When people opened up their Twitter accounts on Monday morning, the iconic blue bird was replaced with a black “X” as the upper left desktop icon on the social media site. A hashtag for “RIPTwitter” was also trending, and users’ posts featured images of the blue bird on a tombstone.
In a four-part thread on Sunday, CEO Linda Yaccarino unveiled the new vision for X. It was soon the talk of the Twitter-sphere. Or ... maybe make that the X-sphere.
“It’s an exceptionally rare thing – in life or in business – that you get a second chance to make another big impression,” Yaccarino wrote. “Twitter made one massive impression and changed the way we communicate. Now, X will go further, transforming the global town square.”
Billionaire Elon Musk, who bought Twitter last year for about $44 billion, has made a number of changes to Twitter. He’s killed the former verification system in favor of paid verification. And many of these moves have angered longtime Twitter users.
Now Musk wants to turn what was Twitter into an “everything app,” adding e-commerce features and multimedia powered by artificial intelligence, according to Yaccarino’s post.
Still, in true Twitter fashion, people across the site flocked to its forum to weigh in on the update. Posts criticizing the announcement were common, and those that saw it favorably were harder to find.
The quotes and replies on Yaccarino’s announcement were rife with “X”-related jokes and criticism of yet another company announcement that moves the site beyond its traditional functions. Anthony Michael Kreis, a Georgia State University law professor, posted a “New Coke” advertisement as a quote to a Musk tweet showing the new “X” logo beamed on the company’s headquarters building.
“It’s probably the worst rebranding since Coke messed up in ‘85 with that ‘New Coke’ stuff,” Kreis told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “Nobody asked for ‘New Coke,’ and nobody asked for new Twitter.”
The Twitter rebrand also got “Sears Tower” trending. The famed Chicago tower now known as Willis Tower, was originally the home of Sears and Chicagoans haven’t let go of the original name.
A Twitter user with the handle @jackfromacworth asked: “You guys that are on Facebook do you call it Meta? Those of you in the Chicago area, do you still call this building the Sears Tower?”
Dan Wolken, an Atlanta-based sports columnist for USA Today, quoted Yaccarino’s announcement with displeasure about the site’s innovation, expressing that most users want to use the site’s typical conversational functions.
“Nobody wants to go further, Linda,” Wolken said in the tweet. “We just wanted to read and send Tweets. You guys don’t seem to get this.”
Kreis, while critical of the rebrand, said he will keep using the platform as long as the site retains the ability to participate in online discussions. Moves to Meta’s Threads and online discussion platform Bluesky have not been as fulfilling as Twitter at its best, Kreis said.
He also expects himself and many others to ignore the rebrand and keep referring to the site with its traditional name. In other words, he will still be “tweeting.”
“I don’t think on a day-to-basis it will change how I use it, or how I think about it, or how I refer to it,” Kreis said, “and I think there a lot of people that are going to be in very similar positions.”
About the Author
