[Update, 12/13/23, 2:20 PM ET: Okay, it seems like links are working again, such as this one.]
If you tried clicking a link on X and got redirected to an error page with spilled ice cream, you’re not alone. It seems that the platform’s legacy shortlink redirection tool, t.co, is broken.
In owner Elon Musk’s effort to completely rebrand every last bit of Twitter to X, maybe the T in the URL was too close to Twitter? I’d guess that the shortlink system is switching over to x.co, but this domain name seems to be available (for almost a million dollars…), and shockingly is not yet a porn site.
Image Credits: X
Or, more likely, X might just be breaking again. How many different ways have we seen the platform crap out after the majority of its staff was laid off? There was the time when a group of journalists were personally banned for sharing links to ElonJet, a bot tracking publicly available data about Musk’s private jet, but the platform was so broken that these journalists were still able to join a Twitter Space, which Musk and his friend Jason Calacanis joined. There were strong words exchanged. The next day, Twitter Spaces was temporarily disabled. Then there was also the time when non-paid, legacy verified accounts could briefly regain their blue check by editing their bio.
Also, since you can’t see headlines in link previews on X anymore, this basically means that we have no idea what anyone is talking about right now. But when have we ever truly known what people are talking about online?
We’re sure they’ll fix this eventually, but for now, enjoy the sad image of fallen ice cream.