a month on Pinterest, I'd suggest you just send in a request to get Verified. Ask for the Red Checkmark. They'll probably give it to you. The bar's actually way lower, but I don't know what the actual minimum is.

I'm transcribing this article from a handwritten version, and I just want to say that the sentence, written in all-caps, "ASKFM VERIFIES ANYONE WILLING TO USE IT FOR 6 MONTHS STRAIGHT", is some of the funniest shit ever.

Moving on: we all have some outliers, in every business. Here, it's social media services that either will never work out, or have been in decline for some time. I won't be listing things like MySpace, because MySpace is cool.

Let's talk about GIPHY. GIPHY is just a place that hosts GIFs. They have a Verification program, and, they want to verify major content providers, and artists. Basically, gigantic media conglomerations, and artists. They just want to fill their content catalog, though I don't know for what. If you're not some super-famous artist or a media company like the BBC, I wouldn't even try. Even if you were, just what the fuck is the BBC getting out of this? It's weird.

Then we have the many, many failed social media derivatives/clones. The one I want to talk about is Player.me, because, I asked them, should I apply? You think this would work? And somebody said, 'yes. Apply!' And I did. And they looked at me, and went, 'nah.'

That shit hurt. But, seeing them fail, that's kind of funny.

In any case, Player.me seemed to want to Verify well-known streamers— y'know, gamers. That worked out well for them.

Twitch, god bless them, has the best Verification standards I've ever seen. They tell you, in black and white, exactly what they're looking for. The process is entirely performance-based. I love it, and I respect it. Study their system: they reveal the baseline standards that every other social media platform has. You'll learn a lot, and be able to apply it to any other service that ever comes out.

Instagram, on the other hand, is a motherfucker. It is a son of a bitch. God damn it.

Instagram verifies celebrities. That's the best way I can put it. However, just like with Facebook, special, registered agents, of a sort, can submit Verification Requests for you. And, from what I've seen, you will get Verified. They're called Media Partners. For Twitter, some richie-rich fucks I overheard, they said that you can just submit a request through a third-party. So there's probably something similar for Twitter, as well.

But let's assume you're not a richie-rich fuck, because, otherwise, you wouldn't be reading this, probably. And let's assume that you want to get Verified on Facebook, or Twitter.

In the olden days, Twitter wanted musicians. So they verified anybody who'd ever even looked at a musical instrument— and these accounts stayed verified, even after the bands fucked off and died. On Facebook, it's kind of simlar: if you can play guitar, and you've released a song, you can probably get Verified.

For Facebook, in general, for the checkmark, you need to be a journalist, a musician, a grifter, a Neo-Nazi, or the most-boring asshole I've ever seen. You cannot be a good person. For example: right now, as of this writing, Elvira has 1.1 million followers on Facebook. She is not Verified there.

This is a joke orphaned from a page revision, but I still want to say it: if you're a neo-nazi, check Facebook right now. You probably already have seven fucking checkmarks.

All this having been said, review what I just said. You will now quite easily notice, the main thread of how to get Verified. If you haven't, I'll spell it out for you:

To get Verified on any service, you must either be extremely valuable to them, and/or, you have to be their bitch.

There's no gettin' around this. It's either/or. If you are who they want with the checkmark, you will get the checkmark. This process is completely willful: it's not like fucking fungus, growing in the woods. It doesn't just happen. Somebody has to flick a switch.

That being said, the most-reliable way you can get Verified, is to just be a journalist.

I wouldn't recommend that. That'd be like running around barefoot in a fucking flooded sewer, making martinis with other people's bathwater. Only use your own.

When it comes to Facebook and Instagram, they're a bit mysterious. But Twitter ain't no black box. Twitter's just fucking stupid. And Twitter wants none other than the worst of all the shit disturbers and piss perturbers, imaginable. You know why? Because it drives new eyes to ads. People who are mad, spend more time on the Internet, than people who are happy. (Thought I'd say glad, right? Right.)

This is why the algorithm constantly pushes up the worst of all content. This is why Twitter is Hell. This is why Twitter doesn't do anything when about a worldwide-trending news story about a mentally ill person raping their mother. Twitter doesn't give a shit. Twitter hates your guts. It wants you to fucking feel pain. In the form of anger.

In the past week alone, every single person who's trended on Twitter, has been a bad person. The worst as of late has been a lady who said, perhaps in 'jest', that she burnt her child's Pokemon cards as a way to punish him for not eating. This is what Twitter wants trending. They could stop it any time. But they don't; because angry people equal ad revenue.

This is why Twitter Verifies bad people. This is why checkmarks are bad people. Twitter needs the worst fucking people they can get, because the worst fucking people they can get, piss everybody off, and keep people using the webzone. That's the trick. Joker's Trick.

Bad people get Verified on Twitter because bad people make everybody mad. And Twitter runs on mad. Because Twitter is Hell.

Find out what the service wants. Either become it, or position yourself as someone who can carry out the duties of such a position. You will be working for free. It's fairly easy to get Verified this way: all you need to do is sell your soul. And maybe suck one dog dick. But the jury's still out on that!

We don't know the actual number of dog dicks necessary.

To be Verified on Twitter, first, become a journalist. This is the easiest way, as tons of Verified publications (an essential feature, in the newest Verification Request form update) are always hiring. Online journalism pays like shit, if it ever pays. So, do that, and write a few bylines; then, submit. They'll almost-always accept ya. If they don't, try again: it's a sure thing within 1-3 tries, if you're a journalist. This works for Facebook as well, I think; probably, just one try necessary there, though.

To be Verified on Facebook, spend $5 on ads, each month, for 6 months. This apparently 'sweetens' your chances. Remember: any page or profile you Verify, has to have accompanying documentation wherein the name on said documentation matches your page or your profile— EXACTLY. They're sticklers for this. Right pricks and cunts, really. And it means that, if you're trans, unless the place you live is real nice to ya, you're not gonna have the documentation that Facebook requires. Sucks~!

Alternatively, find, or become a Facebook Media Partner. They can apply on your behalf. Here's a guide. That contains all that you'll ever need to know about this stupid bullshit, over there. Okay? Okay. Works on both Facebook and Instagram!

YouTube has already been discussed. There are no 'tricks' that I am aware of. Formerly, you could easily be Verified through Google+, and it just transferred over to your YouTube account. But, that's all over. (Still sad I never figured out how to do it, until it was too late.)

That's it.

A Sticker I Shouldn't Want, but Can't Have

En generale, you don't want to be Verified. You think you do, but, you don't. The 'community' of Verified accounts is always going to suck, because you're never going to have anything in common, with these twats. And Verified people tend to follow each other. And eat each other.

I've been questing after Verification for years and years, and, no matter where I get Verified, it always means nothing. Everybody involved always made it seem like it was something really special; like it was something you should really want. It was marketed like beer and cigarettes. It's just as disappointing, because, it's always fucking nothing.

As someone who has tried to drink themselves to death, and has tried probably every drug on the planet? Yeah. Don't do that, kids. There's nothing I ever got out of any drug that was actually worth shit. Alcohol and tobacco especially are just... absolute dog shit.

Verification is something that needs to be seen as being attractive. Otherwise, it has no function. Because, most of the time, being Verified garners you absolutely no rewards, nor even advantages.

On Twitter, your prize for getting Verified is that you get more visibility— which means, more people yelling at you. As if this wasn't bad enough, you'll also soon have tons and tons of Verified cocksuckers following you. Is that what you want? That's not what I want.

I wanted this, so bad. And I still do. And, probably, I always will. Just like I wanted to be made Moderator like Hostbot on Arcadium, I wanted to be special. I wanted human beings to consider me to be special. I didn't want them to just say I was bad all the time. I wanted to be celebrated. Just, one more time.

The reality is, I may probably never be celebrated again like I was on Arcadium. And, I need to focus on MILFs and GILFs. Specifically, being held and kissed by one.

Maybe put some red, green, and gold stickers on my face.