Mark Cuban Lectures Elon Musk

The owner of Twitter 2.0 has just launched a purge on the platform, by removing the checkmarks from personalities who refuse to pay.

This is the fight of the titans.

The headline pits Mark Cuban against Elon Musk, two tech entrepreneurs and billionaires.

The former is one of the most revered and admired investors and personalities. He is the big star of the hit TV show "Shark Tank," a show that features entrepreneurs looking for investors to expand their businesses. 

He is also the owner of the Dallas Mavericks NBA franchise.

The latter needs no introductions. He has become the most influential and powerful CEO in recent months. His name has almost become synonymous to innovation. Elon Musk stands for electric vehicles through Tesla  (TSLA) - Get Free Report, the electric vehicle manufacturer of which he is the co-founder and CEO. Musk also stands for new space conquest through SpaceX, the company he founded.

He has also become, in recent months, the most critical voice of artificial intelligence, for which he calls to be regulated.

Musk and Cuban are also household names.

'Save-a-Celebrity Fund'

But since Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, considered the town square of our time, the two billionaires seem to be in a constant clash. Musk decided to revamp Twitter in order to find new revenue streams. One of his key actions was to incorporate the check mark, which verifies the identity behind an account, into Blue, the platform's subscription service. Blue costs $7.99 per month for individuals and $1,000 for organizations.

Prior to Musk’s takeover of Twitter, the check mark was free and was an honor given to celebrities, journalists, influencers, politicians and well-known organizations who used it for promotion. The advantage was that the public could trust messages posted by accounts with a check mark. By making it a paid feature, Musk decided that everyone had to pay or lose it.

After giving everyone several months to comply with the new policy, on April 20 Musk began to remove the blue badge from those who had not yet paid their subscription. This action provoked mockery, jokes and strong criticism from the celebrities impacted. Musk retaliated by announcing, ironically, that he was setting up a fund to help celebrities unable to pay.

"We’ve started a 'save-a-celebrity fund' to pay their $8. We take this matter very seriously," the billionaire posted on April 21.

"LOL! Actually I think this could be a solution, even though I'm not sure if you are serious," journalist Ed Krassenstein commented.

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