Layoffs & Tech JobsSep 4, 2026·2 min read

Judge blocks X rival from using Twitter name, but allows ‘Tweet’ for now

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1h ago

Judge blocks X rival from using Twitter name, but allows ‘Tweet’ for now

Summary

A federal court in Delaware has ruled on a trademark fight between Elon Musk’s X and a startup trying to launch a rival social network. The startup, Operation Bluebird, originally launched under the name Twitter.now , but the court barred it from using that name, siding with X on the core “Twitter” trademark. However, the court also found that X had likely abandoned two other, related trademarks: the word “tweet” and the Twitter bird logo, making them available to use. Operation Bluebird has since rebranded its website as Tweet.app, using the freed-up “tweet” name, and launched to the public. The story of the Virginia-based startup isn’t really about building something unique; it’s about a company trying to get its hands on abandoned trademarks that X let go of. Even the homepage for the company clearly states its purpose is to go back and pick up what Elon Musk dropped when he renamed the town square as X, and “threw the bird away on his way out,” it says. The effort is headed up by two lawyers, including founder Michael Peroff, based in Illinois, and Stephen Coates , previously a trademark lawyer at Twitter. Notably, the startup is charging users $20 to reserve their handle and join the social network, which likely helps cover its legal bills. Connolly issued a split ruling on X’s request for a preliminary injunction that sought to stop Operation Bluebird from using a series of Twitter trademarks that the startup says X had abandoned since its rebrand. The startup community will gather to answer a pivotal question: How do you build sustainably in the AI era?

From the source

A federal judge temporarily barred an X rival from using the Twitter name, but found that X was likely to have abandoned the “Tweet” trademark and bird logo. The startup has since relaunched as Tweet.app.

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