Elon Musk’s Twitter (aka X) is making more and more changes: A special Bitcoin emoji tied to a hashtag has been removed from the social media platform just as the world’s biggest crypto conference, Bitcoin 2024, kicks off in Nashville. But it appears to be part of a broader move to get away from what Musk recently described as "special hashtags."
Previously, users could type the hashtag “#Bitcoin” and the logo of the biggest cryptocurrency would appear alongside it. That now doesn’t work—and the social media platform’s press office won’t give an explanation.
“Busy now, please check back later,” an automatic response to Decrypt’s emailed questions read.
On top of that, presidential hopeful and recent Bitcoin advocate Donald Trump’s enduring campaign slogan—MAGA (Make America Great Again)—also no longer automatically produces an emoji of the ex-U.S. leader when typed. That one had apparently been part of a paid campaign.
Correct.
I asked that we end special hashtags anyway, as it isn’t obvious that they’re advertising.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 19, 2024
Amid questions around the appearance of the MAGA hashtag emoji last week, Musk tweeted that he had "asked that we end special hashtags anyway, as it isn’t obvious that they’re advertising." Previously, in late 2023, he advocated for removing hashtags from Twitter altogether, though he faced pushback from longtime users. They're still on the platform, as of this writing.
Twitter is particularly popular with the crypto community, as “Crypto Twitter” as it's widely called has long served as the meeting place for the global industry—and the place to find the latest chatter and memes. But broadly, the reaction to Twitter’s move appears to be indifference above all.
“It doesn’t seem like a huge deal,” said Ro Shirole, chief commercial officer at Bitcoin mining infrastructure firm Saxet, who told Decrypt that he believed it may be an attempt by Twitter to get an organization to pay to reinstate such a feature.
“It’s likely X trying to monetize a feature, which makes sense—but people get annoyed when something is being charged for when previously free,” he added. “Since no one ‘owns’ Bitcoin the brand, I don’t know how anyone could pay for the usage of it for an emoji.”
Bitcoin 2024 attendees that Decrypt spoke with in Nashville likewise appeared unfazed. “It’s nice [the emoji], sure, and it’s stupid it changed—but it doesn’t matter,” one Bitcoiner told Decrypt. Another said that although “they were cute,” the Bitcoin fan didn’t ultimately care much.
This isn’t the first time that crypto-related (or at least, crypto-adjacent) emoji mischief has taken place at the social media platform. Last year, the Shiba Inu internet meme emoji replaced the website’s blue bird logo on the X homepage.
Dogecoin, the original meme coin that is based on the meme, surged in price as a result. Elon Musk is a noted Dogecoin fan whose social media antics have previously pumped the price of DOGE, even before Musk owned Twitter.
Since Tesla and SpaceX CEO Musk bought Twitter in late 2022, there has been speculation that the website would be used as a crypto payment platform. Such plans have at least been put on hold for now, documents in June revealed, showing no signs of the long-rumored crypto plans.
Edited by Andrew Hayward