Twitter Turns into X: How Elon Musk is Working In direction of His 1999 Dream of Creating an ‘Every thing App’

Elon Musk, ever since buying Twitter for $44 billion (roughly Rs. 3,59,100 crore), has been introducing adjustments and updates to the microblogging website. The most recent upheaval is an entire change of its title and model emblem, from Twitter to X. The billionaire additionally introduced in a tweet that the area X.com now redirects customers to Twitter. From monetising Twitter by premium subscriptions, to paid verification badges, the adjustments Musk has made on the firm communicate volumes about how he intends to guide the platform and make it certainly one of his X group of firms.

When Musk first acquired Twitter in October final yr, he was clear about his plans for the microblogging website. The Tesla CEO additionally tweeted on the time that “Shopping for Twitter is an accelerant to creating X, the every little thing app.” This “every little thing app”, as he defined, can be an excellent all-in-one app like WeChat, which can be utilized for a number of issues together with reserving rides, sending cash, and making funds, aside from facilitating day-to-day communications.

Now, Musk has certainly modified Twitter to X, in relation to title, area and even its emblem. Nonetheless, it isn’t but an excellent app but. On Sunday, July 23, he posted about altering the emblem of Twitter to an X. Within the following hours, he didn’t solely that, but additionally made x.com redirect customers to Twitter’s house web page.

Elon Musk and his love for ‘X’

The rebranding to X is current, however Musk’s love for this alphabet isn’t so random. In actual fact, it has lasted for years now. The concept of X first emerged in 1999, when the billionaire launched x.com as a finance platform, which later grew to become Paypal after merging with software program firm Confinity in 2000. In line with an article in Time, Musk was faraway from his position because the CEO of Paypal in 2000, and it was later offered to eBay in a $1.5 billion deal.

Whereas Musk was reportedly harm by this, he bought x.com again from PayPal in July 2017, explaining that “it has nice sentimental worth”. Later that month, Musk made x.com reside once more, and it began redirecting guests to The Boring Firm in December 2017.

Since Twitter’s acquisition, Musk has been decided to place his plans for X – his “every little thing app” – into motion. In his dialog with Ron Baron, the brand new Twitter chief introduced his ambition to make Twitter “essentially the most precious monetary establishment on this planet” in April 2023.

Other than Twitter, Musk has additionally used the letter X in his area exploration firm’s title, SpaceX; his newest AI initiative named xAI; and the primary SUV mode launched by his firm Tesla below the title Mannequin X.

Adjustments to Twitter since Elon Musk’s acquisition

Twitter, below Musk’s management, has seen varied adjustments, ranging from termination of its then-CEO, Parag Agrawal and different prime executives. Within the following months, quite a lot of banned celeb accounts have been allowed to return to the platform.

Inside a month of his multi-billion greenback buy, Musk started making an attempt to monetise Twitter with the reinvention of Twitter Blue. The corporate additionally noticed a collection of job cuts and layoffs throughout workplaces, together with the sacking of its total AI Ethics crew.

Blue ticks for formally verified accounts in addition to subscribers’ accounts began to seem in November. Nonetheless, the tick marks on paid accounts disappeared inside just a few days. Musk additionally launched completely different colored tick marks, primarily based on accounts’ possession standing, to be able to recognise information media shops.

With all these adjustments, Twitter’s advert income has seen an almost 50 % drop. Musk has tried to maintain customers engaged by introducing a number of new options together with ive tweeting, group notes, and Twitter Blue for Enterprise. To maintain the enterprise on monitor, Musk lately introduced his resignation from the place of CEO, however continues to be closely concerned, pushing new options comparable to view counts and the flexibility to add lengthy movies.

The following huge information got here in April 2023, when Musk introduced Twitter’s merger with X Corp. In Might this yr, Musk employed Linda Yaccarino to be the brand new CEO of Twitter. He has indicated that he’ll delegate authority to her and can step again to concentrate on his different firms.

A take a look at Twitter’s title and the blue hen’s historical past

Twitter was based in 2006 by Jack Dorsey, Evan Williams, Biz Stone, and Noah Glass. Earlier, Twitter was deliberate to have completely different names, like Smssy and Twttr, as per CreativeBloq. The primary official Twitter emblem was simply its title written in mild blue in sans sherif shapes, and was designed by Linda Gavin.

Twitter’s relationship with a blue hen began quickly after its launch. It was created by Simon Oxley, a British graphic designer. In line with an NYT article, he provided the design on the market on the iStock web site in 2006, and it was purchased by Twitter for round $15. The title Larry was a tribute to basketball star and Boston Celtics legend Larry Hen.

The design has modified thrice, in 2009, 2010, and 2012. The present blue hen design was created by Doug Bowman, the corporate’s former artistic director, in accordance with whom “Twitter is the hen, the hen is Twitter.” Ever since, Larry the hen has been identified solely because the blue Twitter hen.

In 2023, new proprietor Musk has modified not simply the emblem, but additionally the title and the area of Twitter. The corporate will now be often called X, with a emblem of an X. In line with a tweet by Paris Marx, the brand new emblem was created by an in-house designer, utilizing the font monotype. One other Twitter person has additionally come ahead to take credit score for the design, revealing the historical past behind the way it all started.

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