Twitter: the most accidentally-dystopian rebrand ever?

I was a fairly early Twitter user, I think. I can actually remember the sunny afternoon walking down Boundary Row when our head of digital got me signed up. Back then there was something delightfully light-touch about the whole concept. And I remember thinking that the brand reflected it perfectly.

Instead of long, considered, and often kind-of boring blogposts, you’d get a constant stream of little updates (tweets!) from friends and contacts. All brought to you via the soft chirp of a status update and that little blue innocent bird, so reminiscent of Warner Bros’ Tweety. The name was perfect too. Twitter. The calming, bucolic background noise of birdsong. A sound that has soothed us for centuries, letting us know that all is well (and no predator is stalking us).

What, after all, could be more harmless than a little tweet now and again?

Fast forward (must we?) to a time when countless careers have been ended, reputations destroyed, conspiracies amplified, anxieties multiplied, culture wars fought and at least one major democracy almost brought to its knees by… tweets. Tweets upranked by engagement-hungry algorithms and turned into news by journalists and platforms desperate to keep the clicks coming.

So yes, maybe time for a brand refresh. And the new look, unveiled recently, couldn’t be more distressed, dystopian, cyberpunk, reflecting the relentless, destructive, out-of-control firehose of opinion that the platform now sprays at our world.

Everything about the new brand is torn, imperfect, impermanent — except for that little blue bird, still hanging on like the dream of a kinder, cuter, chirpier world. (And increasingly reminiscent of Fallout’s darkly ironic Vault Boy).

I love the honesty, even if it’s accidental. After all, more and more brand identities are starting to reflect the fact that our world is kind of messed up. But few of those brands have had such a starring role in making it so.

Ironically, all this has come at a time when actual birdsong has had a resurgence. Lockdown helped us hear it. And for many, a time of reflection helped us appreciate how much we need it.

Maybe birdsong’s had a rebrand too? I decided at the start of the year to start paying more attention to twittering, and less to Twitter. I feed the actual birds in the hedge opposite, not the little blue one fronting a dystopian attention machine. It’s a lot less exciting. I feel a lot less important. But it’s a much calmer, kinder little bubble to live in.