Billionaire Elon Musk announced Monday that Twitter’s rebrand to X is not only a name change, but an accelerant for the social media giant as it continues to alter how users can interact on the platform.
Twitter officially transformed to X over the weekend – complete with a new logo – months after Twitter Inc. was renamed to X Corp.
In a post shared Monday night, Musk wrote that Twitter “was acquired by X Corp both to ensure freedom of speech and as an accelerant for X, the everything app.”
“This is not simply a company renaming itself, but doing the same thing,” he added.
ELON MUSK SAYS TWITTER TO CHANGE LOGO TO ‘X’: BID ADIEU TO THE TWITTER BRAND’
In April, Twitter’s iconic blue bird logo was temporarily replaced by Dogecoin’s Shiba Inu dog, which helped add as much as $4 billion to the meme coin’s market value.
Twitter limited posts to 140 characters until 2017, when it doubled the limit to 280. After Musk took over the company, paying Twitter Blue subscribers could share longer posts, which started with a limit of 4,000 characters but has since increased to 10,000. Twitter Blue users can now also post two-hour videos, such as full-length sporting events, to the platform – a feature not available before.
“The Twitter name made sense when it was just 140 character messages going back and forth – like birds tweeting – but now you can post almost anything, including several hours of video,” Musk wrote in his post on Monday.
ELON MUSK’S TWITTER OFFICIALLY REBRANDS, CHANGES ICONIC BLUE BIRD LOGO TO X
Several other changes have been implemented since Musk took over the platform in October.
Social media influencers can now get paid if they meet certain engagement criteria and users wanting a blue verification checkmark can now subscribe to Twitter Blue when the feature was previously only available to notable people in news, entertainment or elsewhere. The new verification system and other changes to the platform have prompted harsh criticism of Musk.
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Musk also hinted more changes are in the works at X.
“In the months to come, we will add comprehensive communications and the ability to conduct your entire financial world. The Twitter name does not make sense in that context, so we must bid adieu to the bird,” he concluded.