Twitter, it’s over… Make way for X. The social network launched in 2006 changed its name on Monday July 24th. Its historic logo, a small blue bird, has been replaced by a white X on a black background. This new graphic identity was projected on the facade of the company’s headquarters in San Francisco, rejoiced on the platform Elon Musk, the instigator of this change. The replacement of the brand is only symbolic for the time being, but it embodies the change of era desired by its new owner, also boss of Tesla and SpaceX. This turning point is accompanied by an ambitious strategic discourse. But the direction Mr. Musk wants remains unclear and the company is in the grip of a deep crisis.
“It’s extremely rare – in life or in business – to get a second chance to make a big impression. Twitter once made a huge impression by changing the way we communicate. Now X will take it a step further and transform the virtual village square,” pleaded on the service Linda Yaccarino, the chief executive called in May to support Mr. Musk. “X embodies the future of limitless interactivity – centered around audio, video, messaging, payments and banking, and opportunities, added the former commercial manager of the audiovisual group NBCUniversal. There is absolutely no limit to this transformation. X will be the platform that can bring you, well…everything. »
This roadmap with boundless enthusiasm takes as its model WeChat, the Chinese application of the Tencent group which assembles a social network, video, e-commerce, payment… Since the takeover of Twitter in October, Mr. Musk has also strengthened the place of short video on Twitter, drawing inspiration in part from the model of the Chinese champion of this format, TikTok. More recently, the network has started to share its advertising revenue with certain content creators, in the hope of attracting influencers who have so far been more present on TikTok, Instagram or Youtube, which are more profitable.
Leak of advertisers
The transition to X also illustrates Elon Musk’s desire to further integrate his social network into his business conglomerate: “X” recalls the name of SpaceX but also of X.AI, the young artificial intelligence company he has just founded in the hope of competing with Google or OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT. The contents of X’s messages will also be used to train X.AI’s software (but no longer those of its competitors). In exchange, the social network will use more artificial intelligence (AI) to suggest videos and texts, or to enhance interactivity, explained Mr.me Yaccarino.
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