When part-time supervillain and the man experiencing the worst post-divorce, mid-life crisis of all time announced, on Twitter, that he would be rebranding the platform, reactions were mixed — between horror and hilarity. Overwhelmingly, the response was negative.
On Sunday night, Musk tweeted: “And soon, we shall bid adieu to the Twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds.” Less than half an hour later, he was brainstorming new names and logos. Within 24 hours, the company had started removing Twitter branding from its offices.
The social media company formerly known as Twitter will henceforth be known – by people who care what Elon Musk wants them to call his rapidly collapsing website – simply as the letter X.
The iconic white bird on a blue background has gone, to be replaced with an ‘art deco’ styling of an ‘X’, taken directly from the Unicode font for the letter. There will be no more tweets, there will be Xs. Retweets have become re-Xs. You can no longer be ‘following’ an account, you can be ‘X-ing’ it.
“Not sure what subtle clues gave it way, but I like the letter X,” Musk wrote in another tweet on Sunday night.
Virtually all of his business and personal dealings have capped X-related branding at some point. In 2000, he tried to rebrand his company PayPal as ‘X’, but was forced out by the board and replaced as CEO. His space-exploration company is called SpaceX and one of the most popular cars manufactured by his electric vehicle company is the Model X. He even named one of the ten children he has ‘X Æ A-12’.
Many are claiming that if Musk buying Twitter, for USD$44 billion not 12 months ago, was the beginning of the end for the social media platform, that this latest bizarre move is surely the halfway point.
On the site, users have rebelled against the name change. Here are the best handpicked organic reactions we’ve sourced.
https://twitter.com/MarkHamill/status/1683203272147087362
https://twitter.com/maxdubler/status/1683513841207103490
https://twitter.com/TheCartelDel/status/1682994638024736770
https://twitter.com/tweetsbyparker/status/1683571984754704384
https://twitter.com/kxlider/status/1683436498006478848
https://twitter.com/sesamestreet/status/1683508159942467584
https://twitter.com/StephLoffredo/status/1683471793623818240
https://twitter.com/Ghetsuhm/status/1683316788921249793
https://twitter.com/ChaoticScoot/status/1683566437653262339
https://twitter.com/RonniSalt/status/1683418278365114369
https://twitter.com/David_Leavitt/status/1683488393022304262
Related: Elon Musk Is Actually Stepping Down As Twitter’s CEO — Meet His Top Replacement
Related: As Elon Musk Logs on as the New Boss of Twitter, Thousands Are Logging Off For Good
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