Parody accounts would soon have to change their profile photos and username, according to X's new rules that would be implemented on April 10.

Based on the new rules, all parody, commentary, and fan accounts (PCF) would have to add identifiers like "Parody", "Fake", "Fan", or "commentary" at the start of their display names to make it visible to the viewers that they are parody accounts to ensure they do not cause any confusion for others or incorrectly imply any affiliations.

This is an amendment to the current policy, which dictates that parody accounts has to include the world parody at the end of the user name. But these "titles" often gets cuts off when the name is truncated in the feed display, leading to confusion.

So putting it in the front would not only ensure that the label would still be visible, it also ensures greater transparency and clarity in the app.

Last November, it was also leaked that Twitter was working on a Parody label that would be attached to these parody accounts for viewers to better identify them. Additionally, these accounts would have to change their profile picture as they would be banned from using identical profile pictures to the individuals or entities they are mimicking.

This regulation comes in light of the rise of social media scams, where bad actors often impersonate celebrities in an attempt to trick people into scams or amplifying their contents. Just recently, there was a user who posed as Elon Musk and asked users to like a comment for a chance to win a Tesla. That Post has been interacted with a hundreds of thousands times.

One of X's many troubles

But all these implementations would not be necessary if Musk had just kept his original verification process, and only given blue checkmarks to official, human-verified accounts, which then ensured that impersonators and parody profiles stood out.

But for some unknown reason, Musk reformed that platform and announced later that he would be selling these checkmarks to all users because everybody wanted one.

But by selling it to anyone, the credibility of the blue tick is immediately nullified as any one would be able to buy the badge and it would lose its purpose of signalling those accounts with relative authority or importance.

While Twitter’s old verification system had its flaws—such as inconsistent standards across regions—it was still more reliable than the current approach. Since Elon Musk’s X team introduced the new system, they’ve been forced to repeatedly tweak it to curb ongoing misuse and public confusion.

X is also struggling to get people to pay for their premium service. Currently, X Premium has around 1.3 million subscribers, and that's even with the lure of advanced access to its Grok AI chatbot and other features. 1.3 million amounts to a mere 0.22% of X's recently claimed 600 million monthly actives, signifying that only a fraction of X's user base has felt any compulsion to pay up.

But the 1.3 million subscribers is still a relevant revenue stream for the platform.