With questions regarding who owns the X symbol, Elon Musk replaced the Twitter bluebird in a rebranding move. (Source: Adobe Stock)

Musk Swaps Twitter Bird for X in Rebranding Move, Without Adding New Services

Well, he has done it again. Elon Musk, known for many hats and many ideas, has taken a step that puzzles many analysts in changing the distinctive blue bird logo of the social media company Twitter to a stylized X.

As part of its ongoing “rebranding,” the original @Twitter handle is gone. Use it, and you’ll get the message, “This account is no longer active. Follow @x for updates.” According to analysts in a story on benzinga.com, the move will cost the company billions in brand value.

Perhaps you might be thinking, what the heck, Elon? Musk acquired Twitter on October 27, 2022, and soon after, he took charge as the CEO, replacing the then-CEO Parag Agrawal. Then things began to fall apart. Musk has tried just about everything to make Twitter continue to be successful. Nothing has worked. Just five months after buying Twitter these headlines appeared:

The company’s value has dropped more than half in the last few months, down from $44 billion to $20 billion, which Musk possibly never wanted. But it is what it is, and Twitter is now worth $20 billion, despite cutting thousands of jobs, selling office furniture, laying off janitors, or introducing the Blue subscription, and so on.

Paying for The @X

An article from techcrunch.com pointed out a problem with X—it was owned by someone else. TechCrunch previously reported that Twitter hadn’t contacted the original owner of the @X handle—Gene X Hwang of corporate photography and videography studio Orange Photography. However, later Hwang tweeted “All well that ends well” from his new handle @x1234567998765. It appears that he sold the handle to Twitter.

Twitter Bird Making Its X-it

According to TechCrunch:

Twitter rebranding hasn’t gone smoothly as several parts of the site still carry the Twitter branding and moniker — including the mobile apps. Over the last few days, Multiple reports noted that Microsoft owns an X trademark since 2003 related to Xbox and Meta owns a federal trademark since 2019 covering a blue-and-white letter “X.” Trademark attorney Josh Gerben told Reuters there’s a 100% chance that the Musk-owned social network will be sued by somebody over the X rebranding.”

Since then, the company took down the Twitter sign in front of the San Francisco headquarters. It seems a safe bet that rebranding will continue. Even the office employees are removing the bluebird knickknacks from their desks.

read more at techcrunch.com