Apparently all you need to do to get verified on Twitter is be Warren Buffet.

The influential Chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway joined Twitter yesterday afternoon, sent out a single tweet, and already has the coveted blue check mark next to his Twitter handle.

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If so, did you notice anything funny with your profile picture today? Though we think the issue verified users were facing is pretty funny, we’re guessing Twitter (and the folks affected) probably weren’t laughing.

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For now, this will only work for verified users, unfortunately. But it’s a start!
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• Customisation of your business profile page
• Adding a “verified account” badge to your profile
• Extra preferences, including being able to receive direct messages from customers that you are not following
• Account management tools that will allow multiple employees to easily tweet from one profile (and be credited accordingly)

The part in bold is pretty huge. This allows companies to appease customers by allowing two-way, private communication, whilst also maintaining a clean Twitter feed, something that hasn’t been possible before. Prior to this toolkit, brands were forced to either follow everybody back, and suffer the consequences, or they (rightly) put their focus on signal-over-noise, and risked crapping all over any future sales.

Once Business Center goes live, expect a ton of mass-unfollowing from corporate accounts.

It’s unclear how this verification process works, but one imagines (and hopes) that it won’t be as simple as ticking a box.

As said, this toolkit is slowly rolling out, and is highly unlikely to appear on everybody’s screen, with the focus very much on additional functionality for brands, not individuals.

Still, if you’re a business user on Twitter – and, perhaps more importantly, Twitter is aware of this – keep an eye on your inbox for updates.

(See more at Mashable.)

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(Note: the user who wants to be verified needs to be logged in to Twitter before completing that application form.)

Read the small print here. You can track all the latest verified users here.

We’re starting with well-known accounts that have had problems with impersonation or identity confusion. (For example, well-known artists, athletes, actors, public officials, and public agencies). We may verify more accounts in the future, but because of the cost and time required, we’re only testing this feature with a small set of folks for the time being. As the test progresses we may be able to expand this test to more accounts over the next several months.

This is all still in beta, and it’s worth noting that your odds of being verified aren’t exactly high. I know of several well-known, high-profile Twitter celebrities whose applications were completely ignored.

Also note that once verified, if you change your profile information your account will become unverified, and you’ll lose the badge and have to re-apply. I wonder which genius created that template.

Still, the perks are enormous. Free coffee, unlimited tweets per month, and 24/7 access to Biz Stone via your own personal Twitter mobile phone. Allegedly.

Good luck.

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The experiment will begin with public officials, public agencies, famous artists, athletes, and other well known individuals at risk of impersonation. We hope to verify more accounts in the future but due to the resources required, verification will begin only with a small set.

Please note that this doesn’t mean accounts without a verification seal are fake–the vast majority of Twitter accounts are not impersonators. Another way to determine authenticity is to check the official web site of the person for a link back to their Twitter account.

Already, a lot of celebrities have been given the seal of approval, including Ashton Kutcher, Shaquille O’Neal, Marvel’s @Agent_M, MC Hammer, Oprah Winfrey and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Some businesses, brands and organisations have also been given the early nod, including The Whitehouse. It’s clearly a work in progress, as a lot of names you’d expect to have been verified very quickly – like, say Al Gore – have not, while a few surprising ones have made the early cut.

Curiously, @mashable has been verified, while @Techcrunch has not. Somewhere, Mike Arrington is seriously pissed.

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