Twitter becomes X

Twitter is over. In an official announcement on July 22, Elon Musk announced that Twitter was changing its name to X. In a very short video that has already reached 24.9 million views, Twitter unveils the network's new graphic identity. Although the change was announced over the weekend, the social network wasted no time in officially changing the emblematic blue bird on the application to the black X.

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Twitter becomes X: why the change?

In the 90s, Elon Musk founded a payment company called X.com. It was a platform to facilitate instant payments and bank loans. The company eventually merged with Paypal, but its new partners weren't particularly enamored with its X name. Musk was forced to abandon his company's name, but without abandoning the idea of one day creating an innovative application called X, which would facilitate all transactional activities while also being a social network and entertainment tool.

In a tweet, Linda Yaccarino, Twitter's new director since May, explains:

"For years, fans and critics have been pushing Twitter to dream bigger, innovate faster and realize its great potential. X will do all that and more. We've already started to see X take shape over the past 8 months thanks to the rapid launch of our features, but we're just getting started."

X, a not-so-new project

Although the whole world seems surprised by the name change, Elon Musk has repeatedly stated that the purchase of Twitter was simply "a gas pedal to X".

Elon Musk has been imagining X for 24 years. While we admire his determination, there's no guarantee that this sudden change from the blue bird to the cross will bring him the results he's been hoping for. We remain dubious about the strategic approach chosen, and while it's difficult, if not impossible, to anticipate the success (or fiasco) of Project X, it's clear that for its part, Meta must be feasting in advance on the number of Twittos likely to migrate to its new Threads network.

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