Nearly 24 hours after Twitter changed its blue bird logo to a badly cropped image of a dog meme popularized by cryptocurrencies, the company’s billionaire owner Elon Musk still hasn’t offered any explanation or justification for the change.
On Monday, US time, users noticed that the blue bird logo on Twitter’s homepage and loading screen was replaced with an image of a shiba inu associated with the Dogecoin memecoin cryptocurrency. For hours, neither Twitter nor Musk acknowledged the change.
Adding to the confusion, an unrelated bug that appeared around the same time, one of a growing number in Twitter’s user interface, removed the ability to tell which tweets were retweeted on your timeline.
In typical Kasturian fashion, he eventually tweeted a meme and followed up with an explanation that was close to the one he provided: a callback to a joke a follower made in March 2022, suggesting he buy Twitter and replace the logo with Doge.
The official Dogecoin account tweeted in response: “Too much currency. Wow. A lot of coin. How money. So crypto.” An email requesting comment from Twitter’s press office received only an automated response, which has been sufficient for Twitter’s public relations operation since late March.
Some users assumed it was an April Fools’ Day gag, which the company couldn’t pull off in time for April 1.
Others wondered if it was an attempt to spin news about the court case against Musk. The change comes just days after Musk petitioned a court in the US to dismiss a lawsuit filed against him by Dogecoin investors for $258bn over an alleged pyramid scheme.
According to the complaint, the plaintiffs said Musk knew the cryptocurrency had no value since 2019, but encouraged Dogecoin to profit from its trading, Reuters reported in June last year.
“Musk used his position as the world’s richest man to operate and manipulate the Dogecoin pyramid scheme for profit, exposure and entertainment,” the complaint states.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 3, 2023
Elon Musk's Tweets Explain Why He Changed Twitter Blue Bird Logo
In a stunning move, Elon Musk replaced Twitter’s iconic blue bird logo with a cryptocurrency meme on Tuesday. A ‘dog’ meme appears in the top left corner of the Twitter feed homescreen on the web version. It’s the latest change since Mr. Musk bought the microblogging platform for $44 billion last November. He previously tweeted that starting in April, Twitter will only recommend content from paid accounts in your feed, the first screen users see when they open the app.
The ‘dog’ meme as a logo has caused a stir with comments on Twitter.
“Elon Musk changed the Twitter logo to Doze. Fun Tuesday on Twitter?” asked one user. “There’s always some attention-seeking nonsense going on on Twitter. Who cares if it’s a bird or a dog,” said another.
Mr Musk is a supporter of Dogecoin, a cryptocurrency created in 2013 as a joke. Tesla has confirmed that it accepts Dogecoin as payment for freight and that SpaceX will soon do the same.
After its image suddenly appeared on the website’s interface, Dogecoin surged nearly 30 percent, according to Bloomberg.
As more users started asking questions about why he changed the logo, Mr. Musk posted two tweets joking about his move.
One of his tweets shows a ‘dog’ meme driving a car while a police officer checks a driver’s license displaying an ‘old’ blue bird logo.