A Virginia startup has launched a new social network under the Twitter name, bringing the familiar blue bird back online while a major trademark battle with Elon Musk’s X remains unresolved. Operation Bluebird announced the Twitter.now launch this week after spending months preparing to revive branding that X says it still owns.
The Twitter.now launch comes with a price tag for people who want to get in early. According to the official website, users can pay $20 to become a Founder, which includes early access, a reserved handle, and a numbered Founder badge. People who contribute at least $40 can become Fighters, a status the company says helps finance both development and its legal battle. Operation Bluebird says the paid entrance is also intended to discourage bots and reduce its dependence on advertisers.
The company behind the project is Operation Bluebird, an independent social media startup whose founding group includes former Twitter trademark counsel Stephen Coates. Coates has stressed that the new service is not supposed to simply recreate the old Twitter. Instead, the company says it wants to build a public conversation platform around transparency, trust signals and greater user control over what appears in individual feeds.
One of the biggest differences is a verification system known as Vera. The platform is testing a Gemini-based system designed to analyze claims made in posts and provide information about their accuracy. Operation Bluebird’s own site says its broader Trust OS vision would eventually allow users to control how much lower-trust material reaches their feeds. The company describes the approach as giving users more control without automatically removing speech.
But the Twitter.now launch is also a direct escalation of a legal fight that started before the new network went live. According to Reuters, Operation Bluebird asked the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in December 2025 to cancel several Twitter-related trademarks held by X, arguing that the company abandoned them when the platform was rebranded. X responded by suing Operation Bluebird in Delaware federal court on December 16, 2025.
The dispute reaches back to Musk’s decision to replace Twitter’s branding with X after purchasing the company for $44 billion in 2022. According to Reuters, Musk wrote in July 2023 that the company would “bid adieu to the Twitter brand and, gradually, all the birds.” Operation Bluebird has pointed to that statement and the subsequent rebranding as evidence supporting its abandonment argument.
X strongly disagrees. In its federal lawsuit, X argued that the Twitter brand remains in commercial use and that users still associate the name with its platform. As quoted by Reuters, X told the court, “Simply put, a rebrand is not an abandonment of trademark rights.” The company has also argued that a competing service using the Twitter name could create consumer confusion.
Operation Bluebird believes the law points in the opposite direction. Under federal trademark law, 15 U.S.C. § 1127 states that three consecutive years of nonuse can serve as initial evidence that a trademark has been abandoned. That does not automatically mean Operation Bluebird owns the Twitter name. X can dispute whether qualifying nonuse occurred and whether it ever intended to stop using the marks.
The case grew more complicated during an April 2026 hearing. U.S. District Judge Colm Connolly questioned X’s continued use of the Tweet name and bird logo while leaving questions surrounding the broader Twitter trademark open for additional legal arguments. More recent reporting from Ars Technica says Connolly gave a tentative assessment suggesting X may have surrendered rights to some of the branding. No final written ruling declaring the trademarks abandoned has been issued.
Operation Bluebird decided not to wait. “It’s our opinion that X has abandoned its rights on the Twitter and tweet trademarks,” Coates told Ars Technica. The outlet reported that the service currently has hundreds of users and includes recognizable features such as replies and retweets.
That makes the Twitter.now launch more than a nostalgia play. Operation Bluebird is now operating a live product, collecting payments and using some of the most recognizable branding in social media history while X’s trademark lawsuit remains active. Whether the blue bird has legally found a new home is still for the courts to decide.
