After changing his name to X, they took its original owner, who was also its sole proprietor, and offered him merchandise
“I’m afraid I’m not going to die”: A Syracuse University professor’s experience with the WeChat-like platform “X”
He said that he had been looking at other options such as Threads and Mastodon. It’s different now, but I’m still on it. So we’ll see how much longer I’m on there.”
“I’m not sure he has the trust of his user base to get them to use his app to exchange money, or any other form of financial service”, according to a Syracuse University professor.
The company has been called the “everything app” by Musk. Musk and CEO Linda Yaccarino envision the platform becoming a U.S. parallel to WeChat — a hub for communication, banking and commerce that’s become a part of everyday life in China.
After Musk renamed the site to X, it was only a matter of time before the company took over the handle.
Hwang received an email from the company explaining that his account data would be preserved, and he’d get a new handle. It offered Hwang merchandise, a tour of its offices and a meeting with company management as compensation.
“Elon had been kind of tweeting about X previously,” Hwang said. I had an idea that it was going to happen. I didn’t know when.
The First Three Months of Twitter Rebranding: Joey Mcfly, Mitch McConnell, and the New York Yankees
“There is nothing else that exists like it,” says Matthew Quint, director of the Center on Global Brand Leadership at Columbia Business School. Despite apparently being renamed to serve the interests of its owner, X still “serves a purpose as a tool.” Twitter was a go-to source for news, politics, sports, and entertainment—along with misinformation and hate speech. The platform has had tech problems in the last few months. People have more than once gathered to reminisce and mourn the death of Twitter. But each new day, it’s still there. And despite the frustrations, people keep logging in.
During its first week, X staggered along. It was still a place where sports fans chatted about baseball lineups and the Women’s World Cup. It was the venue where video from a US congressional hearing on UFOs trended, and where people speculated about what caused US senator Mitch McConnell to freeze mid press conference.
Unions, meanwhile, used it for organizing, with SAG-AFTRA, which represents performers and broadcasters, posting pictures as members went on strike. The Teamsters celebrated winning a historic contract for UPS workers. Trolls trolled—often about Twitter now being called X. As marketers and journalists debated the effects of the name change, and tweeters (x-ers?) eulogized the bird, the posts continued. In the months since Musk bought the platform, Twitter has proved somehow irreplaceable—even in its battered state.
JoezMcfly, a sports content creator who follows the New York Yankees baseball team, is unsure of how the change will affect them or their communities. Twitter replacements like Threads, he says, aren’t as good right now for real-time analysis and news—the crux of sports Twitter. The fastest way to get news right now is through it. Sure, he also streams on Twitch and makes YouTube videos and podcasts, but those don’t provide the immediacy of X. “I just don’t know what’s going to replace it.”
Source: https://www.wired.com/story/x-twitter-rebrand-dead/
What Has Changed the Approach to X: Towards a CI-powered Everything App on Facebook, Twitter, and Google Play?
X wants to become a global marketplace and platform for payments and messaging with the goal of being an Artificial Intelligence-powered everything app. It is a long shot. We chat in China, and Gojek in Indonesia are some of the countries that already have everything apps. The super-app idea doesn’t seem to have global appeal when built around people entering their financial information. And building out such an app will be a behemoth task.
The platform is in dire need of lost ad dollars and a budget crisis, and the rebrand does not help them. Lax moderation has caused advertisers to ditch X, and Meta-backed competitor Threads is setting itself up as an appealing option for brands. It will take more than a logo swap to woo advertisers. “All that’s effectively happened is the logo has changed and driven people to talk about it,” Quint says. Visits to twitter.com and x.com spiked Monday as the rebrand began, according to SimilarWeb, which tracks website traffic.
