Elon Musk’s Twitter a year later: Everything you need to know

Welcome to Elon Musk’s Twitter (now X), the place the principles are made up and the check marks don’t matter.

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO introduced his bid to purchase Twitter in April 2022, zealously pushed to rid the platform of spam bots and shield free speech; now, it’s the one-year anniversary since he made his dramatic entrance to the corporate in October 2022, and the platform has modified a lot that even its title is totally different.

“That is simply my sturdy, intuitive sense that having a public platform that’s maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extraordinarily essential to the way forward for civilization,” Musk said at a TED convention on the day he made his provide. “I don’t care concerning the economics in any respect.”

Even for one of many richest males on the planet, $44 billion is some huge cash to cough as much as purchase a middling social platform. Regardless of his fervent declarations about increasing “the scope and scale of consciousness” via public discourse, the billionaire received chilly toes. A month later in Could, he tried to kill the deal, claiming that Twitter had extra bots than its public filings let on. After a really chaotic authorized discovery course of, which even included some embarrassing texts, Musk was pressured to seal the deal. By October, the platform was his.

Since Musk purchased Twitter and took the corporate personal, the information across the microblogging platform has been a whirlwind, rife with verification chaos, API entry shakeups, ban reversals, staggering layoffs, and most notably, rebranding to X.

Musk additionally transitioned from his position as Twitter/X CEO to serving as its govt chair and CTO. It was introduced on Could 12 that Linda Yaccarino will step in as the next X CEO. Yaccarino left her position as chairman of International Promoting & Partnerships at NBCU.

As X enters 12 months two of Musk’s possession, right here’s a complete timeline of all the things that’s occurred since Elon let that sink in.

Right here’s an entire timeline of what’s happening at X, beginning with the newest information:

March 2024

Elon Musk says certain free users will get access to X Premium features

In a put up on X, Musk mentioned that accounts with greater than 2,500 “verified subscriber followers” will get entry to Premium features for free. Accounts with greater than 5,000 of these followers will get entry to options from the Premium+ tier totally free.

X is apparently testing NSFW adult communities

In line with app researchers, X is engaged on an addition to its Communities function that would let users create groups for adult content. As one of many few social networks that enables NSFW content material, the brand new function might give creators a extra direct solution to attain their viewers.

Elon Musk says all X Premium subscribers will gain access to Grok chatbot

In a put up on X, Musk introduced that Grok will become available to all Premium subscribers. Beforehand, the AI chatbot was solely out there to subscribers of the higher-end tier Premium+ tier.

X usage has fallen by nearly a fifth since Elon Musk’s takeover, according to a new report

In line with a current report from Sensor Tower, X usage in the U.S. was down 18% year-over-year as of February 2024, and down 23% since Musk’s acquisition. The report claims that the U.S. every day lively person base has flatlined or declined each month since Musk’s takeover.

Don Lemon says Elon Musk has canceled his deal for a show on X

Former CNN anchor Don Lemon introduced that Elon Musk has canceled the deal for his upcoming talk show on X. In a press release, Lemon says the partnership was terminated hours after he interviewed Musk for the primary episode of the present. In response, Musk said the present’s “strategy was principally simply ‘CNN, however on social media.”

X to launch a video streaming app on Samsung and Amazon TVs

Persevering with on his promise to make X the “all the things app,” Elon Musk is planning to launch a YouTube-like streaming app for Samsung and Amazon sensible TVs. Musk mentioned the devoted app will permit customers to observe movies from X on bigger screens, just like the Samsung TV and Amazon’s Hearth TV.

X now allows Premium+ users and organizations to publish articles

X Premium+ subscribers and verified organizations can now publish longer posts on the platform. The Articles function lets customers publish posts with textual content formatting, different X posts and embedded movies and pictures — much like a weblog put up or a Medium article. The change comes after X elevated the restrict for lengthy posts to 25,000 characters for paying customers.

X turns on voice call feature that could impact your privacy

Elon Musk launched audio and video calling on X in one other bid to make it the “all the things” app. The brand new function is switched on by default, leaks your IP tackle to anybody you speak with, and may be extremely complicated to determine tips on how to restrict who can name you. Right here’s a step-by-step guide on tips on how to flip it off.

Former Twitter executives sue Elon Musk, alleging owed severance payments

4 former Twitter executives, together with ex-CEO Parag Agrawal, sued Elon Musk, alleging that they’re owed over $128 million in severance payments. The lawsuit quotes Walter Isaacson’s biography of Musk, which quotes the X CEO as saying he would “hunt each single one” of Twitter’s C-suite “until the day they die.”

February 2024

X goes to court in Elon Musk’s war against the Center for Countering Digital Hate

X Corp is in court against the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) after accusing the extremism analysis group of “actively working to claim false and deceptive claims about X” in a lawsuit final 12 months. The nonprofit, shaped in 2018, conducts analysis on social media platforms to trace hate speech, extremism and misinformation. A decide has hinted that the suit may be dismissed.

X says it’s withholding accounts and tweets in India to obey orders

X mentioned it’s withholding specific accounts and posts in India in response to govt orders issued by the Indian authorities. The corporate mentioned it disagrees with the motion, however noncompliance would have subjected the agency to “potential penalties together with important fines and imprisonment.

X will soon let advertisers run ads next to a ‘curated list’ of creators

Advertisers will quickly be capable of run ads next to select content creators on X. The transfer will permit advertisers to make sure that their advertisements don’t run subsequent to controversial or offensive content material, following an exodus of numerous brands from X final 12 months after their advertisements appeared subsequent to pro-Nazi content material.

Sports betting is coming to X with BetMGM partnership

X has forged a deal with BetMGM, making it X’s unique Stay Odds Sports activities Betting associate and can introduce entry to the betting service on X. Initially, X customers within the U.S. will be capable of discover the betting odds on professional soccer, with extra skilled and school sports activities to roll out over time.

X becomes No. 1 app on U.S. App Store following announcement of Tucker Carlson-Putin interview

After Tucker Carlson announced he would be interviewing Russian president Vladimir Putin on X, downloads of the app despatched it to the highest of the U.S. App Retailer in a single day. Appfigures’ early estimates point out X gained 117,000 new downloads on Tuesday, up from 93,000 the day earlier than.

January 2024

X CEO Linda Yaccarino claims company has 90M US users, less than 1% are teens

In the course of the Senate Judiciary Committee listening to centered on children’ on-line security, Linda Yaccarino mentioned that less than 1% of the app’s U.S. users were teens aged 13 through 17. Yaccarino additionally claimed that there have been 90 million X customers within the U.S. — a drop from its reported 95.4 million estimated customers as of January 2023.

X announces plans to hire 100 moderators in Austin

X introduced that it could staff a new “Trust and Safety” center in Austin, which is able to embody 100 full-time content material moderators. The transfer comes greater than a 12 months after Elon Musk acquired the corporate, which noticed him drastically lowering headcount, together with belief and security groups, moderators, engineers and different workers.

Taylor Swift fans strike back after explicit deepfakes flood X

Nonconsensual deepfake porn of Taylor Swift went viral on X, with one put up garnering greater than 45 million views before it was removed. In response, Swifties organized a fandom-driven marketing campaign to bury the AI-generated content material searched below phrases “taylor swift ai” or “taylor swift deepfake.”

X removes support for NFT profile pictures

X quietly eliminated a function for paid subscribers: the power to set an NFT as their profile picture. The function, which allowed Twitter Blue subscribers to set NFTs minted on Ethereum as customized hexagonal profile photos, was initially launched by earlier administration in January 2022. Those that had NFT profile photos nonetheless have hexagonal avatars, although it’s unclear if X will take away these as effectively.

X promises peer-to-peer payments, AI advances in 2024

In a blog post, the corporate claims it will launch peer-to-peer payments this 12 months, to unlock “extra person utility and new alternatives for commerce.” X additionally mentioned that AI can be used to “more and more energy the X person and promoting expertise” in search, advertisements and a forthcoming “See Dissimilar Posts” function.

Journalists critical of Elon Musk had their X accounts temporarily suspended

X temporarily suspended the accounts of multiple journalists, commentators and podcasters who’ve been important of Elon Musk, together with The Texas Observer’s Steven Monacelli, The Intercept’s Ken Klippenstein, MintPress Information’ Alan MacLeod and The TrueAnon podcast. The impacted accounts have been reinstated a couple of hours later.

X brought back, then removed, then brought back again, headlines to link previews

X began showing headlines on the backside of hyperlink preview playing cards once more utilizing a small font. A number of users reported that they might see titles on hyperlink playing cards on the net, with some titles being reduce off as a consequence of character limits. The corporate seemingly pulled the brand new format hours later, however it’s now again.

X launches “Verified Organizations” feature for small businesses

X’s “Verified Organizations” program now has a $200 per month tier supposed for small companies. The fundamental tier comes after X launched the $1,000 monthly providing for companies on the platform.

Fidelity marks down X’s valuation by 71.5%

Mutual fund firm Constancy marked down its investment in X holdings by 71.5% from the unique valuation of shares. Constancy spent $19.2 million to accumulate a stake in X again in October 2022 and made a valuation reduce of 65% a 12 months later.

December 2023

Musk says X is bringing video to Spaces soon

X might be bringing video to Spaces in an try and get customers to additional have interaction with their viewers with out having to go to a third-party platform. Musk mentioned X plans to launch the function by the top of the 12 months, however “actually by early subsequent 12 months.”

Musk brings Alex Jones and Infowars back on X after user poll

Conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and his media website Infowars are back on X after they have been “completely banned” from Twitter by the earlier administration in 2018. 

Musk ran a ballot asking whether or not it was applicable to carry Jones again to the platform. Practically 2 million individuals voted, with about 70% saying Jones’ account needs to be restored.

xAI’s chatbot ‘Grok’ launches to X Premium+ subscribers

‘Grok,’ xAI’s “rebellious” AI chatbot, has rolled out to all U.S. X Premium+ subscribers. Musk cautioned that the beta would face many points, although it could be steadily improved. He additionally mentioned that each one English language customers who subscribe to Premium+ would achieve entry to Grok in “a few week or so.”

X is now licensed for payment processing in a dozen U.S states

Musk is transferring ahead along with his plans to morph X into a payments platform. The corporate in late November was granted three further cash transmitter licenses in South Dakota, Kansas and Wyoming, bringing the overall variety of states the place the corporate is allowed to have interaction in cash transfers to 12.

X says it will chase SMB ad dollars after losing major advertisers

A brand new report by the Financial Times says X will flip to small and medium-sized advertisers to shore up income. This comes after Elon Musk alienated huge manufacturers fleeing the platform over his endorsement of an antisemitic put up.

November 2023

X sues Media Matters for defamation

X filed a lawsuit alleging defamation by Media Issues over claims that main firms like IBM, Apple and Oracle had advertisements seem subsequent to antisemitic content material. 

“The cut up second court docket opens on Monday, X Corp might be submitting a thermonuclear lawsuit towards Media Issues and all those that colluded on this fraudulent assault on our firm,” Musk mentioned.

Musk says X will bring headlines back to link previews

X will reportedly start showing headlines in preview playing cards with URLs on the platform after removing them in October. Musk said an replace will overlay the headline within the higher portion of the picture of a URL card. He didn’t point out any particular timeline for rollout for the replace.

Major X advertisers pause spending after Musk endorsed an antisemitic post

After Musk amplified antisemitic conspiracy theories on X, quite a few high-profile advertisers paused their spending on the platform. They embody: Apple, Comcast/NBCUniversal, Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, IBM, Paramount International, Lionsgate, European Fee, Walmart and as of the time of this replace’s publication, TechCrunch.

X additionally misplaced a high-profile model marketing campaign with Paris Hilton’s 11:11 Media, which might have seen Hilton promoting key X features like reside video, reside e-commerce, X Areas and extra over a two-year interval.

On the DealBook convention, Musk advised advertisers who lately paused their advert spending on X to “go fuck yourself.”  X CEO Linda Yaccarino later publicly backed Musk and his remarks.

X introduces job search tool

In pursuit of turning into the “all the things app,” X is making an attempt to compete within the hiring house. X unveiled its new job search function, the place Verified Organizations can put up job listings that customers can then search via by key phrase and site. X plans for extra updates sooner or later, together with extra subtle filtering instruments, a job suggestions function and the power to bookmark roles.

Ads watchdog files FTC complaint against X over unlabeled ads

X was caught working unlabeled advertisements in September. Now the problem is within the arms of the FTC. Unbiased non-profit Verify My Adverts filed a formal complaint with the FTC urging an investigation over the promoting practices at X, together with the dearth of disclosure about which posts are advertisements.

X changes algorithm to highlight smaller accounts

X’s For You feed usually surfaces in style and trending posts from its broader community alongside highlights from these you comply with. The new algorithm update as an alternative surfaces posts from smaller accounts, based on an X put up by Elon Musk.

X runs ‘timeline takeover’ ad promoting anti-trans film

As a part of a timeline takeover, conservative media nonprofit PragerU promoted the hashtag “#DETRANS” to promote an anti-trans film. In a press launch, PragerU noted that it selected X particularly for its advert marketing campaign “because it is likely one of the least censored social media platforms” after being bought by Elon Musk.

October 2023

X shuts down its Circles feature

On October 31, X shut down Circles, the much-beloved function that allowed customers to put up to a small, unique viewers much like Instagram’s Shut Pals. It stays unclear why Circles was sunsetted a bit greater than a 12 months after its August 2022 launch.

X tests charging $1 per year in select markets

“This new take a look at was developed to bolster our already profitable efforts to scale back spam, manipulation of our platform, and bot exercise whereas balancing platform accessibility with the small payment quantity. It’s not a revenue driver,” the corporate mentioned.

The corporate plans to make use of payment, phone and ID verification to stop bots.

Beginning right now, we’re testing a brand new program (Not A Bot) in New Zealand and the Philippines. New, unverified accounts might be required to enroll in a $1 annual subscription to have the ability to put up & work together with different posts. Inside this take a look at, current customers will not be affected.

This…

— Assist (@Assist) October 17, 2023

A new report claims X traffic and monthly active users are down

In line with data from market intelligence firm Similarweb, X’s world website visitors was down 14% YoY in September. U.S. visitors was down by 19%. Efficiency had additionally declined 17.8% YoY on cellular units within the U.S., primarily based on month-to-month lively customers on iOS and Android.

X now requires users to answer a question before joining private Communities 

Admins of personal Communities on X can now require customers to reply a query once they request to hitch, together with agreeing to the group’s guidelines. The brand new function might assist admins and moderators resolve who ought to be capable of be a part of and provide some safety towards spammers and bots.

X updates Community Notes

A collection of updates have been made to Neighborhood Notes after the fact-checking system took multiple days to correct misinformation associated to the Israel-Hamas struggle. The changes embody:

• X CEO Linda Yaccarino promised Neighborhood Notes would “seem extra shortly on X”
• Notice previews at the moment are supported on each Android and the net, with help “coming quickly” to iOS
• Improved media matching
• Notifications will ship to customers who Preferred, Reposted or Replied to a put up that later acquired a notice

X changes its “Public interest expectations”

X/Twitter eliminated the requirement of getting at the least 100,000 followers for posts to be newsworthy. Previous to the coverage change, solely verified accounts can be thought of for newsworthy posts. Nonetheless, now that X permits people to get verified by paying for a subscription, the brand new model of the coverage says posts solely by “a high-profile account” counts as newsworthy posts.

Nonetheless, the up to date web page doesn’t give particulars on what sort of accounts are thought of “high-profile.”

X can now limit replies to verified users

The brand new management shouldn’t be restricted to paid/premium accounts. Customers who don’t pay for X Premium may select to not let non-verified customers reply to their posts.

The feature originally limited replies to both “Accounts you comply with” or “Solely accounts you point out” in 2020, however customers might solely select this setting earlier than posting a tweet. In 2021, they updated the feature to permit customers to regulate replies after a tweet was printed.

X to test its three premium tiers

X CEO Linda Yaccarino mentioned the plan in a briefing to X debt holders on October fifth.

It’s not clear when the three-tier subscription plan would go reside, but references found in the X app’s code by @aaronp613 reference a “Premium Fundamental,” “Premium Customary” and “Premium Plus” plan, which have full advertisements, half the advertisements or no advertisements, respectively.

X is cutting headlines from link previews

Now you’ll solely be capable of see a picture with the area title of the hyperlink on the underside left, which is straightforward to overlook. The change is a part of Musk’s efforts to get customers to put up “long-form content material” immediately on the platform quite than encouraging customers to click on out of the platform with hyperlink playing cards.

X Corp. faces a trademark lawsuit

Trademark legal professional Josh Gerben and his agency are representing what appears to be the primary consumer to sue X over its trademark — a Florida-based social media advert company, X Social Media.

The complaint, which was filed within the U.S. District Court docket for the Center District of Florida, states that X Social Media, LLC “has repeatedly used the X Social Media Mark in commerce since at the least early 2016,” and has considerably invested in market consciousness, which included creating a particular “X” mark that’s related to its social media promoting providers.

September 2023

X is shutting down its circle feature

“X is deprecating Circles as of Oct thirty first, 2023. After this date, you won’t be able to create new posts which can be restricted to your Circle, nor will you be capable of add individuals to your Circle. You’ll, nonetheless, be capable of take away individuals out of your Circle, by unfollowing them as described under,” X mentioned on its support page.

Audio and video calls will be available to premium subscribers

New code within the X app reveals that each audio and video calls might be supported. Nonetheless, the function will solely be out there to these with an X Premium membership, it seems. The brand new findings have been uncovered by tech veteran-turned-investor Chris Messina contained in the X app’s code.

X may no longer be a free site

In a live-streamed conversation with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, X Proprietor Elon Musk mentioned the corporate was “transferring to a small month-to-month cost” for the usage of the platform. He prompt that such a change can be essential to take care of the issue of bots.

Musk didn’t affirm what the brand new subscription cost would value, however described it as a “small amount of cash.”

X launches account verification

X has launched authorities ID-based account verification by way of a partnership with Israel-based Au10tix for paid customers to forestall impersonation and provides them advantages akin to “prioritized help.” The pop-up for ID verification signifies that the Au10tix might retailer this information for as much as 30 days.

X caught running unlabeled ads in users’ Following feeds

X bans scraping and crawling

The new terms, that are efficient from September 29, ban any type of scraping or crawling with out “prior written consent.”

NOTE: crawling or scraping the Companies in any kind, for any function with out our prior written consent is expressly prohibited.

The earlier model of the phrases allowed crawling in accordance with robots.txt.

Community Notes is now available for videos on X

Neighborhood Notes is an current program for crowdsourced moderation. X introduced that notes by contributors connected to a video will present up in all posts with that video.

August 2023

X will begin collecting user’s biometric data along with education and job history on September 29

“Based mostly in your consent, we could accumulate and use your biometric data for security, safety, and identification functions,” the updated policy reads. X hasn’t specified what it means by biometric data, however it’s normally used to explain an individual’s bodily traits, akin to their face or fingerprints. X additionally hasn’t offered particulars on the way it plans to gather it.

X allows paid users to hide their likes

Paid customers on X now have a setting below profile customization that lets them disguise the Likes tab. The transfer comes after rival social networks Threads and Bluesky rolled out the power for customers to see their very own likes.

X confirms it’s lifting the ban on political ads

X confirmed it’s lifting its ban on paid political advertisements — a transfer it committed to earlier this year, shortly after Elon Musk took over the social community beforehand often known as Twitter. The corporate had initially banned these advertisements in 2019 below then-CEO Jack Dorsey’s administration.

X lures advertisers with a $250 ad credit

The corporate announced it could provide a one-time advert credit score of $250 to pick companies once they spend $1,000 or extra on new advert campaigns over the following 30 days.

X makes changes to retire some of the legacy API endpoints

The corporate mentioned in a post that it’s discontinuing a few of the endpoints whereas migrating others to the brand new v2 API. X additionally mentioned that it’s retiring the legacy Important and Elevated tiers, and clients utilizing them might want to transfer to any of the brand new tiers.

X plans to hide headlines from news links

Musk confirmed the transfer to roll out a brand new solution to show information hyperlinks with none headline or description in a put up, saying the transfer was coming “immediately” from him. The change would “tremendously enhance the aesthetics,” he mentioned.

As of proper now, a Twitter card for a information article exhibits the headline and abstract textual content together with the header picture within the preview card of a put up. If the proposed change comes via, X will solely present the picture with a hyperlink in a put up. Which means if a publication or a weblog doesn’t put up any accompanying textual content with the hyperlink, customers will solely see the hyperlink and the picture for that article.

Elon Musk says the ‘block’ feature is going away

“Block goes to be deleted as a ‘function’, aside from DMs,” Elon Musk wrote on X. “Is unnecessary.” The put up was a response to a Tesla fan account who requested whether or not there was any purpose to make use of block as an alternative of mute.

X now sorts posts by like counts 

Posts, previously known as tweets, nonetheless seem in chronological order on profiles once you’re logged into the social community, however when you sign off, they’re sorted by efficiency.

Our exams present that even you probably have a pinned put up, it gained’t seem on the prime of your profile feed when logged out, which defeats the purpose of a pinned put up.

X rolls out a new ‘Highlights’ tab for paid users

X started rolling out the brand new ‘Highlights’ tab to some subscribers in mid August. However according to the updated support page, the corporate is now making the function out there to all paid customers.

X makes X Pro a subscriber-only

Beforehand often known as TweetDeck, X Professional is now a subscriber-only product. The transfer isn’t completely stunning, as on July 3, the corporate mentioned that inside 30 days TweetDeck can be accessible to solely verified customers. Nonetheless, the social community was delayed in implementing the brand new rule by a couple of days.

X lowers requirements for its creator payout program

The corporate mentioned that creators who’ve garnered 5 million impressions within the final three months might be eligible for advert income sharing. That requirement was beforehand set to fifteen million impressions.

Creators will be capable of withdraw as little as $10 as an alternative of $50, X mentioned. Customers nonetheless should be verified and should have at the least 500 followers to qualify for payouts.

X CEO claims the company formerly known as Twitter is almost breaking even

“I’ve been on the firm eight weeks,” Yaccarino mentioned in her first broadcast interview since taking over her new position. “The operational run price proper now… we’re fairly shut to interrupt even.”

“Our information licensing and API with X is an unbelievable enterprise. Our new subscription enterprise [is] rising,” Yaccarino mentioned. “After which, a part of my, what I might say, experience and expertise, and what I got here to do, was to drive promoting on the firm.”

Video calls are coming to X

CEO Linda Yaccarino confirmed in her first TV interview that video calls might be a brand new function coming to the service, as a part of its transformation into an “all the things app.”

X expands its partnership with Integral Ad Science

The partnership started in January to inform advertisers if their advert is positioned round inappropriate content material. Now, X is testing sensitivity settings, powered by machine studying, that allow advertisers select their thresholds for the sorts of content material they need their advertisements to seem round — and based on a tweet from X proprietor Elon Musk, advertisers can purchase these much less fascinating, “relaxed” sensitivity advert slots for much less.

Manufacturers can cut back adjacency to gore, extreme profanity and obscenity, focused hate speech, sexual content material, medicine and spam. Quickly, X will add its “relaxed” setting, which presents cheaper promoting alternatives whereas solely filtering for focused hate speech and specific sexual content material.

X takes over @music handle, hinting at future music plans

The @music account was initially operated for 16 years by software program developer Jeremy Vaught, who grew the @music deal with to roughly half one million followers. Vaught posted in anger that X had commandeered the account for itself.

“Tremendous pissed,” Vaught wrote on X, sharing a screenshot of the e-mail X had despatched him informing him of the change.

X streamlines Community Notes

The function traditionally offered data to customers about why they have been seeing a truth verify appended to a tweet. After three years of improvement, the corporate says this additional context will now be eliminated for individuals who are already skilled with Neighborhood Notes.

TweetDeck is renamed to XPro

The corporate has adopted the @Professional deal with as an alternative of @TweetDeck for the instrument. Nonetheless, many components of the instrument, together with the assistance web page, nonetheless have “Twitter” and “TweetDeck” mentions. Musk hinted at the change a week prior, including that XPro will include a “wide selection of psy op plugins.” There are not any particulars about what sort of plug-ins these may be.

X now allows paid users to hide their checkmarks

Paid verification was launched final 12 months with the Twitter Blue relaunch. The service was lately renamed to XBlue in the course of the Twitter rebrand to X.

The thought is to assist customers profit from subscription options with out displaying that they’re a verified account. The choice to cover the checkmark will present up within the “Profile customization” part of account settings.

The corporate has up to date the help page for paid subscriptions, saying that even in the event you disguise the checkmark it may be seen in some locations. The corporate didn’t give any additional particulars about these placeholders.

July 2023

Want to change back to the old Twitter app icon on iOS? Here’s how:

• In your iPhone, navigate to the Shortcuts app. When you have a more moderen iPhone, this needs to be pre-installed, but when not, you could find it within the App Retailer. In case your iPhone is working on iOS 12.0 or larger, you’re good to go.
• From the principle Shortcuts display on the Shortcuts app, you’re going to faucet “All Shortcuts.”
• Hit the blue plus signal within the top-right nook of your display to arrange a brand new Shortcut.
• You need to see a prompt motion of “Open App” to construct your new shortcut. Faucet that.
• Now, you’ll be prompted to arrange a brand new “Open App” shortcut. Subsequent to the place it says “Open,” click on on “App” to seek for the X app. Choose that.
• When you’ve chosen the “X” app, faucet the share icon on the navigation bar on the backside of your display. This may carry up one other menu, the place you may choose “Add to Residence Display.”
• Go forward and kind in Twitter as an alternative of “Open App.” Then, faucet the small Shortcut icon subsequent to the place you typed in Twitter.
• Right here, you may add a picture of the Twitter brand. Nonetheless, you most likely don’t have that already saved to your telephone. Simply Google “Twitter icon.” We used this one.

Apple accepts Twitter app’s rebrand to X in the app store

Apple usually doesn’t permit builders to call their apps as a single character, however they appeared to have made an exception.

X additionally modified its App Retailer tagline from “Let’s speak.” to “Blaze Your Glory!!” Musk himself posted a tweet with this tagline with none context.

X opens up its ad revenue sharing program globally

The corporate announced its “Adverts Income Sharing” program is now out there for eligible creators globally. This system, based on posts by X proprietor Elon Musk, goals to offer out $5 million within the first spherical of creator funds.

Twitter is now X

The enduring chicken brand is formally replaced with ‘X’ after Elon Musk introduced the change the weekend of July 22. Notably, Musk x.com now additionally redirects to twitter.com. Musk additionally known as this an “interim” brand, so we’d see one other brand change sooner or later.

The app additionally changed its official handle to @x as a part of the continued rebranding. The unique @Twitter deal with is now inactive, and its bio reads, “This account is now not lively. Observe @x for updates.” Nonetheless, the original owner of the @x handle, Gene X Hwang of the company images and videography studio Orange Photography, confirmed to TechCrunch that the company took over his account without warning or financial compensation, telling him the deal with is property of X.

https://t.co/bOUOek5Cvy now factors to https://t.co/AYBszklpkE.

Interim X brand goes reside later right now.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 23, 2023

Twitter preps a job listing feature 

Twitter hasn’t formally introduced the job postings function but, though some verified organizations have already been in a position to put up job listings below their bios. The job listings take candidates on to the corporate’s web site, the place they will be taught extra concerning the place and submit an utility.

Twitter Notes is back…kinda

Twitter Notes, the function that allows Twitter users to publish long-form content, seems to be again on monitor, based on a post from Twitter proprietor Elon Musk on Tuesday. Musk confirmed the corporate’s plans in response to a person’s tweet which claimed the Twitter Notes mission had lately been rebranded as “Articles.”

On Tuesday, July 18, person @FaustoChou tweeted that Notes had been renamed to Articles, signaling maybe renewed improvement efforts on Twitter’s half. His screenshot confirmed the Notes interface, trying very like it did earlier than, in addition to different unlaunched options, like Twitter Cash. Musk replied to the tweet, confirming Twitter’s plans.

Twitter shares ad revenue with verified creators

Twitter will now pay creators for a share of the advert income earned from advertisements served within the replies to their posts. Twitter Blue subscribers who’ve earned greater than 5 million tweet impressions every month for the final 3 months are eligible to hitch the creator payouts.

In line with Elon Musk, the primary spherical of creator payouts will complete $5 million, and might be cumulative from the month of February onward. These payouts might be delivered by way of Stripe.

Regardless of this system’s important payouts, some creators weren’t completely satisfied — and took their complaints to Twitter proprietor Elon Musk. In a collection of tweets, Musk addressed creators’ considerations over issues just like the types of accounts that were eligible for monetization, rate limits and other issues.

With the announcement of new DM settings, Twitter admits to having a Verified spammer issue

Starting “as soon as” July 14, Twitter will introduce a brand new messages setting aimed toward lowering spam in DMs by transferring messages from Verified customers you don’t comply with again to your “Message Request” inbox as an alternative of your primary inbox. Solely messages from individuals you comply with will arrive in your main inbox going ahead. Notably, these adjustments may also now apply to everybody who has their inboxes open to permit messages from anybody.

Earlier than turning into pay-to-play, Twitter verification indicated an individual was a public or notable determine of some type — like a politician, superstar, athlete, journalist or different well-known particular person. By making the Verified blue checkmark accessible to anybody who bought it, Twitter diluted the worth of verification.

That apparently escalated to the purpose that folks have develop into bothered by Verified customers spamming their primary inbox, once they had set it open to obtain DMs from the blue-badged crowd. In different phrases, Twitter has a Verified person spam drawback.

Twitter blocks links to Threads

Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino is pushing again at studies that Twitter visitors is tanking on account of the July 5 launch of a brand new competitor, Instagram Threads. Nonetheless, on Monday, July 10, customers reported that Twitter appears to be selectively blocking hyperlinks to Threads.web’s web site in Twitter searches, making it harder for anybody to floor conversations on Threads or find customers’ profiles.

Twitter threatens to sue Meta over its new Threads app

Lower than 24 hours after Threads launched, the Elon Musk-owned firm accused Meta of poaching former Twitter staff to create the brand new platform.

“Twitter intends to strictly implement its mental property rights, and calls for that Meta take fast steps to cease utilizing any Twitter commerce secrets and techniques or different extremely confidential data,” Spiro wrote within the letter, which Semafor shared on-line. “Twitter reserves all rights, together with, however not restricted to, the proper to hunt each civil treatments and injunctive aid with out additional discover to forestall any additional retention, disclosure, or use of its mental property by Meta.”

June 2023

Only verified users will be able to access TweetDeck after 30 days from now

After swaths of customers have been unable to access parts of TweetDeck over the last few days, Twitter began rolling out a brand new model of the net app to customers July 3. The corporate additionally added that in 30 days, customers should be verified to entry TweetDeck. This implies solely Twitter Blue subscribers, verified organizations and a few of us who’ve been gifted verification by Twitter will be capable of use TweetDeck come August.

Twitter limits the number of tweets users can read in a day

Twitter is placing limits to what number of tweets its customers can learn because the social media platform suffers prolonged outage that has stymied customers’ skill to trace new posts.

Verified account holders can peruse a most of 6,000 posts every day, whereas unverified customers should take care of a drastically decreased restrict of 600 posts. Newly registered, unverified customers face even tighter restrictions with an allowance of a mere 300 posts per day, based on Elon Musk. (He has since elevated the restrict to 10,000, 1,000 and 500, respectively.)

These learn limits impacted TweetDeck users particularly, reporting main issues together with notifications and full columns failing to load.

Twitter requires an account to view tweets

For those who’re not logged into your Twitter account, or don’t have one, and attempt to view a tweet, you’ll be introduced with a sign-in display. Nonetheless, days later, Twitter silently removed the login requirement for viewing tweets.

When Twitter began imposing the login requirement, Musk mentioned that he took these “short-term” measures to forestall information scraping.

The corporate hasn’t made any official announcement about permitting customers to view hyperlinks once you aren’t logged in or given any particulars on what measures it has taken to cease scraping.

Subscribers can now post 25,000-character-long tweets

The corporate made the change to its Twitter Blue web page right now, indicating the restrict. An engineer at Twitter, Prachi Poddar, additionally introduced the change by posting a long tweet.

Twitter faces a $250 million lawsuit filed by major music publishers

The Nationwide Music Publishers’ Affiliation (NMPA), representing 17 publishers, listed 1,700 songs for which it despatched a number of copyright violation notices to Twitter. The lawsuit, filed in Federal District Court docket in Nashville, says that Twitter didn’t take any motion towards these notices. The publishers’ group mentioned within the submitting that it’s searching for fines of as much as $150,000 for every violation.

The lawsuit alleged that the social community “fuels its enterprise with numerous infringing copies of musical ‘compositions, violating Publishers’ and others’ unique rights below copyright regulation.” It added that, not like its opponents TikTok and Instagram, Twitter hasn’t struck a music licensing deal for the usage of copyrighted music.

Twitter is being evicted from its Boulder office

Court docket paperwork present that Twitter owes three months’ hire to its Boulder landlord, and a decide has signed off on evicting the tech big from that workplace.

In Could the owner took it to court docket, and on Could 31 the decide issued an order that the sheriff ought to help within the eviction of Twitter throughout the subsequent 49 days — i.e. earlier than the top of July. The case quantity is 2023CV30342 in Boulder District Court docket.

As many as 300 staff as soon as labored in Twitter’s Boulder workplaces, however between layoffs, different firings, and resignations, it’s most likely lower than half of that now.

Window to edit tweets is increased to one hour for Blue subscribers

The time restrict to edit tweets has elevated from half-hour to at least one hour for Blue subscribers, giving customers an even bigger window to alter their tweets and proper any typos.

Linda Yaccarino is officially Twitter CEO

Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino formally began her new gig on Monday, June 5, based on a tweet.

It occurred — first day within the books!

Keep tuned…

— Linda Yaccarino (@lindayacc) June 6, 2023

Trust and safety lead resigns

Ella Irwin took over for Yoel Roth, who famously left the company in the course of the early days of Elon Musk’s chaotic Twitter takeover.

Could 2023

Twitter launched Community Notes for images in posts

The newest function is an effort to place extra onus on crowdsourced moderation by permitting customers to deal with situations of morphed photographs or AI-generated photographs throughout the platform the place the photographs are posted. The launches comes days after a faux AI-generated picture about an attack on the Pentagon spread quickly as distinguished accounts retweeted it.

Twitter’s new API tier costs $5,000 per month

Twitter API Professional for startups provides builders the power to fetch 1 million tweets monthly and put up 300,000 tweets monthly, and offers them entry to the complete archive search endpoint.

Twitter Blue users can now upload two-hour videos

Twitter made adjustments to its paid plan, permitting subscribers to add two-hour movies — increasing the previous 60-minute limit.

The corporate additionally modified its Twitter Blue page and mentioned the video file measurement restrict for paid customers is now elevated from 2GB to 8GB. Whereas earlier longer video add was solely doable from the net, now it’s additionally doable via the iOS app. Regardless of these adjustments, the utmost high quality for add nonetheless stays 1080p.

The rumors are confirmed: NBCU’s leader Linda Yaccarino as the next CEO of Twitter

Musk confirmed Yaccarino’s new position in a tweet this morning (Could 12), a day after he introduced that he had accomplished his seek for a brand new CEO.

Elon Musk tweets that he has found a new CEO 

“Excited to announce that I’ve a brand new CEO for X/Twitter,” Musk wrote in a tweet on Could 11. “She might be beginning in ~6 weeks! My position will transition to being exec chair & CTO, overseeing product, software program & sysops.”

Twitter released its first version of encrypted DMs

Presently, this function is simply out there to verified Blue customers or accounts related to verified organizations. Moreover, the encryption function isn’t appropriate with group messages and Twitter doesn’t provide safety towards man-in-the-middle assaults.

Twitter now allows you to react to DMs with emojis

Twitter has launched a brand new function that lets customers select nearly any emoji to react to a DM in a dialog. Beforehand, the corporate allowed you to react to solely the newest DM with solely a choose set of emojis. CEO Elon Musk tweeted that the brand new function is rolling out with the newest app replace.

Twitter is purging old accounts and freeing up desired usernames, according to Elon Musk 

In line with current tweets by proprietor Elon Musk, Twitter is purging inactive accounts which have had “no exercise in any respect for a number of years.”

We’re purging accounts which have had no exercise in any respect for a number of years, so you’ll most likely see follower depend drop

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 8, 2023

Twitter is contemplating a cheaper verification plan for organizations

Twitter is considering an organizational verification plan that doesn’t value $1,000 a month. Over the Cinco de Mayo weekend, Elon Musk tweeted that the corporate is engaged on a less expensive plan for small companies, however didn’t give any particulars about the price.

We may have a decrease value tier for small companies, however have to handle the onboarding of organizations rigorously to forestall fraud.

The $1000/month is supposed for bigger organizations.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 6, 2023

Twitter confirmed Circle tweets were temporarily not private 

Twitter confirmed a safety error that made Circle tweets floor publicly. TechCrunch reported the glitch in early April, however the platform confirmed the problem Could 5 in an e mail despatched to Twitter Circle customers.

“In April 2023, a safety incident could have allowed customers outdoors of your Twitter Circle to see tweets that ought to have in any other case been restricted to the Circle to which you have been posting,” the e-mail mentioned. Twitter claims that the bug has now been mounted, and that the crew is aware of what triggered it.

Twitter makes its API free for public announcement accounts 

Twitter introduced on Could 2 that it’s making its API free for verified authorities or public-owned providers posting about public utility alerts akin to climate alerts, transportation data and emergency warnings. This comes a month after the corporate introduced its new API pricing tiers.

A bug on Twitter causes legacy blue checks to reappear by updating your bio

It doesn’t appear to matter what textual content you’re including to your bio — TechCrunch reporter Amanda Silberling added a couple of areas, then received her verify again for a second. It even confirmed up with the outdated textual content that designates that she is “notable in authorities, information, leisure, or one other designated class,” and she or he didn’t, actually, pay for this. However when you refresh the web page it disappears. In truth, it’s unclear whether or not anybody else may even see your verify briefly reappear.

April 2023

EU warns Twitter over disinformation

Twitter was confirmed April 25 as certainly one of 19 major tech platforms subject to centralized oversight by the European Union’s govt beginning this fall, when so-called very giant on-line platforms (VLOPs) are anticipated to be compliant with the Digital Companies Act (DSA). However the Fee has not wasted any time warning the Elon Musk-owned social community that issues aren’t trying good for staying on the proper facet of the incoming regulation.

In a pair of tweets, Vera Jourova, the EU’s values and transparency VP, warned of “one more unfavorable signal” by Twitter — accusing the platform below Musk of “not making digital data house any safer and free from the Kremlin #disinformation & malicious affect”.

Twitter now shows labels on tweets with reduced visibility

Twitter mentioned that labels might be proven to each authors and viewers. Normally, these tweets will present textual content akin to “Visibility restricted: this Tweet could violate Twitter’s guidelines towards Hateful Conduct.”

The app’s enforcement policy says that tweets with such labels won’t present up in search outcomes, suggestions or timelines — these tweets might be hidden in each the “For You” and “Following timelines. Moreover, there might be no advertisements positioned adjoining to posts with decreased visibility.

Twitter restored Blue verification mark for top accounts, even if they didn’t pay for Twitter Blue

Over the April twenty first weekend, a number of prime accounts (with greater than 1 million followers) received their verification marks again. Nonetheless, a lot of them, together with author Neil Gaiman, footballer Riyad Mahrez, musician Lil Nas X, actress Janel Parrish Lengthy and British TV presenter Richard Osman mentioned that they didn’t pay for the blue badge.

In March, The New York Times reported that Twitter was contemplating handing out a free verification mark to the highest 10,000 manufacturers and corporations. It’s not clear if the corporate is making use of the identical coverage to private accounts.

Twitter removes ‘government-funded’ news labels

Twitter has eliminated “government-funded media” labels on all accounts, from NPR to the Chinese language state-affiliated Xinhua Information. The app even seems to have deleted its web page explaining the “government-funded media” labels.

Twitter sends an email seemingly requiring advertisers to have a verified checkmark

Several users have posted screenshots of an e mail reportedly despatched by Twitter, which states that ranging from April 21, verified checkmarks are required to proceed working advertisements on the platform.

WOW… Twitter is now telling advertisers it MUST subscribe to Twitter Blue or Verified Organisations to proceed working advertisements! pic.twitter.com/4DrDu82Zi0

— Matt Navarra (@MattNavarra) April 21, 2023

Twitter officially kills legacy blue checkmarks on 4/20

With the legacy checks gone, the app may have verification marks just for paid customers and companies, in addition to authorities entities and officers. Now if a person sees a blue verify mark and clicks on it, the label reads: “This account is verified as a result of they’re subscribed to Twitter Blue and verified their telephone quantity.”

Microsoft drops Twitter from its advertising platform

Microsoft is dropping the chicken app from its promoting platform beginning on April 25, practically two months after Twitter introduced that it’ll start charging a minimal of $42,000 monthly to customers of its API, together with enterprises and analysis establishments. The strikes imply customers will now not be capable of entry their account, or create, schedule or in any other case handle tweets via Microsoft’s free social media administration service.

Twitter proprietor Elon Musk threatened to take authorized motion:

They skilled illegally utilizing Twitter information. Lawsuit time.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 19, 2023

Twitter quietly removes policy against misgendering trans people

Twitter up to date its content material moderation pointers relating to hateful content material, eradicating a coverage that prohibited the focused deadnaming or misgendering of transgender individuals. Enacted in 2018, the coverage explicitly acknowledged that it violated Twitter’s guidelines to repeatedly and purposefully name a transgender particular person by the mistaken title or pronouns.

Twitter to label tweets that get downranked for violating its hate speech policy

Twitter plans to “quickly” start including seen labels on tweets which were recognized as doubtlessly violating its insurance policies, which has impacted their visibility. It didn’t say when precisely the system can be absolutely rolled out throughout its community.

Usually, when tweets violate Twitter’s insurance policies, one of many actions the corporate can take is to restrict the attain of these tweets — or one thing it calls “visibility filtering.” In these situations, the tweets stay on-line however develop into much less discoverable, as they’re excluded from areas like search outcomes, tendencies, beneficial notifications, For You and Following timelines, and extra.

Traditionally, the broader public wouldn’t essentially know if a tweet had been moderated on this means. Now Twitter says that may change.

10,000-character-long tweets for Blue subscribers

Twitter’s new function will let Blue subscribers put up 10,000-character-long posts — as if the social community is trying to compete with a rival newsletter platform. Twitter has additionally added help for daring and italic textual content formatting.

Lengthy-form writing can be not completely new. Final June, the corporate launched a program known as Twitter Notes for select writers. Nonetheless, that program was shut down below Musk. After taking on the corporate he also killed newsletter tool Revue, a startup Twitter had acquired in 2021.

NPR, PBS and a handful of other news organizations bail on Twitter as Musk meddles with account labels

A PBS spokesperson confirmed to Axios that PBS had “no plans to renew tweeting” after Twitter gave it a murky “government-funded media” label over the weekend. Just a few other news entities appeared to have adopted swimsuit, together with the distinguished Boston NPR affiliate WBUR, Hawaii Public Radio and LA-based native information supply LAist.

The Australian Broadcasting Firm (ABC Australia), Australia’s Particular Broadcasting Service (SBS), New Zealand’s public broadcaster RNZ, Sweden’s SR Ekot and SVT, and Catalonia’s TV3.cat a were labeled “government-funded media” weeks later.

Twitter partners with eToro to show real-time stock and crypto information

This expands upon the social community’s Cashtag function, which offered information about a limited number of stocks and crypto coins through TradingView data.

The brand new partnership with eToro goes past simply displaying data. It additionally redirects customers to the eToro website the place they will have interaction in buying and selling. For those who seek for a inventory on Twitter, you will notice a button saying “View on eToro,” which redirects to the positioning.

🎉Very excited to be launching a brand new $Cashtags partnership with @Twitter which is able to allow Twitter customers to see real-time costs for a a lot wider vary of shares, crypto & different property in addition to having the choice to speculate via eToro. @elonmusk https://t.co/Iv2q9iNxbf

— eToro (@eToro) April 13, 2023

Elon Musk says he only bought Twitter because he thought he’d be forced to 

Elon Musk gave a uncommon interview to an precise reporter late on Tuesday, talking to BBC reporter James Clayton on Twitter Areas. In the course of the interview, Clayton pressed Musk on whether or not his buy of Twitter was, in the long run, one thing he went via with willingly, or whether or not it was one thing he did as a result of the lively court docket case on the time through which Twitter was attempting to power him to undergo with the sale was going badly.

The reply was that Musk did certainly solely do the deal as a result of he believed legally, he was going to be pressured to take action anyway.

Elon Musk says Twitter will officially remove legacy checkmarks on 4/20

That is the “last date,” he mentioned in a tweet. If the transfer goes via, Twitter may have verification marks just for paid customers and companies, and authorities entities and officers.

Last date for eradicating legacy Blue checks is 4/20

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 11, 2023

Twitter, Inc. is now X Corp.

Twitter, Inc. is now known as X Corp., based on a court filing in California.

Since Twitter is now not a public firm, it doesn’t need to report updates like title adjustments to the SEC. However in any case, the brand new title was noticed in an April 4 doc associated to far-right activist Laura Loomer’s lawsuit towards Twitter and Fb.

“Twitter, Inc. has been merged into X Corp. and now not exists,” the doc states.

Ex-Twitter CEO and other execs sue firm over unpaid legal bills

The lawsuit, filed in Delaware Chancery Court docket, alleged that Twitter has to pay greater than $1 million to the previous executives for authorized payments they incurred whereas on the firm to reply to requests by the Division of Justice and Securities and Change Fee.

Twitter Circle tweets aren’t very private

Quite a few Twitter customers reported a bug on April 10 through which Circle tweets are surfacing on the algorithmically generated For You timeline. That implies that your supposedly personal posts would possibly breach containment to achieve an unintended viewers, which might shortly spark some uncomfortable conditions.

TechCrunch has spoken to a number of customers who’ve additionally skilled this glitch firsthand; many more have reported the glitch of their tweets. Most frequently, evidently Circle tweets are being surfaced within the For You timeline to customers who comply with the poster, however will not be of their Circle. Others have reported that their Circle tweets are reaching even additional than those that comply with them.

A year later, Twitter is now resurfacing official Russian accounts in search results

The Elon Musk-owned platform has resumed surfacing accounts of Vladimir Putin and the Russian Embassy in search outcomes. A former Twitter worker advised the publication that this transfer is probably going due to a coverage change.

Twitter won’t let you retweet, like or reply to Substack links

Twitter is censoring Substack hyperlinks by making the posts inconceivable to answer to, like or retweet. Whereas quote-tweeting works, merely urgent the retweet button surfaces an error message: “Some actions on this Tweet have been disabled by Twitter.”

You didn’t hear this from us, however in the event you hyperlink to a Substack by way of a redirected URL, it appears to put up with out restrictions.

Twitter Blue subscribers will now be shown ‘half ads’ on the platform

Twitter is rolling out further options for Blue subscribers together with displaying 50% of advertisements of their timeline in comparison with non-paid customers and a visibility increase in search.

“As you scroll, you will notice roughly twice as many natural or non-promoted Tweets positioned in between promoted Tweets or advertisements. There could also be occasions when there are extra or fewer non-promoted Tweets between promoted Tweets,” Twitter’s description of the function says.

Whereas Twitter is claiming to scale back advertisements on paid subscribers’ feeds, it’s laborious to show if they’re really seeing fewer advertisements aside from anecdotal experiences.

Twitter singles NPR out with misleading state-backed media label

NPR’s Twitter account on the platform now comes with a tag denoting it as “US state-affiliated media.” However NPR doesn’t meet Twitter’s personal definition for a state-affiliated account:

State-affiliated media is outlined as retailers the place the state workouts management over editorial content material via monetary sources, direct or oblique political pressures, and/or management over manufacturing and distribution…

State-financed media organizations with editorial independence, just like the BBC within the UK for instance, will not be outlined as state-affiliated media for the needs of this coverage.

GET REKT @NPR

Properly finished, @elonmusk 🤣 pic.twitter.com/jvX15QWSf5

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) April 5, 2023

NPR later announced that it’ll now not be posting content material to its 52 official Twitter feeds, turning into the primary main information group to go silent on the social media platform.

Twitter’s verification changes feel like an accidental April Fools’ joke

Musk had claimed that beginning on April 1, blue checkmarks that beforehand indicated that an account was legit, verified and notable can be maintained solely for individuals who have a subscription to Twitter Blue. The change can be a part of a wider push for Twitter to gate beforehand free options, and bundle new ones, below the $8 monthly Twitter Blue subscription, which prices $11 on iOS and Android units.

As quite a few celebrities and companies spoke out to say they wouldn’t pay the $8 payment, it appeared that eradicating so many blue checks can be simpler mentioned than finished. As an alternative, Twitter merely updated the text accompanying a blue verify to make it unclear whether or not somebody was verified for being notable, or for paying for Twitter Blue. In an final act of pettiness, Twitter eliminated The New York Instances’ verification verify when the information big mentioned it wouldn’t pay for verification.

Based mostly on early returns, the revamped Twitter Blue has yet to contribute significantly to Twitter’s bottom line, with simply $11 million generated from cellular signups in its first three months.

March 2023

Twitter announces new API tiers; free, basic and enterprise levels

The three API tiers embody a free stage meant for content material posting bots, a $100/month primary stage and a pricey enterprise stage. Subscribing to any stage will get entry to the Adverts API at no further value. 

Twitter talked about that over the following 30 days, the corporate will discontinue outdated entry ranges, together with Customary (for v1.1), Important and Elevated (for v2), and Premium.

Developers remain unhappy with Twitter’s new API construction.

Introducing a brand new type of Free (v2) entry for write-only use circumstances and people testing the Twitter API with 1,500 Tweets/month on the app stage, media add endpoints, and Login with Twitter.

Get began: https://t.co/CqCRD3vbE5

— Twitter Dev (@TwitterDev) March 29, 2023

Elon Musk says Twitter will only show verified accounts on its “For You” timeline starting April 15

Musk justified the transfer by saying this was the “solely practical solution to tackle superior AI bot swarms taking on.”

Beginning April fifteenth, solely verified accounts might be eligible to be in For You suggestions.

The is the one practical solution to tackle superior AI bot swarms taking on. It’s in any other case a hopeless shedding battle.

Voting in polls would require verification for similar purpose.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 27, 2023

New Twitter accounts now have to wait only 30 days to purchase Twitter Blue

Twitter decreases the wait to buy Twitter Blue for newly created Twitter accounts from 90 days to 30 days.

“New subscriptions to Twitter Blue can be found globally on internet, iOS, or Android. Not all options can be found on all platforms. Newly created Twitter accounts won’t be able to subscribe to Twitter Blue for 30 days. We might also impose ready intervals for brand spanking new accounts sooner or later at our discretion, and with out discover,” the Twitter Blue web page reads.

Twitter to kill ‘legacy’ blue checks on April 1

Twitter introduced that the removing of legacy blue checkmarks will start April 1 for customers that aren’t subscribed to Twitter Blue.

Elon tweeted back in December that the corporate will take away legacy checkmarks “in a couple of months.” After that, customers with legacy blue checks had been seeing a pop-up once they clicked on their checkmark, which learn, “This can be a legacy verified account. It may or may not be notable.” However as soon as Twitter botched this removing of checkmarks, they modified the copy once more — as of now, users cannot distinguish whether someone has a checkmark as a result of they paid, or as a result of they have been deemed notable.

On April 1st, we’ll start winding down our legacy verified program and eradicating legacy verified checkmarks. To maintain your blue checkmark on Twitter, people can join Twitter Blue right here: https://t.co/gzpCcwOpLp

Organizations can join https://t.co/RlN5BbuGA3…

— Twitter Verified (@verified) March 23, 2023

Twitter’s privacy-preserving Tor service goes dark

Twitter’s Tor service, a model of the positioning that might be accessed even in nations the place the social community is banned, has gone darkish after the corporate didn’t renew its certificates, which expired on March 6.

Pavel Zoneff, director of strategic communications on the Tor Venture, advised TechCrunch that the positioning “is now not out there seemingly with no plans to resume.”

Twitter Blue is now available in more than 20 countries

This growth makes the social community’s subscription service out there in additional than 35 nations internationally.

These nations embody Netherlands, Poland, Eire, Belgium, Sweden, Romania, Czech Republic, Finland, Denmark, Greece, Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Slovakia, Latvia, Slovenia, Estonia, Croatia, Luxembourg, Malta and Cyprus.

February 2023

Layoffs continue

Twitter laid off greater than 200 staff in its fourth spherical of cuts, together with loyalist Esther Crawford — the chief govt of Twitter funds who oversaw the corporate’s Twitter Blue verification subscription.

Twitter’s workers is down from about 7,500 staff to lower than 2,000 since Musk.

A lot of hypothesis amongst ex staff that Musk have to be about to put in a complete new regime and that’s why he’s cleansing home. In any other case the cuts don’t make sense. “Arduous to maintain the lights on with the people who find themselves nonetheless left,” one ex supervisor advised me.

— Alex Heath (@alexeheath) February 26, 2023

One of many quite a few rounds of cuts eradicated the platform’s total accessibility crew. Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) known as on Elon Musk to carry the accessibility crew again in an open letter. Markey requested a response by March 17.

Twitter allows cannabis ads in states where it’s legal

After updating its ad policy on February 15, Twitter grew to become the primary social media app within the U.S. to permit hashish promoting. Hashish advertisements will run on Twitter in U.S. states the place hashish is authorized and in Canada.

Twitter delays launch of its new API platform…again

The preliminary date set to chop free entry to Twitter’s API was February 9, which was then prolonged to February 13. Now, the social community has delayed the shutdown once more, this time with no date set.

There was an immense quantity of enthusiasm for the upcoming adjustments with Twitter API. As a part of our efforts to create an optimum expertise for the developer group, we might be delaying the launch of our new API platform by a couple of extra days.

Extra data to comply with…

— Twitter Dev (@TwitterDev) February 13, 2023

The delay jeopardizes the plans of builders and startups constructing instruments across the Twitter API as they wouldn’t have any readability on future spending and funds allocation on the developer platform.

Twitter’s basic tier of its API will cost $100 per month

The corporate initially deliberate to close down free entry to its API on February 9. Now it has prolonged this deadline to February 13. Twitter mentioned that it’ll cost $100 monthly for the essential tier of API. This may get builders entry to a “low stage of API utilization,” in addition to the Adverts API.

We now have been busy with some updates to the Twitter API so you may proceed to construct and innovate with us.

We’re excited to announce an extension of the present free Twitter API entry via February 13. Right here’s what we’re delivery then 🧵

— Twitter Dev (@TwitterDev) February 8, 2023

When builders attempting to hunt readability across the new API guidelines went to the developer forum website, they discovered that the positioning had been put behind a login. The discussion board was lastly accessible 4 days afterward February 13.

Twitter Blue introduces 4,000-character tweets

Twitter introduced the power to put up longer tweets for paid customers on February 8. As an alternative of being restricted to 280 characters, paying Blue subscribers can put up tweets which can be as much as 4,000 characters.

Whereas solely Twitter Blue subscribers can put up lengthy tweets, all customers will be capable of learn them. You will notice solely the primary 280 characters on the timeline, and if you wish to learn extra, you may click on on “Present extra.”

want greater than 280 characters to specific your self?

we all know that plenty of you do… and whereas we love thread, typically you simply need to Tweet all the things abruptly. we get that.

so we’re introducing longer Tweets! you’re gonna need to verify this out. faucet this 👉…

— Twitter Blue (@TwitterBlue) February 8, 2023

Elon Musk claims Twitter will start sharing ad revenue with creators

Elon Musk introduced in a tweet on February 3 that the corporate would quickly start sharing promoting income with creators on the platform for the primary time. He follows up the announcement with a catch: Eligible customers have to be signed up for Twitter Blue.

Payouts have but to reach creators’ wallets.

More monetization pushes: Twitter Blue expands new countries, brings back Spaces curation

Twitter Blue subscriptions at the moment are out there in Saudi Arabia, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal and Spain, making it 12 areas in complete to which customers can subscribe to it as of February 2. On February 8, Twitter Blue extended services further to India, Indonesia and Brazil.

Twitter additionally introduced launching a brand new Areas tab with curated stations for reside and recorded areas, together with podcasts. The social community is making podcasts out there solely to Blue subscribers and “some individuals on Twitter for iOS and Twitter for Android apps.”

Twitter to end free access to its API

Twitter will discontinue providing free entry to the Twitter API beginning February 9 and can launch a paid model, Twitter mentioned because it appears to be like for extra avenues to monetize the platform.

Beginning February 9, we’ll now not help free entry to the Twitter API, each v2 and v1.1. A paid primary tier might be out there as an alternative 🧵

— Twitter Dev (@TwitterDev) February 2, 2023

Every week later and days earlier than the February 9 deadline, Elon Musk mentioned that after getting suggestions from builders, Twitter will provide a write-only API for “bots providing good content that is free.”

Twitter discontinues CoTweets

Twitter announced February 1 that it’s discontinuing CoTweeting, a function that allowed two customers to co-author a tweet. Customers will be capable of view the set of co-tweets for a month. After that, they are going to be robotically transformed to retweets on the co-author’s profile.

January 2023

Twitter partners with DoubleVerify and IAS on brand safety initiative

Because of declining advert income and advertiser exits, Twitter introduced on January 25 that it has teamed up with adtech firms DoubleVerify and Integral Advert Science (IAS) to inform advertisers if their advert is positioned round inappropriate content material. This system, out there first for U.S.-based promoting campaigns, permits manufacturers to research the content material adjoining to — primarily tweets above and under the advert — all kinds of advertisements, together with promoted tweets.

Twitter rolls out its bookmark feature on iOS

The brand new design shows the bookmark button below the expanded tweet view, making it simpler so as to add a put up to your bookmarks.

Earlier than the change, you needed to faucet on the share button to open the sharing card after which faucet on the bookmark possibility to avoid wasting a tweet. Along with the brand new button, as quickly as you faucet on the button, you will notice a banner on the prime of the display that claims “Present all bookmarks.”

The choice is presently seen solely on the iOS app, however we are able to count on that Twitter will roll this out to Android and the net quickly.

Picture Credit: Twitter

Twitter quietly bans third-party clients

After cutting off prominent app makers like Tweetbot and Twitterific, Twitter quietly up to date its developer phrases to ban third-party clients altogether on January 19.

The “restrictions” part of the corporate’s developer agreement was up to date with a clause prohibiting “use or entry the Licensed Supplies to create or try and create a substitute or related service or product to the Twitter Purposes.” Earlier within the week, the corporate mentioned that it was “imposing long-standing API guidelines” in disallowing shoppers entry to its platform however didn’t cite which particular guidelines builders have been violating.

Consequently, third-party Twitter shoppers started offloading their apps from App Stores.

Twitter now offers an annual Blue subscription

Customers now have an opportunity to get a reduction for $84/12 months in the event that they buy an annual Blue subscription on the net.

Twitter Blue, together with the brand new annual plan, is presently out there within the U.S., the U.Okay., Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Japan.

Picture Credit: Twitter

Twitter HQ furniture auctions

In a wierd try and become profitable, Twitter is auctioning off surplus office furniture (public sale is now closed) that it doesn’t want anymore, now that 1000’s of staff have both left the company or been laid off. If you’re quickly shedding advertisers and apparently not paying your rent, why not go for the hail mary?

Twitter makes algorithmic “For You” timeline the default

The corporate has tried to tug this stunt previously, solely to offer the choice to modify again to a chronological timeline after a lot of backlashes.

What’s totally different this time? The Elon Musk-led firm is now displaying each algorithmic and chronological feeds side-by-side. Customers can swap between them by swiping on their telephone screens. Till now, customers needed to faucet on the glint icon within the top-right nook to modify between the “Residence” and “Newest” timelines. Twitter is justifying its newest change by saying that customers can now simply swipe between the renamed “For You” and “Following” timelines.

• January 13: Twitter rolled out the dual-timeline replace to the net however at the moment the social community used to recollect your alternative.
• January 20: The corporate made the “For You” feed default on the net when customers first opened Twitter in a tab or refreshed the web page.
• January 24: Now, Twitter remembers your selections once more.
• February 7: Twitter remembers your selections once more on iOS and Android, too.

Now you can simply swap between “For you” and “Following” on internet. Android coming quickly 👀

— Twitter Assist (@TwitterSupport) January 13, 2023

Twitter’s advanced search filters for mobile are said to be coming soon

In line with social media analyst Matt Navarra, Twitter’s superior search filters for cellular are coming quickly.

Right here’s what it appears to be like like:

NEW! Twitter Superior Search function on iOS is coming quickly 👀👇 https://t.co/ae56yE3JTU pic.twitter.com/xbQUpQJAlS

— Matt Navarra (@MattNavarra) January 4, 2023

Twitter lifts the political ad ban to bolster revenue

The corporate initially enforced the ban back in 2019. At the moment, it mentioned that “political message attain needs to be earned, not purchased.” Twitter charted a unique path from different social networks like Fb and Instagram, which allowed political advertisements.

The corporate’s announcement to carry the political advert ban comes at a time when advertisers have been pulling back spending on the platform, and the corporate has been reducing down its internal revenue projections.

December 2022

Twitter Blue users can now upload 60-minute videos

On December 23, the Twitter Blue page was up to date declaring that subscribers can now add 60-minute movies from the net at 1080p decision and 2GB in file measurement.

Layoffs continue, impacting employees in public policy, engineering

In line with posts on Twitter and LinkedIn from a former public coverage worker on December 22, Twitter reduce half of its public coverage crew.

The corporate additionally laid off some engineers in infrastructure by way of e mail on December 16. Throughout all of Twitter, it’s estimated that about 75% of staff have both chosen to depart or have been laid off since Elon Musk took possession of the corporate in October.

Twitter now displays stock and cryptocurrency prices directly in search results

To entry the brand new function, customers have to simply kind the greenback image adopted by the related ticker image, e.g. “$GOOG” or “$ETH” (minus the quote marks), within the search bar and Twitter will show the present worth. This additionally works with out utilizing the $ image in some situations, however it’s much less constant and doesn’t all the time return the inventory or crypto costs as requested.

If somebody desires to know extra particulars a few inventory or cryptocurrency, they will hit the “View on Robinhood” button.

$Cashtags, now with information 📈

👀 $SPY 👇 pic.twitter.com/XgOK6gf02E

— Twitter Enterprise (@TwitterBusiness) December 21, 2022

You can now see how many people view your tweets

A tweet’s View Depend might be seen to everybody, not simply the proprietor of the account.

“Twitter is rolling out View Depend, so you may see what number of occasions a tweet has been seen! That is regular for video,” Elon Musk wrote in a tweet. “Reveals how rather more alive Twitter is than it might appear, as over 90% of Twitter customers learn, however don’t tweet, reply or like, as these are public actions.”

Twitter Blue for Business now allows companies to identify their employees

Twitter’s product supervisor Esther Crawford said the social media platform is launching a pilot program for Blue for Enterprise with choose companies. The corporate plans to broaden this to extra organizations subsequent 12 months.

We’re launching the pilot of Blue for Enterprise so starting right now you’ll begin seeing firm badges on choose profiles. We’ll quickly be increasing this system and stay up for having extra companies added within the new 12 months! https://t.co/ytnMRO5rcE

— Esther Crawford ✨ (@esthercrawford) December 19, 2022

Twitter goes on an account suspension spree, including prominent journalists

A day after Twitter crafted a brand new coverage to elucidate its choice to ban an account that tracks Elon Musk’s private jet, Twitter also suspended its open source competitor Mastodon from the service.

Throughout the similar day, Twitter suspended quite a few distinguished journalists on the platform with out warning. “Similar doxxing guidelines apply to ‘journalists’ as to everybody else,” Elon Musk tweeted in a reply concerning the journalists’ suspensions.

The corporate seemingly had a glitch that allowed banned customers to nonetheless take part in Twitter Areas. A bunch of the banned journalists began a gaggle dialog on Areas the place Musk himself joined in. Shortly after, the app pulled its Spaces group audio feature briefly.

Twitter shuts down Revue, its newsletter platform

Revue, the publication platform acquired by Twitter in January 2021, sent a message to newsletter writers on December 14 declaring, “We’ve made the tough choice to close down Revue.” Writers had till January 18, 2023 to retrieve their information in the beginning was deleted.

Twitter disperses the Trust & Safety Council

Twitter dispersed the advisory group consisting of roughly 100 unbiased researchers and human rights activists from all over the world. The council members acquired an e mail on Monday, December 12 from the corporate saying that the Belief & Security Council is “not one of the best construction” to get exterior insights into the corporate product and coverage technique.

Elon Musk says Twitter will remove all legacy verifications ‘in a few months’

Twitter will take away all legacy blue checkmarks “in a couple of months,” Elon Musk tweeted on December 12. Earlier than Musk purchased Twitter, checkmarks have been used to confirm people and entities as lively, genuine and notable accounts of curiosity.

This previous week, many blue checkmark holders have been seeing a pop-up once they click on on their blue checkmark that reads, “This can be a legacy verified account. It could or might not be notable.”

Twitter Blue relaunches with new verification process, plus Blue for Business

Twitter is formally bringing again the Twitter Blue subscription on December 12, beginning in 5 nations earlier than rapidly expanding to others. The app updated its terms to specify that users will need to verify their phone numbers earlier than buying the Twitter Blue subscription.

Net sign-ups will value $8 monthly and iOS signal ups will value $11 monthly for “entry to subscriber-only options, together with the blue checkmark,” per a tweet from the corporate account. Twitter Blue became available on Android on the similar worth as iOS in January 2023.

Along with the relaunch of Twitter Blue, the corporate additionally started rolling out a new offering called Blue for Business that provides a gold checkmark to firm accounts.

Twitter’s Community Notes feature is now global

Neighborhood Notes, beforehand often known as Birdwatch, at the moment are seen all over the world. Neighborhood Notes is the social media big’s crowdsourced fact-checking system.

Moderators who’re a part of this system can add notes to tweets so as to add context and customers can then vote in the event that they decide the context to be useful. Previous to this world growth, Neighborhood Notes have been solely seen to customers within the U.S. Twitter added moderators from the U.Okay., Eire, Australia and New Zealand in January 2023.

Twitter announces charging $11 on iOS for Blue subscription to offset App Store fees

When Twitter launched its new subscription plan with a verification mark on November 9, it charged customers $7.99 monthly. In an try and offset App Retailer charges, the corporate is charging iOS customers $11 for the brand new subscription plan — although the Twitter Blue plan is on halt.

November 2022

Twitter’s Community Notes updated to better address ‘low quality’ contributions

The platform’s crowdsourced fact-checking system, Neighborhood Notes, are notes written by customers which can be appended to tweets to offer additional clarification and context.

The Neighborhood Notes algorithm change includes scoring notes the place contributors clarify why a tweet shouldn’t be deemed deceptive.

Twitter announces a new multicolored verification system

Elon Musk declares that Twitter will tentatively roll out a brand new multicolored verification system the place firms will get a gold checkmark, authorities officers will get a gray checkmark and the blue checkmark might be devoted to people even when they don’t seem to be celebrities. Which means the blue checkmark might be used with legacy verified accounts and folk who purchase the corporate’s proposed $8 per month paid plan.

For those who’re confused about all of the checkmarks, you’re not alone. Right here’s a quick guide on what every checkmark and badge means.

Twitter Blue verification chaos ensues

On November 9, CEO Elon Musk floated adjustments to Twitter’s system for verifying person accounts, together with charging $8 per month for it. The social media firm seemingly started rolling out a brand new tier of Twitter Blue, its premium subscription service. In line with a tweet by Esther Crawford, a former product lead, the brand new Twitter Blue plan wasn’t but reside, however some customers noticed notifications as a part of a reside take a look at.

The brand new Blue isn’t reside but — the dash to our launch continues however some of us may even see us making updates as a result of we’re testing and pushing adjustments in real-time. The Twitter crew is famous. 🫡 New Blue… coming quickly! https://t.co/ewTSTjx3t7

— Esther Crawford ✨ (@esthercrawford) November 5, 2022

The corporate additionally launched grey-colored official checkmarks for notable accounts akin to firms and politicians. However inside hours of the launch, Elon Musk killed it. Crawford clarified that the gray “Official” labels are nonetheless going out as a part of the brand new Twitter Blue product.

The brand new $8 Twitter Blue plan started rolling out to iOS customers within the U.S., Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the U.Okay with the one function out there on the time being the blue “verified” checkmark. This triggered a number of fake accounts pretending to be celebrities, manufacturers and in any other case influential individuals to create accounts and unfold misinformation.

The Twitter exodus begins with mass layoffs and exits

Elon Musk laid off 3,700 individuals on November 3, nearly half its workers, shortly after finishing the acquisition. Twitter was sued in a category motion lawsuit in response to not giving staff advance discover of a mass layoff, alleging Twitter violated employee safety legal guidelines.

Every week later, the app reached out to some former staff to return as they have been laid off “by mistake.”

Along with layoffs, a round of executive departures additionally swept via the corporate. In Musk’s first email to his new staff, he talked about ending distant work and making the battle towards spam a precedence.

October 2022

Elon Musk is revamping Twitter’s verification system

Twitter begins overhauling a brand new and dearer model of Twitter Blue, the platform’s paid plan, that may reportedly value $19.99 monthly and provides customers a verified badge. On the time, Twitter Blue value $4.99 monthly within the U.S.

In line with a report from The Verge, the corporate plans to take away verification badges from present holders in the event that they don’t pay for Twitter Blue inside 90 days of launching the brand new verification system.

Elon Musk officially owns Twitter

Elon Musk closed on his $44 billion acquisition of the chicken app on October 27, 2022. The deal got here after months of legal drama, bad memes and will-they-or-won’t-they-chaos. After sealing the deal, Musk took Twitter private and commenced clearing house. On day one, he fired former CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal, basic counsel Sean Edgett and head of Authorized, Belief and Security Vijaya Gadde.