Twitter is back for real — and Elon Musk isn’t happy about it

Twitter has returned — at least in name. Operation Bluebird, a Virginia-based startup founded by former Twitter general counsel Stephen Coates, has launched a new social network at Twitter.now, attempting to revive the name and identity abandoned by Elon Musk when he rebranded Twitter as X in 2023.

Stephen Coates, who served as Twitter's chief legal counsel before Musk's takeover, founded Operation Bluebird after arguing that X had effectively given up its rights to the Twitter name and related branding. The startup announced its plans last December and subsequently sought rights to the Twitter trademarks.

The dispute quickly ended up in court. X asked a federal judge in Delaware to block the launch of the new social network. During a hearing in April 2026, however, Judge Colm Connolly tentatively indicated that X appeared to have abandoned its intellectual-property claims over the word “tweet,” the familiar bird logo and possibly even the Twitter name itself. The judge has yet to issue a written order, but his comments were enough for Coates to move forward with the launch.

Twitter.now makes a point of distancing itself from Musk’s company, explicitly stating that it is not affiliated with X Corp. The new platform looks and feels much like the Twitter of old, with familiar features such as replies and retweets.

Twitter.now is still in its early stages, with only hundreds of users for now. One of its main differences from the original Twitter is Vera, an AI-powered fact-checking system based on Google’s Gemini that analyzes every post. Coates has been testing it by deliberately publishing obviously false claims to see how the system responds.

Coates says the goal is to recreate a safer online “town square” while allowing people to express themselves without relying on algorithms that reward harmful or inaccurate viral content.

The legal battle is far from over, however. Trademark attorney Josh Gerben thinks that Operation Bluebird may have a workable legal argument, but the case is not clear-cut, and he expects X to fight back now that the new service has launched. For now, at least, the Twitter name is back online — just not where Elon Musk intended it to be.