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Twitter has officially changed its logo to ‘X’

• dotcoma 3y ago
  A case study in brandicide.
  • quickthrower2 3y ago
    This is much worse that the blandification of the Slack logo. Actually the X logo itself is good on it's own terms. And would be great for a newcomer startup, but not for Twitter. Twitter is the household name. This looks like a midlife crisis.
    • dotcoma 3y ago
      Agree. Not to mention that we speak of "tweets" and "retweets", not "mini-posts on Twitter" and "shares on Twitter"...
    • DonHopkins 3y ago
      Blandification? More like Penisification and Swastikafication in one swoop.
      • quickthrower2 3y ago
        Honestly the first time I saw it (I saw it in the app before it was announced) my reaction was "I don't use Python... what is this??"
    • guax 3y ago
      wouldn't this logo be not trademarkable since its a mathematical symbol?
  • pessimizer 3y ago
    The conversation about it is a case study in bikeshedding.
  • js8 3y ago
    You mean that rebranding to X is a kiss of death?
    • dotcoma 3y ago
      Not necessarily. But they certainly are throwing away the Twitter brand.
• DamonHD 3y ago
  So I am removing all the obsolete bird icons (with links) from my site... Not that Elon will exactly be quaking in his boots, but the search engines will notice me and others doing the same. Death by a billion hyperlink cuts!
  • DamonHD 3y ago
    The birds are purged! B^>
• matsemann 3y ago
  Twitter has managed to get so many words to be common. Like it's a "tweet", not "a post on facebook". It's a "retweet" or "quote tweet", not "something I shared on facebook". Why throw all this deep brand recognition away? It's like people say "google it", and google suddenly changing the name of their search.
  • ekianjo 3y ago
    when a word becomes too common it risks losing its trademark though
    • oxfordmale 3y ago
      Good luck trade marking X
      • mcintyre1994 3y ago
        Or the logo, which is a unicode character: 𝕏 https://www.compart.com/en/unicode/U+1D54F https://www.compart.com/en/unicode/U+1D54F
      • xdennis 3y ago
        You would be surprised how accommodating US trademarks are, like how you can't make pink insulation because it's "owned" by Owens Corning.
      • panopticon 3y ago
        Ohio State University trademarked the "THE" in certain contexts: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/ohio-state-university-officially-wins-trademark-word-federal-governmen-rcna34857 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/ohio-state-university-o...
    • oplaadpunt 3y ago
      Thats's only when applied to things outide twitter, which I don't think it's the case. I have never heard anyone talk about retweeting on facebook or whatever. The fact they don't do this would make their brand even more valuable
• varispeed 3y ago
  > The company’s CEO Linda Yaccarino tweeted that while Twitter changed the way people conversed with each other, X will go further and will have features “centered in [...] payment/banking” Good luck with that. I was permanently banned from Twitter for reporting Russian terrorist content. If you fancy being locked out of your money for apparently a thought crime, then X (or rather Z) is for you, comrades.
  • explain 3y ago
    > If you fancy being locked out of your money for apparently a thought crime, then X is for you The entire banking system is for you*
    • orwin 3y ago
      It's really hard to be blocked from your money by the entire banking system. In my country, at worst you're banned from credit and investment, which is really not cool (cannot use checks, only have debit cards, no saving account trying to keep up with inflation...), but in the end you don't have to sue to get your money back. It's quite different from payment apps (my father used PayPal once to collect a 7k payment, spent 3k in lawyer fees to get the money).
• andrewstuart 3y ago
  I’ve been assured that Musk is a business genius , so just have confidence folks.
• sschueller 3y ago
  This man is burning anything that had any value at Twitter. From an extremely valuable list of verified users to the name which is even used as a verb. There is absolutely no reason to rename Twitter. The name isn't even that stained compared to like Comcast or what ever the name was of that phone company in the 90s that sucked so bad it was renamed.
  • reisse 3y ago
    > From an extremely valuable list of verified users Was it extremely valuable? I know a lot of people (myself included) viewed blue checkmarks as a "company PR account/mass-media journalist/celebrity account maintained by SMM" sign. The most interesting people I followed on Twitter were not verified.
    • 3cats-in-a-coat 3y ago
      A verified account managed by PR/SMM is probably better than a scam account of the same person offering you to get rich with this one weird trick. A verified account of a newspaper is probably better than a fake one, spreading false news about the war in Ukraine, for example. Managed by PR or not, a verified account stood for the person behind this account, and guarantees this is their (proxy or direct) opinion or a real fact about upcoming event, or information about a past event. Right now a verified account means nothing.
      • kaba0 3y ago
        Obligatory mention of r/RealTwitterAccounts. The content at the time of the enshittification of verified accounts have been fantastically funny! But you are absolutely right, that trust was very important.
    • threeseed 3y ago
      Yes because on a Twitter style platform it is those core influencers that are important to the growth and health of the overall network. It is not the random guy with 100 followers, no qualifications, life experience or expertise. And the point of the original verification system was to make sure you can trust what that person is saying especially in volatile situations e.g. during a crisis where Twitter's role was so influential and important.
• simbolit 3y ago
  I initially thought buying twitter was about converting massively overvalued TSLA stock into only somewhat overvalued TWTR stock. I now think I was wrong.
  • dotcoma 3y ago
    That was my thinking, too. What do you think now ?
    • rob74 3y ago
      My (very personal and unsubstantiated) opinion is that his thinking was something along the lines of "You say I can't buy Twitter for 44 billion $ and then drive it into the ground?! Ha! Watch this!"
      • deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
    • simbolit 3y ago
      He is even stupider and has even less impulse control than I thought.
      • cubefox 3y ago
        If he was stupid, he wouldn't have so much success with both Tesla and SpaceX. Compare Jeff Bezos, who was highly successful with Amazon but not with Blue Origin. Which suggests that his success with Amazon was significantly due to luck. There are very few people who manage to create two world class companies.
        • gloryjulio 3y ago
          He can be good in certain sectors and stupid in others. If his goal is to make money with Twitter he definitely failed at it
        • 3y ago
• zgluck 3y ago
  Not X, 𝕏. (Mathematical Double-Struck Capital X, U+1D54F)
  • cubefox 3y ago
    Interesting. This raises the further question: Which Unicode characters are allowed in company names? Surely it's not just the Latin alphabet.
    • deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
• erulabs 3y ago
  You know, for all the talk about how twitter is going downhill and making stupid decisions, this is the only one so far that really, really, does seems stupid. Verification was bad and now it’s a joke, api rate limits have some possible argument etc - but why in the hell buy a household name just to change it? Why not build X from scratch?
  • dotcoma 3y ago
    I guess he wanted 400 million prospective customers for $ 100 each.
  • dooraven 3y ago
    It still has a boatload of users and is still the cultural town square of the tech world. To build X from scratch you'd have to convince people like Marc Andreessen, Paul Graham, a bunch of other VCs etc to move. Changing behaviour is very hard. You'd have to get people to install new apps, get use to new workflows etc and humans are creatures of habit so this is very hard.
    • meibo 3y ago
      My entire tech bubble moved to mastodon and it's been great. No ads, no algorithms. Maybe the VC bubble is just stuck with it because of what it used to be?
      • dooraven 3y ago
        I'm curious about the composition of your tech bubble - is it programmers / technical folk mostly? cause yeah lots have moved. The non-technical tech sphere hasn't really moved though, but maybe my circles are quite different to yours.
        • orwin 3y ago
          Infosec/cybersec. If you just want CVEs, automatic updates, and LinkedIn-style influencers, Twitter is still fine. If you want the stories, the how, the why, and reading humans live updates, you go to mastodon/Activitypub (bonus if you're a student: make your own activityPub reader!)
• dutchCourage 3y ago
  What does the path to success look like for "the everything app"? I can't picture it. So far it looks like they're acting like a FAANG in a "fake it til you make it" move to try to attract money. But not only do they not have the scale, Twitter is also losing its place as the reference app for live text updates.
  • dooraven 3y ago
    If they can replicate WeChat it might be a good outcome, since WeChat is essentially the everything app for most China Problem is that the CCP is basically intimately tied to it so WeChat has massive advantages there.
    • threeseed 3y ago
      This is what he's been envisioning since back in the PayPal days. The problem for Musk is that the US, EU, UK, AU etc are not remotely interested in a mainstream commerce platform that takes a lax approach to KYC/AML. And despite Musk's delusions the "blue tick" program is not a suitable verification foundation to build payments on top of.
    • jacquesm 3y ago
      There isn't a chance that I'll ever use something like WeChat. I keep all of those components on separate companies because I don't ever want to be tied into something that has that kind of power over my life. Having choice is far better than integration. I've switched banks 3 times over four decades, ISP more times than that, comms channels a couple of times as well (most recently due to Musk's acquisition of Twitter) and will probably do so again at least once. Tying it all together with an 'everything app' seems like a stupendously stupid move to me (from the consumers perspective). Especially with an unhinged guy like Musk at the helm.
      • Eddy_Viscosity2 3y ago
        Indeed, just hearing the stories here on HN about how people are suddenly locked out of just their gmail or other accounts without explanation or recourse is pretty good reason to not but all your eggs in one dystopian corporate basket.
• Quinzel 3y ago
  It seems like Elon Musk has a vision of creating a platform business model that encompasses all his business endeavors and more. I don’t like Twitter, nor do I like Elon Musk, but it seems clear to me that he has a strategic plan. I doubt he gives two shits about what Twitter is or was - when he bought Twitter he acquired a lot of talent, and a place to start to launch his platform - of which he envisions the world being beholden to, and he will be the king of that castle. I wouldn’t be surprised if he will have some kind of X crypto, X digital wallets, X online shops, he’ll probably even have his own X-onion sites too, for all the people who want his X branded LSD and MDMA.
  • jacquesm 3y ago
    > it seems clear to me that he has a strategic plan I highly doubt that because he originally didn't want to buy the thing in the first place. He's just making one hail Mary pass after the next to try to get it to turn a profit and failing so his last card - the one he always seems to play at some point - is to set it up for acquisition by one of his other companies to bail himself out. That may work, or it won't, in which case Twitter (sorry, 'x') may well end up taking the rest of his empire with it.
  • kolektiv 3y ago
    He did acquire a lot of talent. Then he fired the majority of it and slagged off/alienated the rest, losing most of the institutional knowledge gained over years. He then systematically torched any external goodwill with both advertisers and users, before torpedoing the brand identity which had cut through to non-tech culture. At some point, you have to just admit that he might not be playing 5D Chess, but 1D Connect Four, and he's still losing.
    • jacquesm 3y ago
      > but 1D Connect Four I think we're down to noughts and crosses. o| |o ----- x| | ----- x| |o oops...
      • Pyramus 3y ago
• ohgodplsno 3y ago
  * Spend 44 billion because of memes * Fire 90% of the workforce * Get clowned on every day on the very platform you own * Lose half of your advertising revenue because you insist on platforming fascists * Destroy any brand recognition you had, including having created a damn verb out of it * Have your puppet CEO spout some vapid shit about your new platform being all about AI * Have your logo be blatant copyright infringement of a well known typeface Eagerly awaiting Paul Graham to tell everyone how Elon is a complete genius and that he puts rockets into space, making a WeChat clone can't be this complicated. Every single one of them, clowns failing upwards
  • getmeinrn 3y ago
    "I don't think about you at all."
• hrtenc 3y ago
  On the one hand, Musk was always obsessed with X, so the change may be organic. On the other hand, a name change together with new product announcements is standard for American CEOs if they don't know what to do and have to show to their investors that they are doing something. I believe Musk has a number of Saudi investors. Let's see what he does. If he goes into streaming like with Tucker Carlson the renaming may be appropriate. Perhaps he'll buy Fox News, who knows. I have little hopes for the payment processor. I've avoided PayPal and I sure will avoid this one.
  • agubelu 3y ago
    If he goes into streaming, will the platform be called XVideos?
    • notahacker 3y ago
      As another wag put it "Cancelling my X Blue subscription before my wife sees it on my credit card statement" Something as generic is X is bad for an "everything platform", and something where lots of the existing use has specific connotations is worse
• captainmuon 3y ago
  Now that Elon no longer wants the Twitter brand, somebody please steal it, make a new "twitter" clone hosted in Kosovo so they can't take it down (cough) and we all just move there.
  • RGBCube 3y ago
    Related: https://basehost.eu/ https://basehost.eu/
  • pessimizer 3y ago
    Do you really need a brand name to tell you what to do?
    • fullshark 3y ago
      No but you need a user base for a twitter clone to be useful.
• brianbest101 3y ago
  [dead]
• lolc 3y ago
  I embrace this change! Now I might just stop impulsively clicking on links that report on the Twitter trash fire. Because now it's the X trash fire and whatever is X anyway. I remember when Facebook turned into Meta. Made it much easier to ignore them.
• akmarinov 3y ago
  What's the new name for tweets? Xosts?
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  • evanb 3y ago
    Xpositions
    • martypitt 3y ago
      This is actually really clever!
    • spiralx 3y ago
      Xpounds. And I'm sure Musk would love the puerile possibilities thereof.
  • ulrikrasmussen 3y ago
    The first thing I thought of was "eggs"
  • ricardobayes 3y ago
    "equis"
• warning26 3y ago
  Looks like the X11 logo, doesn’t it? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_Window_System https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_Window_System
  • veave 3y ago
    I mean, it's an X. There aren't many things you can do to an X to make it look unique.
  • tsavo 3y ago
    Was jokingly musing that perhaps the "brand change" is to intentionally create a dust-up with Microsoft, claiming MS needs to change the icon for Excel from the green X to something else. The intent would be to create a distraction in the news from the other chain of poor choices made around Ex-Twitter.
• simbolit 3y ago
  Elon Musk is addicted to the messaging app formerly known as Twitter. Elon Musk seems to believe everyone else is addicted to the same degree. Everything he does with twitter only makes sense to me given the assumption that all users have to stay and they can not possibly leave. How many people are like "I don't want an everything app, I just wanna read silly tweets"? This demographic apparently doesn't exist in his mind.
  • jacquesm 3y ago
    > the messaging app formerly known as Twitter. I like that. Permission to re-use?
    • simbolit 3y ago
      Lol. As if that was copyrightable. Of course, go wild.
      • replwoacause 3y ago
        Better yet, go x’ing wild
• aaron695 3y ago
  [dead]
• Y_Y 3y ago
  Mr Praline: It is an X-company! Owner: Well, it's...it's, ah...probably pining for the fjords
• HlessClaudesman 3y ago
  Twitter is dead.
  • mrweasel 3y ago
    Twitter was dying even before Musk bought it. There was no way of running Twitter profitable in a market where ad revenue is shrinking and VC founding is drying up. Forcing Musk to actually buy Twitter, at a grossly inflated price, was one of the smartest business moves in the past 10 years. I don't know, I think the rebranding is a bit silly, but I also think Twitter should have gone bankrupt years ago. Musk paid $44 billion dollars of other peoples money for what was a billion dollar company at best. Trying to turn that around probably require someone as reckless as Elon Musk. The dream of the everything app just seems to fare way. The potential early adopters shy away because it's Musk. Unless his own branding (as in "Elon Musk") is enough to get other businesses to jump onboard I don't see how it will ever get off the ground.
• cbovis 3y ago
  What a bizarre brand launch... * Primary logo in top left of web changed to X * Favicon still old Twitter logo * Search bar says "Search Twitter" * Meta title still says Twitter * Tweet terminology still in use * Footer updated to © 2023 X Corp. * Dialog for upgrading to Twitter Blue now has a blue X logo but copy refers to Twitter Blue * Communities still called Twitter Communities What's the plan here and why so inconsistent?
  • jacquesm 3y ago
    There is no plan. You're seeing management by whim.
    • sdfzguf 3y ago
      It's a calming thought, that once you have too much power, there is no one left to question you and stuff like that is the result. Fortunately there are no actual lifes of people involved here, opposing to some similar political situation of the past.
      • deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
  • gonzo41 3y ago
    I agree, its messy. But in a week, it'll all be X, and we won't care. However, I do strongly feel this is a big mistake and will act as a jarring moment for a lot of people who will not want a 'new' thing. This may be the move that spikes the platform as the relevance of X becomes less and less because now it's history is disjoint from twitter and it's relevance to current events over the last 20 years.
  • tibbydudeza 3y ago
    The team have no idea as the folks who knew how to affect the change was fired.
  • dtech 3y ago
    This feels like a lot of decisions of Musk w.r.t. Twitter have been, impulsive and hastily implemented.
• redsaber 3y ago
  I thought for a second that I click bad link earlier when the X showed up and the twitter logo turn into X.
• idleproc 3y ago
  X.com Where all the 'cross' people hang out.
• martypitt 3y ago
  Meanwhile, the x.com domain seems to be somewhat shambolic. As I write this, it hits a Godaddy parking page. According to this[0] tweet[1], it's been a Godaddy site, a dead link, a redirect, and now a godaddy site again. Shambles. [0] https://twitter.com/rothschildmd/status/1683289016723202050 https://twitter.com/rothschildmd/status/1683289016723202050 [1] No, I'm not calling them X's. That name is saved for those who broke my heart, made me cry, and left me binge watching Notting Hill.
  • dools 3y ago
    It's going to the Wikipedia page about x.com for me. EDIT: oh wait my browser did that. X.com now goes to Twitter. So now a sizeable portion of people who try to go to x.com is going to go to the Wikipedia page for x.com I guess. Also the Twitter sign-in page says "X - Sign into Twitter".
  • bee_rider 3y ago
    X.org seems to have taken some damage just by proximity.
  • domh 3y ago
    From my computer when going to x.com I get an http:// http:// only site that has a blue background but has no content. If I try to go to https:// https:// I get "Secure Connection Failed". My phone is showing the godaddy parking page, wonder why it's not working on my computer.
  • NelsonMinar 3y ago
    The rollout has been embarrassing. Well maybe not, if you work at Twitter these days you probably are past being embarrassed by technical failures. When they manage to serve a redirect instead of a free GoDaddy domain parking page, the redirect was to ".twitter.com". Complete with broken leading dot.
    • sanderjd 3y ago
      I honestly believe that Musk is doing this stuff himself.
• tibbydudeza 3y ago
  Imagine if Google rebranded it's core product to Alphabet Search :).
• ronnykylin 3y ago
  Bye Bye Birdie
• tibbydudeza 3y ago
  The CEO latest tweets is hilarious - never read so much word salad in my life. It makes that hippy WeWork CEO look like a genius. X is the future state of unlimited interactivity – centered in audio, video, messaging, payments/banking – creating a global marketplace for ideas, goods, services, and opportunities. Powered by AI, X will connect us all in ways we’re just beginning to imagine. SoftBank - time to double down !!!!.
  • zzbzq 3y ago
    Kendall Roy energy
  • giantrobot 3y ago
    I love that the company is "centered" on a bunch of separate areas. It's like someone really wanted to disrespect the definition of the word "centered".
• jjkaczor 3y ago
  If only there was a common phrase that could describe this change, hmmmm - perhaps something like: "Rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic"
  • Outright0133 3y ago
    [dead]
• pavlov 3y ago
  I don’t really see what Musk is trying to accomplish. Everything he’s done to Twitter carries the foul stench of Death by Private Equity. No product improvements, but worse reliability, more spam, and a weird desperate-looking rebrand. This is what it looks like when inept MBAs try to squeeze some more life out of a dying platform. The strange thing here is that Musk’s acquisition was supposed to be the exact opposite. He’s not beholden to private equity masters. He’s supposed to be a product genius. He was supposed to bankroll exciting new ventures. Instead it’s kind of like MySpace meets SourceForge.
  • brtkdotse 3y ago
    It’s not a popular opinion on this site, and I’m probably going to be savagely downvoted, but whatever talent Musk had for business was eroded at least a decade ago by him surrounding himself with ego-stroking yes men. He drank his own cool aid.
    • deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    • xena 3y ago
      I don't think he had any talent, he just got lucky and companies insulated themselves from him. With Twitter we're seeing what happens when companies don't insulate themselves from him.
      • coldtea 3y ago
        >he just got lucky Several times? Oscar Wilde wrote: “To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness.” Something of the kind, with an opposite sign, could be said for repeated business success. And in this case it's more than 2 times, and not just some small successess either. Isn't it more like "He's idiosyncratic and often erratic and/or has political views I don't like" that people translate to an absurd "he has no business talent"?
        • 3y ago
• tgv 3y ago
  It's not pining, it's passed on! This bird is no more! It has ceased to be! It's expired and gone to meet its maker! This is a late bird! It's a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! If you hadn't nailed it to the perch, it would be pushing up the daisies! It's run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible! This is an x-bird!
  • actionfromafar 3y ago
    Your train of thoughts run with great speed!
  • mellosouls 3y ago
    Rebranding rue.
  • nickelcitymario 3y ago
    No no he's not dead, he's, he's restin'! Remarkable bird, the X, idn'it, ay? Beautiful plumage!
    • dathinab 3y ago
      duno, pretty much everyone I know on twitter is like "I don't feel like using it anymore." and only stays around due to the remainder of the network effect and the fundamental issue of transferring followers to another platform being hard. and that it's a pretty bad branding doesn't help either, I don't want to eX my friends, imagine saying to your spouse you want to eX them etc. and I mean people often act stupid but it has limits and if you first go around claiming you will buy twitter to protect free speech and then aX anything which tried to protect free speech in twitter from the inside and have way higher censorship numbers people might wonder if buying X products will aX them and their values and their health at some point. That he aXt anyone believing him to be a serious reliable person due to his public appearances probably won't help either.
      • nickelcitymario 3y ago
        Just to clarify, I was simply playing along with the reference to Monty Python's Parrot Sketch. I'm in no way defending X or Musk.
• dools 3y ago
  Can't wait to X about this and re-X other people's X's too. Maybe I'll sub-X or quote-X a few too. Looking forward also to the news outlets having to talk about famous people and politicians having X'd about a topic on X.
  • awb 3y ago
    It’ll probably go back to the generic “posted”, “re-posted”, “quoted”, etc.
• AndyMcConachie 3y ago
  The rumour is that Musk will soon be renaming it to Wayland...
  • aquova 3y ago
    That rebranding will have some benefits, but won't really be viable for the general user until 2037.
  • DonHopkins 3y ago
    https://donhopkins.medium.com/the-x-windows-disaster-128d398ebd47 https://donhopkins.medium.com/the-x-windows-disaster-128d398... Official Notice Post Immediately X x X x X x X x X x X x X Dangerous Virus! First, a little history. The X window system escaped from Project Athena at MIT where it was being held in isolation. When notified, MIT stated publicly that “MIT assumes no responsibility…”. This is a very disturbing statement. It then infiltrated Digital Equipment Corporation, where it has since corrupted the technical judgement of this organization. After sabotaging Digital Equipment Corporation, a sinister X consortium was created to find a way to use X as part of a plan to dominate and control interactive window systems. X windows is sometimes distributed by this secret consortium free of charge to unsuspecting victims. The destructive cost of X cannot even be guessed. X is truly obese — whether it’s mutilating your hard disk or actively infesting your system, you can be sure it’s up to no good. Innocent users need to be protected from this dangerous virus. Even as you read this, the X source distribution and the executable environment is being maintained on hundreds of computers, maybe even your own. Digital Equipment Corporation is already shipping machines that carry this dreaded infestation. It must be destroyed. This is what happens when software with good intentions goes bad. It victimizes innocent users by distorting their perception of what is and what is not good software. This malignant window system must be destroyed. Ultimately DEC and MIT must be held accountable for this heinous software crime, brought to justice, and made to pay for a software cleanup. Until DEC and MIT answer to these charges, they both should be assumed to be protecting dangerous software criminals. Don’t be fooled! Just say no to X. X-Windows: …A mistake carried out to perfection. X-Windows: …Dissatisfaction guaranteed. X-Windows: …Don’t get frustrated without it. X-Windows: …Even your dog won’t like it. X-Windows: …Flaky and built to stay that way. X-Windows: …Complex non-solutions to simple non-problems. X-Windows: …Flawed beyond belief. X-Windows: …Form follows malfunction. X-Windows: …Garbage at your fingertips. X-Windows: …Ignorance is our most important resource. X-Windows: …It could be worse, but it’ll take time. X-Windows: …It could happen to you. X-Windows: …Japan’s secret weapon. X-Windows: …Let it get in your way. X-Windows: …Live the nightmare. X-Windows: …More than enough rope. X-Windows: …Never had it, never will. X-Windows: …No hardware is safe. X-Windows: …Power tools for power fools. X-Windows: …Putting new limits on productivity. X-Windows: …Simplicity made complex. X-Windows: …The cutting edge of obsolescence. X-Windows: …The art of incompetence. X-Windows: …The defacto substandard. X-Windows: …The first fully modular software disaster. X-Windows: …The joke that kills. X-Windows: …The problem for your problem. X-Windows: …There’s got to be a better way. X-Windows: …Warn your friends about it. X-Windows: …You’d better sit down. X-Windows: …You’ll envy the dead.
• LelouBil 3y ago
  I hope that this will push government officials and structures to set up mastodon instances. Like one for the government where each agency has an account. Europe did this [0] and I find that it's a very good idea to have control over communication (plus since it's open anyone can do what they want with the data) [0] https://social.network.europa.eu/ https://social.network.europa.eu/
  • LapsangGuzzler 3y ago
    I’m surprised that the pro sports leagues haven’t tried this given all of their complaining about abuse on Twitter and IG. NBA teams are about to start paying middle-of-the-road players $60M per year, hiring a full-time mod team to support an official mastodon instance should be a drop in the bucket for them.
    • capableweb 3y ago
      + is great when you want to censor something that one of the players said but they refuse to delete it. Could also just straight up make everything players say go through a review queue and only approve things manually, skipping anything that could cause drama. Not saying that this would be better/worse for the public/players, but I certainly could see why the owners/companies would want to silo the players voice into platforms they themselves own.
    • tomjakubowski 3y ago
      The NBA and NBAPA just signed a CBA through 2030, if this does happen it won't be any time soon (and I doubt it would, banning players from using a social media site is pretty far reaching).
    • halkony 3y ago
      Pragmatic, but a marketing move like that has far-reaching consequences -- both in their relationships with social media companies and the normies that look up mastodon and associate it with "hackers."
    • sunflowerfly 3y ago
• coolgoose 3y ago
  If they do a photo app, would it be called Xzibit ? :P
• femto 3y ago
  Twitter is now a windowing framework? The domains are similar too (x.com vs. x.org).
• globular-toast 3y ago
  Does Musk have the same PR people as Kanye West? Being publicly crazy seems a really odd choice and, if it works, quite worrying for the future of humanity.
  • tremon 3y ago
    I thought Musk is his PR people?
• okasaki 3y ago
  Seems there's a bug: https://i.imgur.com/aL0ap8h.png https://i.imgur.com/aL0ap8h.png I'm clicking the X but the modal won't go away
  • Zealotux 3y ago
    This looks so amateurish; they're running around the code, changing all references to 𝕩 but with no real brand thinking behind it. For example https://i.imgur.com/CxF6iri.png https://i.imgur.com/CxF6iri.png how does "𝕩" related to "Twitter" here? Am I still visiting Twitter? Is Twitter a product of 𝕩?
  • aquova 3y ago
    I don't think that's a bug, Twitter has been really limiting what non-users are able to see anymore. I think the bug is that the X shouldn't be there at all (there's a joke here somewhere as well)
  • replwoacause 3y ago
    The workaround here is to not visit the website in the first place
• eimrine 3y ago
  What is the meaning of x, I mean all possible meanings? Why it seems that "x" is a favourite letter in an alphabet when some things need to be named.
• terpimost 3y ago
  I thought they would just do xtwitter just to highlight the change . xwitter would be ok too. Xtagram would be interesting.
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• Waterluvian 3y ago
  When they register the domain x.com do we have to be worried about a UFO Defense network that’s run by Elon?
• telesilla 3y ago
  Do visit https://xcorp.com https://xcorp.com for a hearty laugh (or slightly frightened chuckle, on how life mirrors art). X Corp - Non-Human Intelligence (NHI) - UAP Technology X Corp is one of the largest multinational conglomerates in the world. It is headquartered in the Western Hemisphere and was founded after the consolidated mega-corporate merger between ApostleCorp, The Allied Spacecraft Corporation (ASC), and Tyrell Corporation. It is currently the global leader in the retrieval and reverse-engineering of non-human intelligence technology (NHI). Compare to our real-life version of X Corp's CEO, Linda Yaccarino: Powered by AI, X will connect us all in ways we’re just beginning to imagine. (yesterday in what we used to call a Tweet, https://twitter.com/lindayacc/status/1683213895463215104 https://twitter.com/lindayacc/status/1683213895463215104)
  • samstave 3y ago
    >Powered by AI, X will connect us all in ways we’re just beginning to imagine. She must have been the previoius CEO at MONDO.com! You can do ANYTHING at Mondo.com! Dammit, thanks, it was ZOMBO!
    • emehex 3y ago
      zombo.com*
  • marcusverus 3y ago
    If that site is intended to create a bizarre sense of discomfort, it's a work of pure creative genius. If not, it's the work of a madman!
  • coldfoundry 3y ago
    Cool play on E-Corp from Mr.Robot! Wonderfully written show where every day that goes by makes it seem more and more like a documentary. Great watch even if you are only vaguely into tech.
  • 38 3y ago
    https://www.xcorp.com https://www.xcorp.com
• projektfu 3y ago
  I feel like I'm watching The Producers in real life.
  • DonHopkins 3y ago
    Springtime for Twitler in Germany!
• elAhmo 3y ago
  I wonder how long will this last, will it be the same as Doge logo? I think Twitter had among the best brands across social media, similar with HBO in entertainment. To use a generic letter instead of all of the goodwill that the brand and accompanying verbs had seems really ridiculous.
• mark_l_watson 3y ago
  He owns Twitter/X and he can name it anything he wants. I had not been using Twitter much before he bought it, and I use Mastodon a bit, but ironically I started using Twitter/X more after he bought it. There are a few things that give me hope for the future: Twitter/X strongly supporting free speech, and the presidential campaigns of Kennedy and Cornel West. I think the corporate-democrats and the corporate-republicans are a sign of a ruined country. Our country is being looted as we watch. That is just my opinion, which is only important to me. I am not trying to tell anyone else how to vote or how to think.
  • DonHopkins 3y ago
    You're just glad an anti-vax conspiracy theorist has a platform.
    • terly 3y ago
      You're just glad that you never get downvoted or flagged because your name protects you.
      • DonHopkins 3y ago
        How is that even supposed to work? Go ahead and downvote and flag and try to deplatform and cancel me all you want (even though it would disprove your conspiracy theory that my name somehow protects me, and make you a hypocrite). So you actually created that brand new green account just to say that, huh? You're so ridiculously and ignorantly wrong, no wonder you don't want to associate your own name with your comment. You're so addicted to conspiracy theories, you even make them up about me. I invite everyone to downvote and flag this comment just to prove how wrong you are.
    • mark_l_watson 3y ago
      I am glad everyone has a platform. Yeah, I disagree with some of what Kennedy says, but I also believe he has a kind heart and good intentions. You know that he has had his children vaccinated, etc., right? I took the time to listen to his long interview on the All In podcast and it seems like his big complaint was rushing the Covid vaccines. You might want to look into Pfizer’s interactions with the Indian government recently. They wanted some limited efficacy double blind tests and Pfizer decided to ignore the Indian market. Anyway, I am an old man, and I was happy getting the Covid vaccination, but I always thought that everyone should get to make the choice for themselves. There are really too many people in the world who are hung up on telling other people what to do.
• owlbynight 3y ago
  Hey uh, why not pay top-tier talent to build a more modern platform from scratch, starting with zero technical debt, and then when it's ready, merge in the Twitter userbase, and sunset it? It's because he's a fucking moron.
• moondistance 3y ago
  Shockingly contrarian view: while product feedback is always great to read, we should be offering our love and support. Go Elon!
  • Applejinx 3y ago
    Why?
    • jackjorn 3y ago
      [dead]
  • dbbk 3y ago
    Why?
    • jackjorn 3y ago
      [dead]
  • replwoacause 3y ago
    If I may: s/contratian/delusional
  • tremon 3y ago
    Go Elon! I fully support this motion. But who in their right mind would want to take over at this point?
• throw_m239339 3y ago
  I usually don't comment on these threads but I think it is the stupidest decision Musk could ever take. Marketing 101,Branding 101, you don't rebrand a (relatively) successful product and confuse both your users and advertisers unless you really want to destroy your product. Because despite all its problems, users were still willing to stay on the platform. Even Zuck knew that after the company rebranded as Meta, Facebook is still Facebook. Well the good thing is that there is room for a replacement, although it's going to be tougher than 15 years ago because the tech and legal landscape has changed and VC are much less inclined to fund social media. Threads had a huge start but it's already shedding users and Bluesky is already ultra partisan.
• wiradikusuma 3y ago
  Lol x.com is blocked from Indonesia, probably one of the largest Twitter users. Probably the website was used for pr0n, or the dev who made the blocking rule use a wrong regex.
  • timbit42 3y ago
    Elon has owned x.com for over 20 years.
• philk10 3y ago
  The Brand Toolkit page needs updating - https://about.twitter.com/en/who-we-are/brand-toolkit https://about.twitter.com/en/who-we-are/brand-toolkit Not only does it still have the bird it says "Our logo is our most recognizable asset. That’s why we’re so protective of it. Take a moment to think about how you apply it and take a read of our Brand Guidelines for examples of how we like you to use it."
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  • dmix 3y ago
    The app is also "Twitter", the <title> tag is etc. Everyone is going to keep calling them tweets. It's just the logo and redirecting the x.com domain really. Which makes sense IMO (regardless of whether it was a good idea which I'm skeptical), I don't think they should go hard with the rebranding immediately. You need to slow roll it so people don't get confused. The logo is a good start making people notice and get curious without making a big disruption in Google results and mobile app discovery.
    • herval 3y ago
      googling for photos or videos on twitter just got a whole lot better!
      • samstave 3y ago
        They suspended the XVIDEOS account (the porn site), apparently in prep to claim the name... So searching for "xvideos" on google or DDG is going to be interesting going forward.
        • optionalsquid 3y ago
          @xvideos seems to have been banned since at least 2018: https://archive.li/wH3B3 https://archive.li/wH3B3 xvideos.com's account is @xvideoscom and is dated 2010.
• Applejinx 3y ago
  Ketamine is a hell of a drug.
• jussij 3y ago
  A common saying amongst rich family dynasties is 'The first generation builds the business, the second makes it a success, and the third wrecks it'. Elon seems to be trying hard to break that rule, as he seems to be working to achieve all of this in a single generation.
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  • anaganisk 3y ago
    Elizabeth Holmes, Bernie Madoff and Sam bankman freid have entered the chat.
• paulsutter 3y ago
  I'd like to give a little background. This isn't intended in defense of the move, I share the general discomfort with the change X.com, a payments company, was Musk's second company formed in 1999. In March 2000 PayPal was formed by the merger X.com with Thiel and Levchin's Continuity. Musk was the initial CEO, but by September 2000 the board replaced Musk with Thiel while Musk was on vacation to Australia. October 2002, eBay purchased PayPal for US$1.5 billion Musk repurchased the X.com domain from PayPal in 2017 In October 2022, Musk said he will execute the X product plan "with some improvements" which will make Twitter "the most valuable financial institution in the world" Other notes: - Musk is a fan of cryptocurrency and Bitcoin - Starlink is an independent internet backbone that can be access from anywhere on earth - Starlink plans to separate from SpaceX and IPO. Funds from the IPO is how SpaceX plans to pay for the Mars project
  • marcinzm 3y ago
    >opposed to censorship He's not or rather he's in favor of being able to say anything he wants and shutting up anyone who says what he doesn't like (such as his jet's location or anything he views as woke).
    • mcv 3y ago
      He's opposed to censorship by others, but in favour of censorship by him. Actually, he's also fine with government censorship as long as they're not censoring him or people he likes. Twitter obeying government censorship requests have gone way up since he took over.
      • noman-land 3y ago
        Do you have a source for "Twitter obeying government censorship requests have gone way up since he took over"?
        • Joeri 3y ago
          https://cyber.harvard.edu/story/2023-04/twitter-complying-more-government-demands-under-elon-musk https://cyber.harvard.edu/story/2023-04/twitter-complying-mo...
• jiwidi 3y ago
  It is fun to see the fall of Musk, I don't know anyone who defends him at this point, everyone I know (myself included) have changed how we think of him since he acquired twitter. He has become an egocentric man with need for acceptance.
  • simbolit 3y ago
    Can you explain to those who never saw anything in him, what you originally saw in him, and what changed?
    • capableweb 3y ago
      I originally thought he seemed alright, when Tesla and SpaceX started to look like viable companies doing good and interesting stuff. Then he started fucking around with trying to fool the financial system by pumping and dumping stocks/cryptocurrencies, and started calling people pedophiles randomly and I'm guessing it was somewhere there I started to see him differently.
      • progx 3y ago
        That was 4 years ago, long time before he buy Twitter.
    • AlexandrB 3y ago
      I think the early years of Tesla (around the Model S release) were peak Musk in my mind. It was nice to see someone pursuing a technology that would reduce the need for fossil fuels. He was also not yet posting constantly, so his public image mostly stemmed from the companies he was involved in.
  • fullshark 3y ago
    I'll defend him, he's done great work at SpaceX and Tesla, and I hope he can somehow accept that he's failed at Twitter/X and move back to doing great work at Tesla/SpaceX. I don't expect it to happen anytime soon, he's got too much money, but people can do great things and not necessarily have admirable character overall or only have admirable traits in certain contexts. Edit: I'm ejecting this thread, Musk discourse is so divorced from rational conversation, the hatred (and admiration) is too overpowering for too many.
• orwin 3y ago
  To me, even if my Linux now use Wayland, X is my Linux graphic interface. I created a rasterizer for Xserver, but i'm sure anybody who has worked on Linux GUI, mouse, tiling or even keyboard event will be the same. Like how at work they called a project group 'GCC'. This perturb me.
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• Renaud 3y ago
  So WeChat does this: > text messaging, hold-to-talk voice messaging, broadcast (one-to-many) messaging, video conferencing, video games, mobile payment, sharing of photographs and videos and location sharing.[1] Twitter does public messaging and DMs, but is not a chat platform and doesn't have any of the other features of WeChat. To become a SuperApp, X will need a lot of additional features: X will need enough features to both convince new users to join the platform AND keep them using it for most of their daily needs. That would mean Twitter would need to replace WhatsApp/Signal/Telegram when people want to chat with friends and businesses. That would require a lot of new Twitter users! Twitter is noisy, but quite small for a social media. Based on the track record of Twitter acquisition and subsequent changes, I don't see how Elon is going to massively increase the user base to have enough critical mass to make this happen. Wechat is successful and became a de-facto "everything app" in great part because it's extremely useful to the Chinese government as a way to monitor and control its populace. [1]:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WeChat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WeChat
  • wraptile 3y ago
    The obsession with WeChat's success is honestly disturbing. Even if that would work in the west nobody actually wants that, right? Anecdotally, in Japan and SEA we have Line which tries to be an everything and fails everything but the messaging itself because individual components are simply better elsewhere. AFAIK it's losing market to Whatsapp and Telegram pretty badly these days too. Launching a different app is not that much more difficult than going to a different window within an app. It's almost like we already have everything apps in the form of app stores and web browsers huh!
    • kayxspre 3y ago
      I have seen a lot of complaints from those who used (or is obligated to use) LINE at work, particularly the inability to retain anything in the chat for more than 7 days (except if it is saved in the Album for that chat or Keep), meaning that it's very difficult to keep track of all previous conversations and files. They said "LINE is anything but a good Chat App", and I fully concur. I recall that LINE's infrastructure wasn't built for multi-device use, and since the focus is needed for reliability, the underlying infrastructure wasn't touched or improved. There is a session at LINE Dev Day 2019 [1] that addressed this issue, though I still don't see much progress ever since [1] https://linedevday.linecorp.com/jp/2019/sessions/A1-2/ https://linedevday.linecorp.com/jp/2019/sessions/A1-2/
• tsavo 3y ago
  A solid move to instill faith with advertisers that what is left of "the platform formerly known as twitter" will be stable, avoid confusion with their users, and be a brand-positive environment. What's everyone's timetable for either shutdown or sell-off of twitter, 18 months. Ad revenue will continue to shrink, effective 'cost per' rates will decrease while Ex-Twitter will try to squeeze out stable or higher, likely push brands toward longer term campaign spend, engagements so as to reflect long-term dollars on a balance sheet. Only reasonable counterpoint would be if this is part of a strategy to convert X to a portal with Ex-Twitter being one app/platform tied to central identity graph with other services/platforms to be connected later.
  • eviks 3y ago
    X-Twitter :)
    • thenthenthen 3y ago
      Twix?
  • awb 3y ago
    Despite all the chaos, Musk and his personal image are the only thing holding everything together. I’m sure he could raise a few billion via text message by the weekend if he wanted to. Given Musk’s success in other ventures and no prominent Twitter competitor for journalists or government orgs to share quick breaking news updates, the show goes on. If Musk gets bored and moves on though, then I think your timeline is spot on.
    • sanderjd 3y ago
      Or, just, governments and journalists will start using one of the million other applications where they could share those updates.
• foobarbecue 3y ago
  Reminds me of when Blackwater renamed themselves Xe to try to get people to forget their little problem with killing civilians.
• fullshark 3y ago
  It was certainly worth making your employees work over the weekend to do a half-assed rebrand for no reason, now the site is full of "interim" X logos and text referring to twitter. Pointless and stupid.
• sparrowInHand 3y ago
  Stylized aleph ? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleph https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleph
  • tremon 3y ago
    Why Aleph? Wouldn't it be more like a stylized Chi? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chi_(letter) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chi_(letter) Which has the added bonus that it's pronounced in modern Greek as an aspirated soft S sound. I'm all for pronouncing the new Xitter as "shitter".
    • sparrowInHand 3y ago
      Xitter is clogged.. Scribbles on a bathroom stall
• afavour 3y ago
  It’s all just so dumb, isn’t it? It isn’t even interesting any more. I can’t exactly say I had high hopes when Musk took over Twitter but I was interested to see where he’d go with it. Now we’re just at the lipstick on a pig stage.
• 0x53 3y ago
  The other problem with “x” as a logo is that it looks a lot like a close button.
  • entriesfull 3y ago
    I hope people begin realizing by this move that this guy is a complete fraud. Government funded puppet and media clickbait egotist. The nerve of this guy to call his company "Tesla" after a genius that could vividly model his ideas. A genius that invented radio, AC power to homes, etc. "X" sounds so stupid and he picked it because it makes people think "his" things are bigger than they actually are. My advice is to not use his products as he'll only produce further garbage.
• eis 3y ago
  Elon thinks X represents a variable. So a "super app" that will do anything. I think X represents closing a dialog/window or deleting things. We'll see which one is more apt in the near future.
• technotarek 3y ago
  For a company that isn’t making the economics work, how does one justify such a massive resource investment in a brand change like this?! Do the gains from the related PR (ie news coverage) make up for it? These are not meant to be rhetorical questions.
• xg15 3y ago
  First thing that came to my mind was this: https://youtu.be/hS57I6swXcc?t=59s https://youtu.be/hS57I6swXcc?t=59s More seriously, at least it's not an unforeseen step. Musk actually mentioned his longtime plan shortly after the acquisition: https://www.zdnet.com/article/what-is-elon-musks-x-the-everything-app/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/what-is-elon-musks-x-the-every...
• amadeuspagel 3y ago
  Whenever I see another change to twitter, I ask myself: Will this break the spell? Will this finally let me quit twitter? Well, maybe this is it.
• konschubert 3y ago
  I would like to be a fly on the wall of meta headquarters right now.
• dr_j_ 3y ago
  Kind of reminds me of the X11 logo....
• xiconfjs 3y ago
  Interesting... x.com has in contrast to twitter.com an AAAA record dig +short x.com AAAA 2606:4700::6812:11d5 2606:4700::6812:10d
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• slevcom 3y ago
  Sorry, there can only be one zombo.com
• warrenmiller 3y ago
  this is worth a listen re: elon musk, technocracy and "X" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAddtaCFKYg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAddtaCFKYg
• replwoacause 3y ago
  Another goof from Musk
• krzat 3y ago
  Plot twist: Elon realized how harmful twitter is to the society and decided to destroy it.
  • gilbetron 3y ago
    He sure is going about it in an odd way.
  • SketchySeaBeast 3y ago
    He could have just, you know, turned it off.
• nwoli 3y ago
  Insane decision
• gumballindie 3y ago
  Musk's either trying to show everyone how _not_ to approach web product development and engineering, part of some weird accelerationist ploy, or he's simply lost the plot.
• dherikb 3y ago
  I think Elon Musk is planning to expand the features of Twitter and transform this social network in something bigger and not entirely correlated with we know as Twitter right now. We should expect some big announcements after this name change.
• replwoacause 3y ago
  Hey everyone, I’m having a genius business idea. Let’s create ambiguity around everything we do by just calling it all “x”. That way, nobody will know wtf we’re talking about half the time. SpaceX? X.ai? X.com? The shit I took earlier while forming this idea?
• 65 3y ago
  Why not? I've found I've been using Twitter more ever since Elon bought it. He's made some good improvements. It's popular to hate Elon but I think he's trying to make Twitter better than he found it.
  • parabyl 3y ago
    How exactly does changing a logo (in one, messy looking place not to mention - not anywhere else yet) lead even in the slightest to "making twitter better than he found it"?
    • 65 3y ago
      This is a straw man. I was not equating changing the logo to Elon making things better at Twitter. My argument for changing the logo is "why not" with my observation that Elon has made Twitter better since he bought it - therefore the hypothesis is that this could make Twitter better.
      • parabyl 3y ago
        I don't think a brand change can make anything better or worse. It's just a lick of paint. Sure, the changes that come along with a brand change may change things for the better - but I'm sure we can all agree with that involving actualy changes to the product, aside from literal branding-only (and not even all of it). Why not? Maybe, just maybe, if you're re-launching a brand it's best to do so when there's actually something to change aside from (one of the) logos and (one of the) copyright marks. It's like if Reddit bought HN, said "We're going to change this into a platform similar to Reddit", and simply changed the logo from Y -> Snoo without any of the other changes or promised features ready to go. While the change isn't set-in-stone BAD for users, I don't see how it's good or useful at all conversely.
  • shdon 3y ago
    Which of the changes he's made do you consider improvements?
  • thomasfromcdnjs 3y ago
• einpoklum 3y ago
  I wonder what's more inane: The Facebook name change to 'meta', or this.
• wnevets 3y ago
  Are there still folks on HN who think Musk isn't destroying Twitter?
• tremon 3y ago
  Will they also replace their stock ticker symbol with U+1D54F ?
• dboreham 3y ago
  I remember, in 1999, a colleague telling me the story of how he sold the domain to Musk, and how upset Musk was about the price.
• air7 3y ago
  Ah, the end of an era... http://x.com http://x.com used to return a single uncached "x" as a reply. I used it countless times as a quick connectivity test. Alas, simplicity always fades...
  • ryanbrunner 3y ago
    Better to use something that's specified for usage like this and much more guaranteed to not change, like example.com.
• decide1000 3y ago
  'Tweet' is a word pronounced pretty good in many european languages. 'X' does not. I don't find this a smart move for such a big brand.
• bannedbybros 3y ago
  [dead]
• iamsanteri 3y ago
  [deleted]
  • madeofpalk 3y ago
    Elon was not forced to buy the company. He voluntarily bought the company.
• footlose_3815 3y ago
  I'm tired of tech blogs stroking musk every time he sneezes. The billionaire worship is exhausting. He's also a classless egomaniac xenophobe who never had a tough day in his life.
• vlovich123 3y ago
  Doesn’t Google have a trademark on X?
• thih9 3y ago
  Tweeting was like googling, or photoshopping. It demonstrated market lead on a linguistic level. I guess this kind of rebranding must be very appreciated by competing platforms.
• GoofballJones 3y ago
  ButWhy.gif
• jgehrcke 3y ago
  Via Ukraine war footage I learned that "getting off the X" is an established military idiom (for leaving a dialed-in target area of e.g. artillery). Now it might find a newer even more popular meaning.
• jmyeet 3y ago
  Elon Musk has hit the tipping point I like to call "too big to succeed" (a riff on "too big to fail"). He has successfully failed upwards his entire career and bought into his own hype. This isn't new. He was ousted from Paypal for incompetence. What fooled a lot of people (including me) was SpaceX but it's become clear that SpaceX has succeeded in spite of Elon, not because of him. Someone in the SpaceX leadership has done an exceptional job of insulating SpaceX from Elon's terrible and random micromanagement. Some might say Tesla. I think the jury is still out on Tesla. The business doesn't justify its market cap but irrational hype can last a very long time. Just look at Bitcoin. Eventually these fail-sons make a bet so large it costs them everything. It's why wealth rarely lasts more than a few generations. It's why the wealthiest people in America aren't named Astor, Vanderbilt, Rockefeller, Morgan or Carnegie. Eventually some fail-son destroyed the fortune their forebears built. Elon wants to turn Twitter into WeChat, basically. An all-encompassing destination and platform. Chat, banking, etc. Elon has done the Mckinsey or Private Equity thing of just raising prices and cutting costs without regard for long-term consequences. His actions have caused a huge drop in advertiser revenue, one that won't be recouped at $8/month. He has to come up with the money to cover interest payments and the Tesla board and shareholders have limited patience for him selling Tesla stock to do it. Should Tesla crater, Elon could well go under. To paraphrase something I saw on Twitter (sorry, "X"), Elon has thrown away a 15 year old household name for a delete button.
• btbuildem 3y ago
  "x.com is parked free, courtesy of GoDaddy.com" Wild. I was expecting they'd use the obvious domain name. Does this rename include retaining the original trademarks (name, "twitter blue", etc etc?) - or can someone now clone the site and restore the original functionality?
• andreygrehov 3y ago
  The logo is interim, so we should expect a re-design in the near future. No any other assets have changed, which means the logo change was mainly to highlight on the vision. I actually appreciate the sloppiness. Twitter is now like a dorm startup. Change the logo? Sure, <img src="new_logo.png"...>
• damnesian 3y ago
  What's a post on X going to be called? An "Eh?"
• Andrew_nenakhov 3y ago
  So how do we call tweets now? I nominate "eXcrements". Lately I've been mostly supportive of things Musk was doing with Twitter, but this rebranding thing is just insane. I almost think it's trolling to generate buzz and the name change will be reverted in a few days.
  • gonzo41 3y ago
    "eXcrements" makes mastodons 'toots' a lot more likable!
• atbpaca 3y ago
  I'll use X like "ex-twitter user", with "ex-tweets and ex-comments".
• kmos17 3y ago
  This is even more bone headed than hbo renaming to max and forcing all users to re-download a new app just because of the name change.
• top_sigrid 3y ago
  https://archive.ph/a5rfw https://archive.ph/a5rfw
• MR4D 3y ago
  Interesting thread today. I see lots of haters here in the comments. While you all very well may be right about his future failure with Twitter, I think it’s important to highlight that Musk is very different from most people in that he looks like he’s failing until he succeeds, and he’s done that with just about every company he’s run. Twitter make look like a dumpster fire now, but based on past history, I’m betting he’s going to make a ton of money here (but it won’t happen over night).
  • 542458 3y ago
    > in that he looks like he’s failing until he succeeds Is that true? When I look at very old SpaceX or Tesla posts on HN the comments are generally very positive on product direction.
    • MR4D 3y ago
      Today they are, but it wasn’t always that way. SpaceX only exists today because he somehow found enough money to launch one more time (his 4 launch attempt) which finally worked. Even after that, people thought he would fail at landings rockets and also fail at reusing them. He upended the entire industry. Tesla was considered bankrupt and a fraud so much that well-respected shortsellers gambled tons of money that it would go bankrupt. The Boring company is still considered by many to not be a success despite raising nearly a billion dollars last year. Solar City (now part of Tesla) was ridiculed for its battery approach to power grids, but that approach now is being emulated by numerous competitors.
      • 542458 3y ago
        No, what I'm saying is that posts on HN a decade-plus ago were always very optimistic about Tesla and SpaceX. It's not like everybody here was hating on him and he suddenly succeeded, people (at least on here) always saw the benefits to "The Car of the Future" or "Private Space Launches, Done Cheap". Tesla posts pre profitability: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=317921 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=317921 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=534198 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=534198 SpaceX posts pre profitability: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=409653 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=409653 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=320362 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=320362 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=317918 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=317918 (Please excuse the low comment counts. That's not because I'm cherry-picking, old HN was just a much quieter place.)
• pcdoodle 3y ago
  I can't believe how salty HN is about CEOs like Musk or Jobs. This sounds like people making fun on the iPad. Let's watch what happens over 6 months and see.
• mihaaly 3y ago
  This must be an ID10T error...
• inatreecrown2 3y ago
  the logo reminds me of xerox
• patchtopic 3y ago
  let's hope this goes as well as MySpace did under the wise stewardship of the Murdoch oligarchy.
• heyjamesknight 3y ago
  I've been mostly ambivalent about the Musk-era at Twitter—mostly because I just don't care enough to have an opinion. This, though. This one makes me angry and disappointed. Twitter has had such a solid brand for so long. It's accomplished things most marketers only dream of: getting a verb like "Tweet" into the standard lexicon is like the pinnacle of branding. Even with all of the issues, "Twitter" and its "Tweets" have been at the core of international discourse for a decade now. Throwing all of that away so Elon can use a domain he's sat on since '99 seems exceedingly foolish.
  • ethbr0 3y ago
    > so Elon can use a domain he's sat on since '99 seems exceedingly foolish. As far as I can tell, it's the domain of the company he co-founded (X.com), that merged with the company that became PayPal (Confinity), that led to him briefly being CEO before Thiel took over and pivoted to focus on the PayPal service. 2000 - 2017, X.com was property of PayPal. Musk then buys it back in 2017... and then here we are. Ref: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk#X.com_and_PayPal https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elon_Musk#X.com_and_PayPal
    • danso 3y ago
      > 2000 - 2017, X.com was property of PayPal. Musk then buys it back in 2017... and then here we are. I was just wondering how in the world did Elon manage not to sell "x.com" to a porn company for shits and giggles. It being in the custody of PayPal explains that.
      • afiori 3y ago
        Likely he just has a fetish for the letter x
        • ben_w 3y ago
          I think nerd culture in-jokes seem to be his thing, so in this case XCOM the video game series.
• wesleywt 3y ago
  X-genius throwing a brand in the toilet.
• vbo 3y ago
  I'm no branding expert but this sounds like a bad idea, yet given Musk's whimsical decisions, I'm not entirely sure he's serious about it rather than trying to reap the benefits of keeping Twitter in the news.
• rpastuszak 3y ago
  Is this really relevant news for HN? I mean, I know we’re talking about a large tech company, but this feels pretty insignificant (just a marketing stunt, we already knew about his plans for Twitter). I feel like any other business doing that would be ignored on HN and rightly so.
• malcolmgreaves 3y ago
  [flagged]
  • archgoon 3y ago
    [dead]
  • nancyhn 3y ago
    I realize I'm doing a quixotic thing by offering a different perspective to a hate mob, but he's clearly not motivated by appearing intelligent and is doing things with high risk to reward ratio on a long time horizon. He said repeatedly that SpaceX and Tesla had a low chance of success, but poured all his resources into them anyway. People thought he was crazy with examples of countless individual decisions over a 20 year period, but he ultimately succeeded and changed the world. Still the haters persist as an electric car (Tesla Model Y) becomes the #1 selling car in the world and rockets are routinely taking off. "Ha ha, look at this brainless moron doing this thing that looks stupid! See, I was right all along!"
    • Capricorn2481 3y ago
      > He's clearly not motivated by appearing intelligent Well he could've fooled me. He might troll every once in a while, but the rest of his public discourse is standing on a soap box telling us all we're wrong.
      • te_chris 3y ago
        Exquisitely concise way of describing his shtick
    • CamperBob2 3y ago
      They laughed at Einstein, they laughed at Galileo, but they also laughed at Bozo the Clown. You don't see the losing outcomes in a game where someone becomes wealthy and famous by taking unlikely risks. Those outcomes lead to ignominy, not celebrity. Musk reminds me of the guy who came up with the idea of scamming people by dividing them recursively into two groups, each of whose members receives an opposing prediction about some future event with a binary resolution. By the time he works down from 65536 potential marks to 4 or 8 or so, they think he's a god, a time traveler, or a time-traveling god. They'll give him their life savings without a second thought.
• tapoxi 3y ago
  Is it just me or does http://x.com/ http://x.com/ redirect to a GoDaddy parking page?
  • sebzim4500 3y ago
    Goes to twitter.com for me
• danShumway 3y ago
  Y'all are trying to make fun of this, but it's really a brilliant tactical move. Think about it; Musk desperately needs to flip Twitter, and this branding change both makes the site much more attractive for a potential buyout from a porn company, and also lowers the valuation of Twitter even further to the point where it's probably within range for a decently sized porn company to buy.
  • selykg 3y ago
    I don't think this is the end game. If you haven't read The Founders by Jimmy Soni, I'd recommend it. Musk has had a fascination with "X" for a long long long time. This is just his latest attempt to make a platform that does everything. It's what he wanted PayPal to be. He's not going to sell Twitter as "X.com" because X is his grand plan.
    • danShumway 3y ago
      For HN in particular I feel I need to clarify this more often[0] -- but this comment is a joke. It's riffing on the idea that Elon thinks "X" sounds cool but it actually just sounds like a porn site, that the valuation of Twitter would need to drop substantially for a porn site to be able to buy it (and that this rebrand is likely to further devalue Twitter), and that it would still be a terrible waste of money for Elon even if the fictional "plan" succeeded because he'd be selling at a substantial loss -- but in the context of the joke, it's implied that Elon wouldn't see it that way, he'd see it as a success. It's meant to satirize Elon's plans for Twitter (and common defenses of Elon's mistakes that show up on HN) by implying that the downsides of "X" are so obvious that Elon would need to be aware of them and would need to be incorporating them into his "plan"; but even so he'd still be the type of person who would make a plan with obvious downsides (ie, selling his company off at a substantially lower price than he bought it for) and just not realize that those downsides exist. The joke frames itself as if it's going to be a defense of the rebrand, but then just goes on to describe an outcome that would be terrible for Elon anyway. --- The actual non-joke reality is likely pretty much exactly what you say -- Elon has owned "x.com" for ages and has always wanted to name something "x.com" and he has a grand vision of an everything "brand" that probably mostly just seems cool to him and that he's convinced would seem cool to everyone else as well. But he's unable to see that to everyone else it just looks like he's rebranding into a porn site. He's convinced himself that this is a master plan that could lead to his Everything App dominating the Internet. But to everyone else outside of his bubble, the downsides are obvious and the plan just looks silly. And thanks for the book recommendation, I'll add it to my list :) ---- [0]: This is not a criticism of HN, I am myself much more prone to missing jokes than the average person and I regularly rely on context clues to figure out if someone online is joking -- and those context clues are usually missing from HN. So very much no shame to anyone for not catching a joke, I get the confusion and I also regularly miss the exact same jokes.
• registeredcorn 3y ago
  I've been very indifferent to the Elon love/hate stuff and don't really see the point in investing personal opinions on someone I'll never meet. I do have a strong annoyance for this change though. This yet another company is trying to horn in and "claim" stuff that is fundamental to language. A company cannot own a letter, for goodness sake! It bothers me at how much common, everyday stuff that big brands are trying to steal from the lexicon. Meta, Apple, Sky, etc. These are things that belong to the public. They don't exist for the sole purpose of some company to hawk its wares - the word does not exist solely for them to swoop in and claim it for their stupid VR-branded neckties. Use your family name. Make up some goofy nonsense word. Make up a phony sounding "foreign" word if you have to (Starbucks cup sizes, etc.) I'm fine with all of that! Just don't call your company some everyday word like "Dog" or "L" whatever. That's ours. It's not right that companies would take these very basic elements of language. It's cheesy, and lame, and tedious. If I remember correctly, Sony tried something like this with trying to trademark the word "blue" for Bluray. You don't get to own the word blue, for goodness sake! It's aggravating.
• rpastuszak 3y ago
  In my opinion the healthiest approach is to not care. Life’s too short. Almost everything else is more important than some rich brain parasite’s midlife crisis dressed up as 5-d chess. The brain parasite feeds on attention whether positive or negative.
  • heyjamesknight 3y ago
    Fair. But I've already given up on news, politics, and pop culture. Billionaires playing 5D checkers was my last source of mindless entertainment!
    • spacemadness 3y ago
      Isn’t that all of the above?
    • mindslight 3y ago
      I'm pretty sure it's just 2D checkers and they're not even using half the board.
  • padolsey 3y ago
    For myself at least, Twitter has been instrumental in my career, hobbies and friendships. But now, seeing it flounder, and having people shard off to mastadon, bsky, and siloed instances of [insert next federative platform], makes me so very sad. It feels like I’ve lost a key part of my social “surface area”. Things change, I know. What hurts though is that this didn’t need to happen. He ruined something that was, within margins, doing ~alright. It had massive public and social value for many individuals and institutions. With time, of course, we’ll forget he butchered it to death, but for now.. I’m pissed off at this childish fool and all those who enabled him.
    • mrpopo 3y ago
      Social platforms come and go. Back then, people gained "views" and "followers" on IRC and blogs. Some pages I follow on FB are dying out because their viewers stop coming on FB and donating. Twitter is next, then it will be Instagram...
• PurpleRamen 3y ago
  So, is it just the logo? Or will the whole platform renamed to Twitter X, Twi-x or something like that? I mean he already has Space X, maybe he will now line them up for the giggles?
• JoshTko 3y ago
  Twitter is Musk's hobby. An expensive hobby, but nonetheless a hobby.
• Fiahil 3y ago
  I absolutely don't care about what's going on at Twitter, but, wow, the current owner like to spend very little time between announcing and shipping features!
• icybox 3y ago
  X.com: terror from the deep.
• madrox 3y ago
  This is a case study in how to destroy a company. Elon is doing it so effectively I have to wonder if it's on purpose.
  • r00fus 3y ago
    He's not just destroying it - he's burning it to the ground then salting the earth.
• karif_ghannam 3y ago
  How much of this is due to Elon wanting to pretend "I built this?" insert meme.
• martin-adams 3y ago
  For what I can tell, Elon bought Twitter to take it off the stock market, fix it as a private company, creating growth and profitability, and then list it later to make his money back. He sees the X vision to make Twitter become the Everything App, where people turn to it for more than just messaging, but video calls and commerce. Very much like WeChat where it serves as a platform for things like restaurant bookings and hailing a taxi. I do agree though, it doesn't feel like renaming it to X is the right approach if this is the longer term vision. Personally I would have thought about Twitter X with these additional services and a much slower migration to X to align with the Everything App vision.
  • jkaptur 3y ago
    Sure, everyone wants to be "WeChat for the rest of the world", but even WeChat hasn't really made progress in pulling it off.
  • datavirtue 3y ago
    So do that instead of bike shedding the logo.
  • catgary 3y ago
    At this point it seems like he’s dismantling Twitter on purpose. I can understand why the Saudis who lent him money would want it gone after the Arab spring.
    • dualboot 3y ago
      This. Twitter has been the bane of billionaires, aspiring billionaires, and corrupt nation-states for a long time now.
      • azornathogron 3y ago
        Really? Why? What problems does Twitter cause for them?
      • pookha 3y ago
• datavirtue 3y ago
  Junior high male marketing. X is soooo coooool!
• ptkanchi 3y ago
  Musk will do what Musk does, whether or not he will be successful time will tell. But he has proven track record and he has made me a lot of money historically. To all you cringe haters, use your valuable energy else where rather than trashing others online.
  • amanaplanacanal 3y ago
    Twitter is everybody’s favorite popcorn drama! Or maybe that’s Reddit.
• hxii 3y ago
  It’s as if this man child is on a personal vendetta to destroy and deform Twitter after they “made him” follow through with the purchase of Twitter. This, together with the Reddit debacle and the whole Threads privacy thing really puts a spin on social. What a time to be alive.
• prpl 3y ago
  I’m annoyed that this will be the bridge too far that killed a useful service, even though it was never one I checked daily. If I’d have known 6 months ago I would have accepted the offer to sell my twitter handle for $400.
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• DoingIsLearning 3y ago
  Musk and other media attention black holes distract us from more pressing issues, specially these past weeks as we have seen all sort of weather records being broken.
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• sam0x17 3y ago
  I'm extremely excited to see if Elon Musk can actually pull off driving twitter into the ground to the point where his entire purchase becomes an utter waste of money.
• DueDilligence 3y ago
  [dead]
• Yhippa 3y ago
  Is this similar to when Google and Facebook renamed to Alphabet and Meta respectively and then rebalanced the former applications under the latter like a red-black tree?
• sesm 3y ago
  I instinctively click on 'X' when I want to close a thread. It kinda works.
• deepfriedchokes 3y ago
  Someday MBAs will study this guy to learn how ego is a killer.
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• bitwize 3y ago
  Well, with the X Window System now obsolete, I guess Elon can have that thick and thin stroked X... for whatever it's worth.
• yyyk 3y ago
  When Musk bought Twitter, I had the notion that Musk doesn't care if twitter falls under. I completely underestimated the depth of his indifference. He's going to have twitter be his way totally, and survival won't be a consideration. Twitter stays alive? Great. It fails? Oh well.
• vcarrico 3y ago
  After reading some comments here, this rebranding seems so ridiculous that looks like a joke, honestly. > X is the future state of unlimited interactivity – centered > in audio, video, messaging, payments/banking... How do we call videos from X? xvideos?
  • ke88y 3y ago
    > xvideos It's a funny joke, but is actually one of the main reasons I stopped using Twitter. The onlyfans spam got really bad.
  • mbStavola 3y ago
    Unironically, I can see him purchasing XVideos for the name + meme.
    • monetus 3y ago
      Didn't mindgeek offer that guy more than 100 million but he said something to the effect of sorry, I've got to go play Diablo? Pretty fascinating
• nitin-pai 3y ago
  An earlier thread on why an everything app is bad for liberal democracy. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33151774 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33151774
• bilsbie 3y ago
  I think it’s a great idea. Keeps things fresh to change branding from time to time. I do think they should keep calling posts tweets though.
• explaininjs 3y ago
  Has anything Elon-doomers have said with regard to Twitter ever materialized? I still remember when people were sure it’d blow up if it didn’t have a constant supply of thousands of engineers doing… “stuff”. Are y’all really that naïve about how little most people in tech actually do? Similarly here, are y’all really that naïve to think the branding matters at all compared to the user base?
  • sidibe 3y ago
    The naive people are the ones who still believe anything Elon says or that he had any plan when firing those people
    • explaininjs 3y ago
      Like when he said he’d change it to X and did? And the plan that involved firing the majority of the company and proceeding to develop faster than ever before? K.
• bilsbie 3y ago
  Is there a way to filter out the anti Elon comments on this thread?
• numeromancer 3y ago
  Is it April 1st already?
• penjelly 3y ago
  its tiresome that non-technical folk treat musks ideas as novel, but anyone familiar knows that Snapchat, IG, wechat and others are already well along the paths of "everything apps". Sorta interested to see how twitter can compete, being so far behind capability wise.
• musha68k 3y ago
  I don’t remember who stated this but basically there is this thought that Musk was in fact mad about how on Twitter the “common man” could indeed vocally and effectively share their disagreement with his decisions. It also might have been an impulsive decision to become relevant in “new tech” at the same time (why would he care so much about this, boredom?). Ultimately he probably just wanted to get out of that impulsive deal again though but it was too late. Lastly he probably also had/has some WeChat ambitions. We can see how most of these potential goals are now falling apart spectacularly due to extreme unreflected and unchecked ego. He seems to have succeeded in the first case though, the “moderated”/“mostly sane”(?) free speech “town square” basically destroyed and replaced by an increasingly irrelevant echo chamber for his greater brand.
  • gjsman-1000 3y ago
    [flagged]
    • jmondi 3y ago
      Aah yes, everyone knows that google trends is the best way to judge the health of a business.
      • gjsman-1000 3y ago
        It's only one example. Look into it. Sure, Elon has no doubt pissed off some bubbles that you frequent or some advertisers, but any evidence that Twitter as a whole is dying is purely anecdotal, or so small that it's not worth registering. (For example, the Financial Times said Twitter is "dying"... by citing SimilarWeb showing a 5% decline since Elon's takeover.)
        • jmondi 3y ago
          Google Trends has literally nothing to do with twitter succeeding or failing as a business. Literally nothing. If twitter went offline, it would be skyrocketing in Google Trends, does that mean twitter is successful then? Also: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1680082007873953794 https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1680082007873953794
• butz 3y ago
  The blue bird will live on in favicon (until they notice) and in many websites that has link to twitter, but won't be updated anymore.
• massung 3y ago
  Is it just me or does that new logo look an awful lot like the X11 logo?
• SocketAcc133123 3y ago
  There is already a bug report for this: https://github.com/twitter/the-algorithm/issues/1876 https://github.com/twitter/the-algorithm/issues/1876
• throw-ru-938 3y ago
  Elon's acquisition of Twitter is a gift that just keeps on giving. At this point, considering the social polarization it brought, destroying Twitter for good would be an immense service to humanity, and Musk is doing exactly that, even if unwillingly.
  • wnc3141 3y ago
    Its interesting given that it would probably be easier to just hire a few competent managers to steer Twitter into profitability rather than Musk actively managing Twitter into the ground.
    • danudey 3y ago
      Musk is operating Twitter in a "divine right of kings" sort of way. He's been chosen by (who? God? investors? being rich?) to run things, and therefore whatever it is he does is obviously the correct choice and it's heresy to suggest otherwise (and will get you fired). He thinks that every idea he has is a good idea, simply because he had it, and therefore his ability to think on his feet and come up with and try new ideas is a virtue; he doesn't understand having to build and maintain something, to provide stability and consistency, because that would mean not using all of his new great ideas. Unfortunately, all of his ideas sound like he came up with them while sitting around in his mom's basement getting high and saying "wouldn't it be cool if...", so I guess we'll see how this all bears out. My biggest hope is that people see him for who he really is: an insecure and entitled man-child who's never been told no.
      • monetus 3y ago
        This rebranding is so bad, it sounds like you are denigrating the average stoner idea with that comparison imo.
    • mcpackieh 3y ago
      That would be better for twitter and Elon Musk. But it's better for the rest of us if he crashes and burns the company.
  • 3y ago
• kak3a 3y ago
  X or Y, Twitter has a failed business model that will never generate positive cash flow, to me, that's a bigger problem to solve.
• TurkishPoptart 3y ago
  There's so much Reddit-tier Musk-hate in this thread. I don't really understand it.
  • BrotherBisquick 3y ago
    There are legitimate reasons to dislike the man but it's so obvious that the mob is just grumpy that Musk allowed criticisms of the Democratic party line to exist on Twitter.
  • tamimio 3y ago
    He WANTS the attention and being controversial, it worked with him in other companies and he’s trying to apply the same for twitter, you have side that are a die-hard fans that doesn’t see a problem to implant his chip in their minds yet they refused a medical injection under the claim it had a nanochip, on the other side, you have people hate his guts for ruining their safe space discussion platform. My personal take, he is a con and he knows what he’s doing, so let it be, it might shake the industry to something better (say ATproto or activitypub or something else) as usually these events are what drive innovation, or it might destroy the industry marking the end of such technological progress, who knows, grab your popcorn and enjoy the (shit)show!
    • TurkishPoptart 3y ago
      The Twitter Files have demonstrated that political operatives have used and abused Twitter in order to force the removal of content deemed inappropriate (such as the story about the Biden family laptop prior to the 2020 election). Before and since Musk's takeover, the corporate press have decried Musk as "dangerous" or "racist-aligned", because they now lack the opportunity to kill inconvenient stories about various political agendae. I have supported Musk as a more conscienscious and pro-human CEO than the previous leadership, though I have zero interest in his Neurolink project and find it dystopian.
• ensocode 3y ago
  As a frequent internet user, I must admit that "X" is my go-to symbol when I want to close a browser tab quickly. It's a simple yet effective design that has become almost universally recognized across various web browsers.
• rgovostes 3y ago
  How is Alphabet going to take this, considering their “moonshot factory” is also called X (https://x.company/ https://x.company/)?
  • yreg 3y ago
    In my opinion if you call your company 'X' or 'Apple' you shouldn't expect everyone else to just shrug and say okay, this letter/this word now belongs exclusively to you. Of course the trademark system is not that simple.
• Towaway69 3y ago
  I do wonder how much work will go into changing the logo on all the websites that have twitter buttons. The number of WordPress blogs that are now being updated. All because of the whim of one person.
  • frodowtf 3y ago
    Here is a list of wordpress blogs that will be updated because of this:
• nologic01 3y ago
  The world of "tech" seems to be spiralling into a realm of absurd metaverses, the dark obsessions of a tiny gang of annointed leaders, a house of cards, lies built upon lies, increasingly desperate hypes. The whole thing detached from the deteriorating human reality, a pervasive lack of empathy for our condition. Not clear how we could / should respond to this grand fiasco. Somehow tech needs to be reinvented. Much more grassroots, more authentic, more focused on real problem solving.
  • atourgates 3y ago
    The upside of those absurd metaverses is that you can mostly just ignore them, and do your own thing.
  • pavel_lishin 3y ago
    Everything is fandom.
  • dogman144 3y ago
    Don’t shoot the messenger but the developer scene in crypto is like you describe. People trying out cool and strange ideas with very low technical barriers to entry once you understand the architecture and development paradigms. Lots of interesting personalities and deep tech bonafides. A lot of people doin their own thing focused deep in the infrastructure or user facing apps. There are power players and centralization, and the above freedom exists for marketing/product people as well and imo this is where most of the fraud comes from. But ultimately - no one controls pushing a new app onto a blockchain. for a lot of reason, idk if blockchain will solve or help solve the centralized internet issue. But it’s got a lot of freedom and oddities like the 90’s internet did.
  • fullshark 3y ago
    Here here. I have no solution, the money/windfall is too perverting a force.
  • TheRealDunkirk 3y ago
    > The whole thing detached from the deteriorating human reality, a pervasive lack of empathy for our condition. This is a result, not a cause. This is learned helplessness in the face of not being able to vote for change, and having no say in the policies of our country. The US government has become 100% beholden to the deep state and the oligarchy. We squabble over left/right social issues while both parties are in almost total lockstep with spending and foreign policy. I mean, I'd love to be proven wrong in next year's election, with some definite outsiders trying to muscle into the circle. And, even if one of them does get elected, we've already seen how one supposed outsider fared against this machine already. If both Vivek and RFK run as independents, it would at least be a BONKERS election cycle.
• klvino 3y ago
  The collective sentiment is that using "X" will make searching and referencing the platform and actions in the platform more challenging. "Did you 'X' it?" Someone in the branding team will make a juvenile tag line of "X marks the spot" and ironically it might catch on for the sake of people calling the platform "the spot". "Did you find 'the spot' for it?"
• kristianpaul 3y ago
  I don't like the new logo, Twitter is not it without the little blue bird :(
• d3vmax 3y ago
  [dead]
• helveticar 3y ago
  Perhaps subscribers get to call it XX, or even XXX? Rebranding requires careful thought and planning and even then is often unsuccessful. This name change hasn't even been given a second's thought.
• russfink 3y ago
  This looks a lot like the X Windows logo from MIT/Project Athena. Am I the only one that's seeing this?
• jokoon 3y ago
  It feels like that all Musk wanted was to destroy twitter. I really don't understand why Twitter really wanted to sell it to Musk. It always felt like a bad idea. I understand that it was probably a matter of money and law or whatever, but I wonder how the former twitter execs are feeling about all this now. I never really used twitter, to be clear, but to sell anything to somebody who clearly seems unfit for it because he just made an arrogant, seems quite like a bad decision. I wonder if they regret it. Although there is one benefit in this story: it shows that Elon Musk is a clown, and as he initially did not want to buy Twitter, it seems like he is taking revenge by destroying it, which is an even better proof. Capitalism is really really awful. This story is a good example why capitalism often doesn't work.
  • tiffanyg 3y ago
    Wow - I know this is not a fresh comment (6 days old, now), but, too many points to pass up writing something. I'll start, for some semblance of "full disclosure", by writing that I was never a fan of Twitter, and I quite dislike Musk in recent years for a Thai-cave-system-sized set of reasons. Nevertheless: 1) It was the money. And, to your point about capitalism, it was "brilliant" within that context. "Free money" wasn't going to last forever, some were already beginning to prepare (more actively) for inflation and interest rate changes, Twitter always had significant trouble with the whole VC and ad-based model* and had continual challenges with profitability and "expectations", etc. No one ever had a great plan for turning Twitter into the kind of economic power that comparable companies, in terms of a certain importance to the information ecosystem of the net, were. A particular challenge in the kind of gray area occupied by a social media company so dependent on the writings of experts, journalists, etc. that led to importance and power yet created serious "conflict of interest"-like challenges (beyond those of systems where user fame and economic power and such were directly coupled to that of the system etc.). So, "exit strategy", particularly in the context of the very "pump-and-dump" (and pyramid-esque, in outcome if not exact implementation) economic model "Silicon Valley" enabled**, was of significant interest to people with that mindset who still had "capital" 'trapped' in Twitter [1]. As for how former execs might be feeling, most are represented by this clip here: https://youtu.be/0Z2JTPalv_s https://youtu.be/0Z2JTPalv_s Some, like Dorsey***, are probably actually mildly unhappy about events. But, even people who were trying to run that company - when Musk walked in with a sink like the class clown on the first day of junior high school - felt more relief to be freed of the burdens, after the initial shock and unpleasantness of the lead-up wore off. 2) Other factors involved in the mess likely include Saudi Arabia (nice chunk of money from them), and their sadistic authoritarianism (looked up - Saudi dissidents twitter - and similar terms for info), China and their continuing work to have more of a say in global affairs, various billionaires annoyed at journalists who depended on the platform (including Musk), etc. 3) Capitalism often does work. It works incredibly well, crucially WITH adequate regulation. There is no way we have the kind of material and other wealth (distributed far too unevenly, but existing and distributed nonetheless) without "capitalism". That written, it undeniably has every bit the potential for harm, corruption, etc. as just about every other system, technology, etc. we've come up with or discovered with similar reach and power. I loathe numerous aspects of it, yet, have no better system to offer - and that is primarily because it isn't systems, technologies, ideas, or anything else really, that causes problems. It's people, and no system, technology, etc. can fix that underlying problem. * More so than most other comparable companies in terms of name recognizability, "importance", etc. & with origins somewhat clustered in an "era" of opportunity within the "internet framework" ** Motto: "This ain't your grandfather's 'Gilded Age'" *** It was his baby, if it was anyone's, in more recent years [1] Recent article on exactly what anyone with some degree of brain power and hanging around "Wall Street Bets" and its more curated and expert offshoots has known for years: https://www.businessinsider.com/venture-capital-big-tech-antitrust-predatory-pricing-uber-wework-bird-2023-7 https://www.businessinsider.com/venture-capital-big-tech-ant...
• tamimio 3y ago
  I feel pity for the developers now (In el risitas sound) - Quick, we need a new icon - X - Rushing to change all birds svg to x svg - Uhh sir, we broke the layout.. - Also, it still says twitter in the text next to it.. - No problem, search replace-all twitter to X - uhh sir, the frontend isn’t communicating with backend anymore!! - Uhh I think we broke the site!!
• pipeline_peak 3y ago
  Or you can spin up your amateur, brittle fediverse instances, pay out of pocket for electricity/internet, and devote to volunteer system administration. No where to run wokists, the Xtermination has begun!
• browningstreet 3y ago
  It’s so embarrassing to me being a Tesla vehicle owner now. And as someone who thought it was awesome he took a drag on Rogan: I hope the government retracts his security clearance and he has to divest his holdings in SpaceX and Tesla. Or Tesla finds a way to separate their identity from Musk. Maybe the FSD fiasco will create a path to that. I hope and believe, at this point, SpaceX and Tesla are thriving despite Elon and have proper adult management.
  • TheCaptain4815 3y ago
    Imagine descending into practically fascism because someone doesn't agree with your political candidate of choice. Where were these warnings when Twitter was full of spam bots, got hacked by a 17 year old, mass censoring, etc?
    • cwkoss 3y ago
      Did you reply to the wrong comment? Seems like a bunch of non sequitors
      • TheCaptain4815 3y ago
        The person I replied to wants the state to forcefully remove Elon Musk from the companies he currently runs because of software decisions he's making. Not sure if the person 'embarrassed' to drive a Tesla has looked into the history of other car companies.
        • cwkoss 3y ago
          I think the workers of those companies and consumers who buy their products would likely be better off if Musk's behavior wasn't a liability dragging it down. It seems like the market will remove him from power soon, but the state could probably do it more efficiently.
        • browningstreet 3y ago
          I didn't say anything about the government forcing Elon from his companies -- losing his security clearance seems like a reasonable outcome of his proclivities driving his instability. As for the rest -- I don't think his choices are consistent with CEO leadership roles across the companies he's in. Twitter & Tesla have issues, Tesla's largely revolving around AutoPilot & FSD -- and eventually the market and/or Boards and/or his creditors will see a change in the risk and ROI of his leadership. SpaceX seems to run pretty smoothly. Elon's halo is massive, and the lift he provided to Tesla and the EV market, in particular, can't be underestimated. But, IMO, there's no way this ends smoothly and happily, 10 years hence, given how he's acting in at least the Twitter corner of his field. As for the previous leadership at Twitter and their censorship / collusion with governments -- yeah, that sucked, but it grants Elon nothing at all. Different shit, different day.
• anjc 3y ago
  Disappointed by the commentary here. Most commenters are focussed on their view of Musk's personal attributes, and think he was stupid all along, and that he had successes only through luck. Many bizarre comments seem to be able to read his mind and understand his inner motivations too. I'd expect more nuance and less bias from Hacker News contributors.
• tegmark 3y ago
  twitters brand is valuable. the only logical explanation is that musk thinks he will get something even more valuable in return for axing the brand. the strength of the brand is exactly why it needs to go. twitters brand is too strong for an identity change into an app that does all kinds of content, banking, identity, etc. the set of services that is offered online is emerging from the primordial soup of the early 2000s and gaining a definitive shape — the wave of the future is all platforms offering the same services on dedicated apps instead of the internet being a hodgepodge of scattered javascript apps. if x can be the first foot in the door of a paradigm change like that, ditching the bird will be an excellent decision. i think the long established pattern of people laughing at musk and then promptly copying him will hold true here.
• unicornmama 3y ago
  When I was a child, I went to grade school. My classmates engaged in dramatic actions to attract attention. They have since matured. In contrast, Musk evidently has not.
• RexFactorem 3y ago
  [dead]
• pvsukale3 3y ago
  Meanwhile twitter is having some serious glitches since 3 days. Replies hidden, broken notifications.
• causi 3y ago
  Exactly how inept do you have to be before the shareholders can successfully sue you for blowing up a company? Musk isn't a slope-browed incompetent; why is he acting this way? I knew when he bought it his stated intentions were probably going to cost the company money long-term but it's like he's intentionally trying to burn it to the ground.
• bad_alloc 3y ago
  In all this nonsense with the so called Metaverse, the reddit shitshow and now with twitter, keep in mind: Brands are made up and even if a few platform commit suicide, the internet will continue. New things will fill the gaps left. Humans want to communicate and will find ways to do so. The fediverse is already one potential way out and more will surely pop up.
• TedHerman 3y ago
  Here is the thread we should continually reëxamine: https://x.com/mattschnuck/status/1590732559029194752 https://x.com/mattschnuck/status/1590732559029194752
• classified 3y ago
  Instead of the birds singing it from the roofs you're going to get X-ed out. Not encouraging.
• TheCaptain4815 3y ago
  Very interesting no one had an issue with twitter when they were mass censoring (even the sitting president of the united states!), got hacked by a 17 year old to have all types of celebrities and politicians tweet a bitcoin scam, were chock full of scam bots, etc. Twitter today is freer and on the path towards improvement, much like the original twitter. Who remembers the Iran revolution and the "stop or i'll tweet" motto?
  • guax 3y ago
    Hahahah, good one.
  • 7moritz7 3y ago
    I've had an issue with Twitter for years. Don't know another platform where getting angry and finding political extremists was as easy, before Musk. Musk made it worse by validating those people's gigantic ego with the 8 dollar blue svg.
  • JakeTheAndroid 3y ago
    Yeah, it's so free the word CIS is considered hate speech. It's so free you can't see tweets without logging in. It's so free Elon gave insider information to hand selected journalists to build a misleading narrative. Maximum freedom for sure. We all know why certain people seem to like Musk, they just won't admit it because they know the reasons make them look bad. Also, there are still scams, still fake accounts, still tons of bots, etc lol.
    • TheCaptain4815 3y ago
      I do wish Elon fulfilled his promise of 'free speech absolutism', but unfortunately it's not possible with advertising today. The problem is we have no choice here given the censorship of other social media companies so anything is better than what we had before.
      • JakeTheAndroid 3y ago
        It's almost like there is a bottom line and laws and stuff that require sites to moderate content. Elon will either follow suit or he'll pay out a ton of money and go broke taking Twitter/X down with him. Twitter is really no different than Facebook or any other social media site, the censorship still occurs and by and large along the same lines. The primary difference is that Elon is fine with the extreme right voices not the extreme left. But there is still a boot on the throat. Flight trackers are not allowed on Twitter. Why? That's clearly free speech, and it's not political in nature at all. Elon just doesn't like it. Censored in Türkiye because like every other platform he will crumble to government pressures. He's doing the same shit that he tried to call out in the "Twitter Files", the ONLY difference is which views he supportive of compared to say Zuck. And overall it's fine with me. A platform built around free speech absolutism is doomed to fail. No one wants to be associated with the most extreme voices, unfettered and in some cases even promoted. It's just more embarrassing when Elon says he wants to establish true free speech values, then his platform doesn't represent those values, and he tries to lie to your face telling you it is.
• Melatonic 3y ago
  This is such bad web design its amazing Go to the Twitter.com on mobile in a private browsing window or basically be not logged in. The standard popup will come up asking you to logon. In the top left is a small X you can click to close this popup and continue to twitter without loggin in. In the center top left is the new X logo which is just slightly larger. I immediately clicked on the larger X and of course nothing happened. I then realized it was the smaller but very similar X in the upper left hand corner I needed to click to close the popup. How is the basic design this bad?
  • Tokkemon 3y ago
    They only have, like, four people employed right now.
• appel 3y ago
  So the 'world's most brilliant entrepreneur' paid 44 billion - about twice as much as its estimated worth at the time, though much less that that now - to own the Twitter brand, only to toss it out within a year. Arguably the one thing that, while damaged, still holds some value. Help me make it make sense.
• ryeguy_24 3y ago
  The bird logo is still showing up in Twitter's HTML icon tags: <link rel="shortcut icon" href="//abs.twimg.com/favicons/twitter.2.ico"> <link rel="mask-icon" sizes="any" href="https://abs.twimg.com/responsive-web/client-web/icon-svg.168b89da.svg https://abs.twimg.com/responsive-web/client-web/icon-svg.168..." color="#1D9BF0"> <link rel="apple-touch-icon" sizes="192x192" href="https://abs.twimg.com/responsive-web/client-web/icon-ios.b1fc727a.png https://abs.twimg.com/responsive-web/client-web/icon-ios.b1f...">
• 93po 3y ago
  It's wild how much emotion and turmoil freaking twitter changing their freaking logo causes for people. An article about the DEA trying to end end-to-end encryption has one quarter the comments.
  • wsintra2022 3y ago
    fascinating isn't it. Everyday I have thoughts like this. Why does X get people so riled up, when the real shit (planet heating, finite resources, plastics pollution, corrupt/broken western democratic systems, who owns your poop, etc etc)
    • Apocryphon 3y ago
      You know what I noticed? Nobody panics when things go "according to plan." Even if the plan is horrifying. If tomorrow I tell the press that, like, a gangbanger will get shot or a truckload of soldiers will be blowing up nobody panics. Because it's all part of the plan. But when I say that one little old mayor will die, well, then, everyone loses their minds. Introduce a little anarchy, upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylwMWpbv5Fk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ylwMWpbv5Fk
• helf 3y ago
  [dead]
• wsintra2022 3y ago
  Twitter logo now copies X Windows system logo, public left gawping
• weinzierl 3y ago
  Does anyone remember the original bird logo, which was literally from iStockphoto IIRC?
• jasmer 3y ago
  [dead]
• 1270018080 3y ago
  For some reason this finally gave me the motivation to delete my account. Not the outages or endorsing fascists or giving Tucker Carlson media deals or removing features behind paywalls or making reach pay-to-win or...
• digitalsushi 3y ago
  they made their logo the same as the "close this app" button on every OS.
• qwertox 3y ago
  I wonder if this is because of Musk's fixation on him owning x.com since he was a young man. Twitter by itself is a valuable brand, why ditch it for a letter which he embeds in apocalyptical darkness? And regarding the logo, would it give him OCD if he realized that he could have elongated one side of the stick into the center of the area in order for it to also symbol a line crossing a plane?
• pcj-github 3y ago
  Well, I'm gone. Just deactivated my account. So done with literally anything that smells like Musk.
• KingShabibo 3y ago
  [flagged]
• whoopdedo 3y ago
  And now I start counting down for someone to point out how this particular logo has already been trademarked. It's a bit similar to the X Window System. Who owns that these days?
• cutler 3y ago
  I think X.org could have a claim on Musk's "new" logo.
• AiTricky 3y ago
  As someone who is a non-user and a bystander watching all this twitter stuff -- I got two words "yikes... yikes"
• Sunscratch 3y ago
  The worst thing that ever happened to Twitter is Elon Musk
• ubertaco 3y ago
  In case anyone was wondering what news story Musk was trying to bury with his latest stupid PR stunt: https://arstechnica.com/cars/2023/07/tesla-misses-deadline-to-inform-nhtsa-about-autopilot-problems/ https://arstechnica.com/cars/2023/07/tesla-misses-deadline-t...
• maxlin 3y ago
  Rebranding makes sense, though how I'd done it was only when the "X app" had enough use cases that many users came to it not from the existing Twitter user pool but from anywhere, like for payments like with WeChat. Rebranding then could just be more complicated though and could kill the potential user rush so in a way this might be the right thing, even though it will look foolish in the case that X.com doesn't take off as hoped and will be easy to make fun of. But I do appreciate the attempt, one can't say it's done due to a lack of courage.
• rad_gruchalski 3y ago
  Who’s going to be brave enough to put anything on an online platform this man ever “builds” in the future?
• swat535 3y ago
  The writing has been on the walls for a while now. Musk has officially killed Twitter. It has basically turned into an anti LGBTQ and right wing circle jerk. Majority of users have already migrated elsewhere. At least we can give him credit for not hiding it anymore.
• whispersnow 3y ago
  X Twitter - HN will be my future single source of truth
• nipperkinfeet 3y ago
  The new logo is tacky and foolish. This guy is trying really hard to kill Twitter.
• DropInIn 3y ago
  X is Elons equivalent of "Fetch". He's obsessed with making it "a thing", but he's forgotten "Fetch will never be a thing"....
• faefox 3y ago
  $44 billion so he can finally call something "X" without any grownups in the room to tell him why it's a terrible idea. Well, I guess we all have our hobbies.
• Inshpro 3y ago
  I think it’s a great change
• user_named 3y ago
  Some fun takes from non-techies. Nobody's into this: https://www.reddit.com/r/redscarepod/comments/158ery9/elon_musk_is_renaming_twitter_one_of_the_most/ https://www.reddit.com/r/redscarepod/comments/158ery9/elon_m...
• brachika 3y ago
  I'm really, really interested in the way Elon's psyche works. He was touted as an IT gargantuan for so long, but to me (and this is only my opinion) he just seems... fairly... simple-minded. Some of his more brazen actions, such as this one just reinforce my opinion.
• brontechnology 3y ago
  [flagged]