Twitter has been among the most popular social media sites to date, spanning millions of daily users since its creation in 2006. Now, it runs rampant with prejudice and injustice due to mismanagement. Nearly 20 years after taking flight, Twitter has begun to lose traction following the descent of its iconic blue bird mascot, which was plucked in July of this year.
On Oct. 28, 2022, billionaire Elon Musk purchased Twitter for 44 billion dollars with the intention of revoking the limitations of speech and censorship to garner a wider audience. To accompany the change in management, Musk poached the iconic bird mascot and opted for a minimalistic X as a new logo and name.
Alongside the altered name, Twitter had its interface stripped of its former bird-related glory and instead replaced with cookie-cutter social media terminology. Tweets have been rebranded to posts, and retweets to reposts.
What if all social media sites were to present themselves in such a matter? Would Instagram be more fittingly called Y, or would SnapChat rebrand to Z?
Additionally, Musk exhibited a hands-off approach to moderation in favor of free speech, and within the 24-hour period following its rebranding, “X” saw a surge of tweets containing racial slurs, anti-semitism, and homophobia.
Musk exhibited no effort to maintain the warzone following his lax moderation towards the community, which is subsequently foaming at the mouth for anarchy. Regardless of personal opinions, there is no excuse to condone a site where people are bombarded with death threats, demeaning words, or are even doxxed.
The immaturity and lack of consideration shown after Twitter’s rebranding may have been partially in the hands of the app itself, but Musk’s incorporation of unnecessary additions that convolute the app stain his portfolio alone.
Formerly, a blue checkmark next to one’s account indicated authenticity; however, on Nov. 9 of 2022, Musk instead implemented the program Twitter Blue to counteract this.
Twitter Blue, which has since become X Premium, offers popular user-requested features that allow in exchange for an eight dollar monthly fee. Bare-minimum features such as the ability to edit posts were thus locked beneath a paywall of 84 dollars a year.
The bleak state of Twitter is only becoming more apparent with every “feature” Musk introduces. With the site’s quality declining as it is, Twitter feels less like a site dedicated to sharing thoughts and more akin to a battlefield.
