The biggest significant alteration after Elon Musk paid $44 billion for the social media network last year would be to replace the bird-shaped Twitter logo with an “X,” as he said on Sunday.
The owner of Twitter announced his intention to make the transition globally as early as Monday in a sequence of tweets that began shortly after 12 a.m. ET.
Musk posted on his account, “And soon we shall bid adieu to the Twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds.”
The wealthy Tesla CEO recently implemented new curfews on his digital town square, a decision that drew harsh criticism since it threatened to alienate more advertisers and diminish the platform’s status as a trendsetter in culture.
In an effort to increase Twitter revenue, Musk launched an $8 per month premium service earlier this year that has a greater tweet-viewing threshold. Since Musk took control of the business and fired about three-fourths of the staff to cut expenses and prevent insolvency, revenue has fallen drastically.
Linda Yaccarino, a seasoned NBC Universal executive, was appointed by Musk as Twitter’s CEO in May.
Musk and Twitter need to attract advertisers after a large number left Twitter in the early months of his takeover, fearing harm to their brands in the engulfing chaos. Due in part to adjustments Musk made that made it possible for more offensive content to grow and alienated a larger portion of the platform’s audience, advertisers have reduced their expenditure.
Musk claimed that advertising had returned in late April but didn’t give any further details.
Musk’s decision to make an “X” the new Twitter emblem also comes as Twitter encounters fresh opposition from Meta’s recently released Threads program. It has been regarded as a substitute for people whose opinions of Twitter have soured.
A text-based version of Instagram, the photo-sharing app from Meta, is being marketed as Threads. According to the business, it provides “a new, separate space for real-time updates and public conversations.”
According to a post on Threads by Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri, 100 million individuals signed up for Threads in the first five days after its introduction.
