In an unexpected turn of events, UW Platteville’s long-standing student-run newspaper, The Exponent, has decided to do a total rebrand and now call themselves X.
This unexpected transformation has left readers and crossword enthusiasts bewildered as if they have been handed a Scrabble set with half the letters mysteriously missing.
This decision is being seen as a strategic rebranding effort to adapt to the changing media landscape.
In an exclusive interview, the paper’s Editor-in-Chief, Natalie Downie, revealed that the decision to drop the extra letters wasn’t made lightly. “We realized that the world was just too full of letters,” Downie stated in an interview with the Antagonist, “we wanted to make our mark by being a little less verbose.”
The rebranding is causing quite a stir, with readers debating whether this is a brilliant marketing ploy, a practical joke or just a typo that got out of hand. However, the folks at X have assured the Antagonist that it is none of the above. Instead, they claim that the missing letters represent a “silent revolution” in journalism, where less is more, or rather, “X-actly enough.”
While some readers are embracing the change with enthusiasm, others are struggling to adapt. The Antagonist was able to interview the very confused advisor for X, Davey Gelato, who stated, “I’m sorry they did what? When did they vote on this?” Gelato does not hold any voting power. Nonetheless, he continued by stating, “I’m sorry I don’t understand why they would give up almost 130 years of brand recognition to only be called one letter.”
A community member, Stacy Fakename, stated she was now embarrassed to be seen reading a copy of X in public. When asked why, she shifted uncomfortably and said, “I don’t know, it just sounds dirty, like an inappropriate tabloid magazine instead of a respected newspaper.”
However, some are excited about the rebranding. Elongated Muskrat, a local business owner told the Antagonist that, “The name change sounds really cool actually.”
Only time will tell if this rebranding cements X as the future of journalism or if it is just another footnote in the history of quirky marketing stunts.
