In his ruling, Connolly wrote that “for all of these reasons,” he believed Bluebird was likely to prove with strict certainty that Company X had abandoned legitimate use of the Tweet trademark and bird logo. The judge therefore denied Company X’s request to block the rival platform’s branding.
New Twitter alternative prepares to rebrand as Tweet.App
Operation Bluebird President Stephen Coates praised the court’s decision in a press release provided to Ars.
“They kept their word,” Coates said. “They released the birds, and they released the tweets.”
“I think this is a huge win,” Dirk Barnhill, Operation Bluebird’s chief marketing officer, told Ars. He confirmed that the competing social media app was immediately renamed in accordance with the court order.
Operation Bluebird had previously launched the twitter.new domain. However, its August 26 launch was not discussed during the court proceedings, meaning the judge did not specifically address how the order might affect competing services using related branding.
Despite the lack of specific guidance, Operation Bluebird has moved ahead with its rebrand. The company announced that “Tweet.App” will become the platform’s new name as it continues developing an alternative to X, formerly known as Twitter.
Some users may temporarily have trouble reaching the newly renamed site. Earlier Thursday, Ars reported that twitter.new was redirecting visitors to tweet.app. At the time of writing, however, the domain had returned to a page using the Twitter name to encourage visitors to claim a handle. Barnhill said Operation Bluebird was working to resolve the technical issue, suggesting that the redirect could be restored soon.
According to the company’s press release, the 172,000 users who have already requested a handle will not lose access or otherwise experience major changes beyond the platform’s new name.
Operation Bluebird aims to create a social media service similar to Elon Musk’s platform but owned by its members instead of billionaires. The Tweet.App website says users can join for $20 and positions the service as an alternative for people concerned about X’s “trust issues.”
Source: arstechnica.com