In case you’re a person of the social media service previously often called Twitter, you’re about to see the bluebird of happiness unceremoniously changed with an “X” in your iPhone.
Earlier this week, Twitter Reichsführer Elon Musk rebranded the social media community to X — a single letter that spells the tip of 1 period and the start of one other.
Virtually in a single day, the acquainted Twitter hen was changed with the massive, daring X as Musk turned the web page on what he hopes will turn out to be a brand new “all the pieces” platform just like China’s WeChat — a spot the place he expects customers to conduct all their monetary enterprise.
To Musk, the Twitter title and hen icon don’t convey that message, therefore the rebranding to “X.”
Whereas the Twitter web site bought the brand new branding straight away, app adjustments take a bit extra time to make their approach by means of the App Retailer. As of at present, although, The Twitter app is now X — at the least kind of.
If it hasn’t already occurred, you possible have an replace ready in your App Retailer queue that may change the icon over, changing the recognizable blue Twitter hen which will have adorned your Dwelling Display for the previous 13 years. Nonetheless, regardless of the rebranding, it’s nonetheless the identical Twitter app below the hood, even when it’s not almost as recognizable.
What’s attention-grabbing, although, is that Apple’s App Retailer insurance policies could also be standing in the best way of Musk’s ambitions for world domination. The app could have the “X” brand and even exhibits “X” because the title in your Dwelling Display, however for those who go to the App Retailer, you’ll discover it’s nonetheless referred to as “Twitter.”
As John Gruber factors out at Daring Fireball, Apple doesn’t enable apps to have a single character as their app title. This little tidbit was shared on X by Nick Sheriff, who provides that it will be a historic exception if Apple truly allowed Elon Musk’s X Corp to rename Twitter to easily X.
Nonetheless, that is greater than merely a beauty problem with the title on the App Retailer. It additionally means the app isn’t presently searchable as “X.” In case you try to find it that approach, you’ll see Microsoft’s Xbox app, Xfinity, and a handful of VPN and video chat apps, however no X — regardless of the app now being revealed by “X Corp.”
The newest model of the app additionally has the identical boilerplate launch notes because the previous a number of dozen updates — “We made enhancements and squashed bugs so Twitter is even higher for you.” This nonetheless consists of the Twitter title and makes no point out of the brand new branding.
Like most issues which have transpired with Twitter since Musk took over, the whole transition to X appears to have occurred very out of the blue. We’ve recognized about Musk’s plans to rebrand Twitter for fairly a while, however no person anticipated it to occur as out of the blue because it did, and the brand new Twitter/X app is only one extra signal of it being a rush job, possible pushed out rapidly simply to get the brand new icon in place.
What stays to be seen is how a lot success Musk & Co. may have in convincing Apple to bend its guidelines for the title title. Musk acquired the extremely useful single-letter area title x.com from PayPal six years in the past, and it was naturally no drawback to expropriate the @x deal with from its unique proprietor. Coping with Apple could also be one other matter completely, although.
It ought to have been completely attainable for X Corp to make use of one thing longer, like “X: The Every thing App” with none points, so the selection to maintain it as “Twitter” for now means that Musk could certainly be combating to turn out to be the primary single-letter app on the App Retailer.